Are you an ambitious UK online retailer?
Do you sell or are you considering selling online internationally?
If the answer to these questions is Yes, then you’re not alone. Almost half of all the big UK online retailers are selling overseas.
However, there is one marketplace even the large online stores seem to be missing and that’s China.
Despite recent news reports saying China is in economic slowdown its online shopping market is growing. In fact, Information Age reported this month that the Chinese total eCommerce market is predicted to grow by 50% to $6.5 trillion by 2020.
The article also highlighted that WorldPay had reported that 44% of people in China shop on overseas websites. Plus other media reports from the 4th quarter of 2015 also confirmed that Chinese shoppers currently make up a quarter of UK online exports.
China is certainly still a country of opportunity for online retail.
Online Shopping that Appeals to China
So if you’re an online retailer should you expand your horizons to China?
Well UK products that appear popular in China include:
- British clothing, footwear and accessories
- Cosmetics and other beauty products
- UK groceries, food, drink and alcohol
If you’re online shop covers these markets, then you should strongly consider targeting China.
To reach this audience your going to need to cover some key requirements including:
- A dedicated Chinese website
- Authentic quality product range
- High payment security
- Offer full duties calculations
But its worth the investment, because if you foster the Chinese market it will repay you with loyal repeat customers.
Chinese Websites and Marketing
At ExtraDigital we have been working on multilingual web design and marketing projects for many years including Chinese, Russian, French and Arabic markets.
We understand that often these markets have more than one written language.
While the official language of China is Mandarin it has two different written forms, known as simplified Chinese and traditional Chinese. The simplified Chinese is used by people in mainland China and further south, In Malaysia and Singapore. While Traditional Chinese is also used by people in mainland China plus some of the islands such as Taiwan and Hong Kong.
We have created website for both including organising all the necessary translations.
For marketing in China you have to start with SEO, but don’t think Google, its Baidu that’s the top search engine here. But again Asian markets have a much wider range of search engines requiring a more skilled approach to maximise reach.
So if you want to expand your online business interests abroad then come and talk to us and we can help you avoid the pitfalls to reap the benefits of international sales.
Call ExtraDigital +44 (0)330 555 4680
