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Archive for the ‘Market Research China’ Category
Friday, August 14th, 2009
With so many people interested in the state of the economy, Alaric Fairbanks this week takes a look at some of the more unusual indicators which may tell us whether prospects are looking up.
Even – perhaps especially – here in Beijing, as elsewhere, not a day goes by without mention of the economy and how quickly it will recover or not. Supplementary to this are the business confidence or climate surveys and their subsequent reports of optimism and pessimism.
These are all very well, and may be a good source of column inches or publicity for a research company. This is all OK with me but, even if reflective of whatever business community or industry sector’s level of confidence, it is perhaps worth thinking about which sources of information are behind, say, agreement with a statement expecting an increase in profit, revenue, headcount, etc.
From examples I have seen, including, I confess, a climate survey we conducted, there is little attention paid to the sources of information upon which these feelings are based. When it does appear, it is usually a choice of ‘respectable’ sources, such as newspapers, journals, or official statistics. Less expected or rational influences are often overlooked and, even if included in the question set, a respondent may not admit to having been influenced by an alternative or informal source.
Of course, it would be great for our business if businesspeople took tailored market research as their main source of guidance for decisions and even opinions, but as this is not always the case, I was curious as to what observations people were making to inform their levels of confidence.
To this end we spoke informally to contacts in the Western business community about any indicators used to reflect on their business prospects. A common theme emerged around indicators being derived from the physical environment, especially through observation. A simple example of an informal indicator was counting or estimating the number of new building sites passed on the way to work – the more new sites, the stronger the economic prospects.
These conversations suggested that observations were aimed at levels of activity. They tended be a mixture of fairly Beijing-specific and the more general. Observed indicators from work and life in Beijing with a perceived positive correlation included:
- The number of properties marked with the character “chai”, indicating ready for demolition.
- Visibility of yellow construction helmets seen at lunchtime
- Levels of air pollution, sometimes with reference to the official air pollution index
- Time taken to get to work
And with a perceived negative correlation:
- Number of unsolicited job applications
- Number of cold visits by salespeople
- Ease of purchasing train tickets.
Interestingly, although not all of these are anecdotally based, they all appear to have some underlying rationale. It would be interesting, at least to me, to look into how effective these indicators really are… but things are fairly hectic here at the moment, what with projects, proposals, etc – another way of showing how things are going right now!
Posted in
China, Economic Downturn, Economic Indicators, Economic Recovery, Market Research China, Statistics, Surveys |
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Friday, July 3rd, 2009
In his latest Thursday Night Insight post, Matt Powell reflects on his experiences working in our China office and the difficulties inherent in conducting business across cultural boundaries.
I recently saw a TV advert from one of the world’s major banks that professes to its excellent local knowledge in every single country. Of course, this campaign has been going for quite some time now as the bank positions itself not as a sprawling, faceless mega-corporation, but indeed as a very localised and personal bank. Whether or not the bank does in fact deliver upon its promise remains to be seen, but the importance of local knowledge cannot be underestimated.
There are many horror stories about corporations naively taking one product or brand that is successful in one country and launching it into a foreign market without first adapting the product or its branding to meet the local culture. Pepsi and Coca-Cola give two sterling examples of ‘how not to do it’.
When Pepsi launched their cola in China, the company thought it would be sufficient to translate their slogan "Pepsi Brings You Back to Life" into Chinese and simply launch the product. Unfortunately, the slogan was translated a tad too literally and instead proclaimed that "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave." Of course, the problem was rectified, but damage had already been done.
Coca-Cola did something fairly similar when launching their product in China; they chose to launch their brand using Chinese characters that read phonetically as “Kekoukela”. Of course, the phonetic spelling sounded similar ‘Coca-Cola’ to a westerner, but I imagine there weren’t many Chinese consumers looking to purchase a refreshing can of “female horse stuffed with wax”. Surely, even just the smallest foray into market research would have highlighted these significant blunders, and saved the companies millions of dollars – let alone the damage done to the brands.
