To have success in Chinese market the companies need to know Chinese consumers behaviour.

In the recent decades, Chinese consumers’ shopping habits have changed dramatically as new products and concepts have entered the China market.

Consumer habits continue to evolve today, and examining generations of consumers can reveal certain shopping trends.

The older generation generally maintains traditional spending habits, middle-aged Chinese oscillate between tradition and new trends, and the younger generation is becoming more Westernized and quality conscious.

Knowing the behaviour of 1,38 billion Chinese is not possible but in this article we want to discuss about some aspect of consumers behaviour in China.

Advertising

Media have a big effect on people in China. Traditionally advertising on TV is so important for introducing the products especially the new products. TV is available for all the people and it is a good mean to aim consumers in midsized cities.

Shopping malls

In China, most people like to go to malls to eat and spend their free time, because of this trend the department store operators have taken advantage of the popularity of their brand to develop freehold shopping malls, leasing the remaining space to complementary retailers.

Retailers especially international investitures plan to open their stores in big cities of China.

List of Brands

Researches had shown that 63 % of the Chinese consumers has a shortlist of preferred brands. It is difficult for them to trust new brands and it is important for companies to enter this list.

In-store marketing

78% of the buyers in China decide in the store what they are going to buy. 37% they’re susceptible to promotions and only 22 % sticks to its original idea before entering the store. Therefore, a good way to convince consumers is to promote products in store.

Show off

For Chinese people is so important the concept of “face”, they like to buy luxury products to improve or to keep their face, even if they have not enough money to pay for housing and to buy sufficient food and clothes.

E-commerce

Chinese consumers already make up almost half of global online retail sales and they are only growing in numbers. Online retail sales amounted to $581.61 billion in 2015.

The volume of online sales in China now exceeds that in the US, and online sales are expected to grow 20% annually by 2020.

Online shoppers are young, urban, and highly educated.

China’s growth in online shopping reflects increasing incomes, higher education, and more sophisticated consumption patterns of the typical consumer.

One of the cause of growing online shopping in China it could be a high penetration of mobile phones in the Chinese urban society (34 % of the urban dwellers in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai intend to buy one in the next two years).

Different attitude

The difference between the regions, on the level of values and attitudes demonstrate that Chinese consumers in the coastal areas have accepted more western’s values and they have become more individualistic than inland consumers, because Inland consumers have more traditional Chinese values and are more collectivistic than coastal people.

So coastal Chinese consumers care more about their own feelings and desires, and less about the opinions or evaluations of other people.

Shopping is not a chore

Chinese consumers think that shopping is an enjoyable conversely of American consumers.

68 percent of Chinese are happy or overjoyed with their shopping experiences, while only 48 percent of American and 41 percent of British people feel the same way.

They enjoy doing their research

Chinese shoppers like to think and search about their shopping more than those from the United States or the UK. In three categories Fashion, Electronics and grocery Chinese are more engaged in each phase of dreaming than Americans and Britain.

Body language

Be careful about body posture and movements. You should always be formal and attentive as it demonstrates self-control and respectfulness.
Give your card using two hands and ensure the Chinese side is facing the recipient.

Always pay attention to numbers and their significance or avoid as appropriate: 8 (luckiest number), 73 (the funeral), 84 (having accidents).

Fonte: a cura di Exportiamo, di Morvarid Mahmoodabadi, redazione@exportiamo.it

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