Do you want to expand your business into the Chinese market?
You need to consider several key aspects of how your website should be adapted for the Chinese market.
China has the world’s largest population and second-largest economy. It is classified as a high- and middle-income country. What’s more, it has the world’s largest e-commerce market, with twice the size of the US. It’s ideal, so don’t ignore the potential of the Chinese market.
To achieve success in selling your products to customers in China, you need to create an e-commerce website that is perfectly tailored to the Chinese market. Pay attention to the following points:
Chinese Internet users seem to have no problem with “clutter” on their websites. This is evident in the loud appearance of many popular sites.
These websites feature large images on their main pages and animated and other eye-catching elements. They have a clearly “vividly animated eye-catching” appearance, which is contrary to what most Western websites try to achieve.
It’s difficult to pinpoint the reason for this fact, considering that China also has websites of major brands whose projects seem to draw from Western standards.
They maintain a “clean” minimalist look, abandoning the general trend of Chinese websites to display as much information and media content as possible in the visible part of the page.
Despite this, most Chinese websites are noteworthy due to their extensive use of content on the site, which is not insignificant for Google, which loves large amounts of unique content and rewards such sites with traffic.
It’s said that Chinese people believe that minimalist websites do not make a good impression on a company. In the opinion of the Chinese, many contents packed onto a website create or rather give the impression that the company has much to offer and is doing well, so it’s worth paying attention to it….
If you want to offer your products in the Chinese market, you should take this into account.
Another key feature of Chinese websites is the large number of links on their pages. These links are usually not added for SEO benefits such as internal linking, but rather due to the specificity of the Chinese language.
Relying on website searches (i.e., searching within a site to find a desired page) was not popular among Chinese users, mainly due to differences in writing some words or expressions (used as keywords) in Chinese. Therefore, websites had to use links to facilitate users finding the content they needed.
Although navigation based on links is no longer necessary, Chinese Internet users have become so accustomed to it that they still use it on their websites.
This has shaped the general behavior of Chinese people who visit a website; instead of using navigation, they search for links to other subpages, so you should take this into account.
Opening subpages in new tabs or windows.
It often happens that Chinese websites open a new tab or window every time a link is clicked. This is actually recommended by almost all Chinese web design specialists. It’s another unique feature that you should remember, as Chinese Internet users usually expect the original page from which they started navigating through the site to remain open so they can quickly return to it without having to click on back buttons in their browser.
Not necessarily the most effective way of browsing websites, but Chinese people love it. Therefore, it would be highly unwise to try to break this norm, as it could only drive visitors away from your website, resulting in lost sales or ad revenue.
SEO for Baidu
This is a very important fact that every entrepreneur who wants their e-commerce website or website to appear in China should know. In China, Google does not exist practically… Optimization based on search engines is based on the Chinese equivalent of Google – Baidu. Here are some key points to consider when optimizing for Baidu:
1. Don’t buy a domain with a lower level
Baidu reportedly prefers top-level domains, e.g., .cn.
2. Don’t buy a subdomain for your blog
In most Western business websites, there is often a section for blogs. In the Western world, such a subdomain is filled with content that can improve optimization for Google and attract traffic from this search engine. However, in the case of Baidu, creating a subdomain (e.g., blog.mojastrona.cn) for blogging may result in the website being penalized.
3. Buy hosting in China located on Chinese servers in a Chinese data center located within China
China has a policy of controlling its own Internet, and part of it is the requirement that all websites must be hosted in China. If you can’t do this, forget about creating a website for the Chinese market.
4. Be careful with censorship
The fact that China censors its Internet is already well-known. So make sure that the content published on your website does not contradict the country’s political specificity.
In addition to Baidu, there are several other search engines in China, but their share of the market is minimal.
Make sure your website loads quickly and only uses Chinese language. Regularly publish new content, use Chinese-language meta tags, etc.
If you don’t have someone experienced in the Chinese language on your team, you’ll need to use translation services, preferably with experience and a documented history, which is called localization of websites.
Your website must be connected to WeChat
WeChat is the most popular social networking service in China, offering many different services. Almost all successful Chinese companies use WeChat, especially when it comes to using QR codes to facilitate subscription, purchases, access to information, and other actions.
That’s why most Chinese websites display a QR code on their main pages or on other pages with so-called calls to action. Most online shoppers in China use WeChat, so it would be a big mistake not to integrate it into your website or e-commerce site.
Opening a WeChat account will not be easy for companies outside of China. However, you should make an effort to create one to avoid being left out when reaching the Chinese market. Chinese intermediaries may help in this regard.
In summary
If you want to take advantage of the enormous Chinese e-commerce market, you need to change your way of thinking about building an e-commerce website or website after a European model.