Indeed, in many cases, the same message or piece of information can still cross hazy lingual and cultural boundaries. I myself had an experience when on secondment in our Beijing office, where lingual barriers became slightly hazy to say the least. Each day when finishing work I would order a taxi to where I lived, pronounced ‘Hua Mao’. Every time I asked, the taxi driver would either laugh, shake his head, ask to see a map, or (in one extreme case) make a loud cat-like ‘miaow’-ing noise at me. I knew I was saying the name of the location correctly, so although slightly perplexed at the behavior of the Beijing taxi drivers, I thought nothing of it… until, that is, one day towards the end of my stay when I took a taxi with some of my Chinese colleagues. When I asked the taxi driver to me to my destination my colleagues burst into uproarious laughter – it turned out that for two months I had been saying the words correctly, but pronouncing them with the wrong tonal inflection – and, of course, was asking the taxi driver to take me to ‘cat with flowers’. At least the miaow-ing taxi driver seemed slightly less disturbing after that.
Although it is an amusing story, it does indeed highlight the importance of local knowledge and just how critical the nuances of any language and culture really are. To most westerners, what I was saying and what I should have been saying sounded fairly similar indeed, but (despite me always managing to get to my destination) the difference it made to the local person – the person who mattered – was huge.
At B2B International we, like the large bank, recognise just how important local knowledge is. Every country is different and brings with it a whole set of language issues and cultural traits. We use ‘mother-tongue’ interviewers when conducting international interviews for this very reason; the cultural nuances are critically important in understanding information and indeed any subtle inferences that may be missed by someone who is not completely immersed in that particular culture or language. Indeed, across our three offices we can span the globe from Asia, to Europe, to the Americas.
Our expertise can help our clients in many ways – from conducting multi-country studies in various languages, to conducting in-depth research and analysis in specific countries, to researching new markets to enter. For more information about how we could help your Company, contact a member of research team at our European headquarters in Manchester, our Asian headquarters in Beijing, or our American head office in New York.
Posted in
China, Culture, International Market Research, Market Research China, Matt Powell, Thursday Night Insight |
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Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009
AdAgeChina is adamant that China remains one of the few bright spots for multinational marketers at the present time. After all, with some 300 million urban and upwardly mobile consumers, China can boast the world’s largest numbers of internet and mobile-phone users, as well as the biggest global market for cars, beer and cigarettes.
But it can still be a tough market to crack, and a new white paper from Ad Age – Winning Consumers in China – can help those, particularly in consumer markets, looking to grow their brands in China.
Some top tips from the paper, many of which also apply to b-to-b markets, include:
- Don’t think of China as a single country. According to AdAgeChina, an unbelievable 273 of its cities are each home to more than one million inhabitants, giving you some idea of the tremendous scale of this country.
- Don’t misinterpret the popularity of some Western brands as a desire among Chinese to become Westernized. China is advancing apace and is embracing many Western products and ideas, but it also has a strong identity, a proud history and many unique traditions of its own, all of which must be acknowledged and respected.
- Underestimate local brands at your peril.
- Beware mass media in China. One of the most effective ways to reach consumers in the world’s most populous country can actually be through one-to-one marketing.
The full white paper can be purchased from adagechina.com.
B2B International, with research experts on the ground in its Beijing office, offers some similar tips to business-to-business marketers interested in the potential of this huge country. Our white paper, Marketing and Selling to Chinese Businesses, explores the reasons behind both successful and unsuccessful marketing and sales approaches in China, and can be downloaded here for free. Alternatively, email beijing@b2binternational.com if you would like to find out more from our team in China.
Posted in
Branding, China, Market Assesment, Market Entry, Market Intelligence, Market Research China |
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Friday, May 15th, 2009
In his latest Thursday Night Insight, Alaric Fairbanks gives us a glimpse into his life conducting market research in China.
Our permanent Beijing office has been up and running for about two and a half years now, and over this period I have been asked by both colleagues and clients outside the country about how working in market research here in China is different from in the west, and how it is similar. On a high level, there are obvious similarities: we have to win and design projects, identify respondents and sources of information, collect data and analyse data…the same as my colleagues elsewhere. This is pretty much as you may expect anywhere.
Things get slightly different, however, on the type of projects: For the first two years, the majority of projects were market analysis and market development, with less interest in more quantitative research projects like customer satisfaction. There is, though, more and more customer sat work happening, as clients become more established, and of course we become more established with existing companies. In our experience, market analysis demand tends to focus on both the factual (i.e. size, structure and trends) and the analytical (i.e. what this means for developing sales). These projects tend to feature more qualitative investigative techniques and, in some ways, are more akin to a jigsaw where you first have to find the pieces.
Clients have, in the main, been larger foreign companies and multinationals who already have a presence in China, but the projects are often commissioned abroad. Often this is because the market research function or strategic decision making unit is located in corporate headquarters, although we are seeing a lot more work commissioned from within China itself. Another reason for foreign-based commissions is the need for third party verification (or otherwise) of information coming from their China-based operations. On a practical level, having a large proportion of clients based in Europe and North America means that face-to-face meetings for commissioning and presentations are not so common, and telephone conferences and web presentations form a larger part of communications. This also means that interesting hours are often worked at commissioning and presentation meetings!
As I already mentioned, an increasing number of clients are from within China and other parts of Asia. Again, the overlying characteristics of working with them remain the same i.e. understanding their needs, proposing a suitable methodology, negotiating timescales and price, etc. Where differences occur, however, are in lead times (longer) and very often in the brief itself. We have seen an increase in the number of specific written briefs, but these are still very much in the minority. Another interesting characteristic is how these clients prefer to communicate. After initial contact, many prefer to rely on instant messaging over the internet, mainly qq or similar services, for day-to-day communication, rather than telephone or e-mail. This is also having an impact on research methodologies.
Methodologies for data collection here include all the usual suspects and, language aside, would be largely familiar to clients and colleagues in other countries. There are, though, some differences in application, for example focus groups tend to work better in smaller numbers, 6 to 8 being optimum. It is often argued that, especially in business, face-to-face interviews are necessary here. Very often this isn’t the case. We recently had a project looking at the market in the ‘biosolids’ industry, meaning we had to talk to respondents in Chinese sewerage works. Initially this seemed quite daunting, until it became clear that these people were extremely receptive; no pushy sales people come and call (for perhaps obvious reasons), and they are seldom asked about the intricacies of their work. Recruitment was aided by the incredible take-up of social networking and bulletin boards among Chinese professionals. As a country undergoing rapid change, it is perhaps no surprise that methodologies and attitudes to them are changing too. From a ‘consensus’ of f2f being the only acceptable technique just a few years ago, telephone and indeed online have increased in importance incredibly quickly, with instant messaging even being used for in-depth qualitative work. Whilst respondents are often very keen to work with different approaches, the market outside China and occasionally inside sometimes sticks to believing outdated truisms.
In this short space available, it is clear that although many principles and approaches are of course similar, there are nuances affecting all aspects of the process. Where this may be more complicated or even contentious is around how this is manifested in everyday work, for example the amount of time required on quality checks, and HR issues and administration. I’ll try to cover these in my next post.
To learn more about our work and our team in China, visit www.b2binternational.com/China
Posted in
Alaric Fairbanks, China, Global Research, International Market Research, Market Entry, Market Research China, New Markets, Research Design, Thursday Night Insight |
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Thursday, April 23rd, 2009
A recent article in BtoB Marketing – Thinking global may help U.S. marketers – argues that many emerging international markets still offer rich opportunities for domestic marketers, even in spite of the global economic downturn.
China in particular, is suggested as a market still offering excellent opportunities for U.S. companies. It is useful to note that the country’s premier, Wen Jiabao, last month predicted an 8% growth in China’s GDP this year, which, while not as large as last year’s growth, is still better than that of many countries.
One potential opening highlighted is for U.S. companies that put an emphasis on customer service. They may be able to take advantage of overseas opportunities, as it is suggested that companies in a number of other countries are much less tolerant of poor customer service.
In China, for example, 55% of companies have switched vendors in the past year because of perceived unfulfilled customer service expectations. Sweden (46%), India (44%), Italy (44%), Finland (43%) and companies in Asian countries other than China (36%) all have a tendency to switch vendors more than their US counterparts (22%).
With emerging markets such as China and India having increasing service expectations, there is the assumption that they may not be loyal to particular brands, suppliers, etc. Resultantly, they may be willing to make the potentially lucrative move from their existing domestic partners to foreign counterparts, as long as these new companies can offer them what they are looking for.
To find out how we can help you to grasp the opportunities presented by China and other Asian markets, visit www.b2binternational.com/China
Posted in
China, Global Research, International Market Research, Market Assesment, Market Entry, Market Research China, Market Research USA, USA |
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