Sunday, 17 November 2013

Comment: Tmall claims 40% of Information-Obsessed Chinese Ecommerce Market

We’re becoming a bit obsessed by the e-commerce data that that keeps cropping up in various industry magazines and the amazing insight they give

This week fashion industry magazine Drapers is in China, courtesy of market researchers iProspect, and shedding some light on the vast territory and its residents’ online shopping habits.

First off it points out that the top five ecommerce players in China control most of the market, an astonishing 60 per cent. Tmall.com has 40 per cent (possibly by traffic but it could easily be estimated turnover given Tmall-owner Alibaba made £2 billion in just one day last week!), 360buy.com has 14.7 per cent, Suning.com has 2.4 per cent, Amazon.cn has 2.2 per cent and Dangdang.com has 1.6 per cent.

It probably won’t surprise anyone with even a rudimentary understanding of Asian consumer habits that the mobile is the device of choice with 78.5 per cent using mobile devices. But desktops are still high with 69.5 per cent and laptops 46.9 per cent.

Perhaps the most interesting and useful fact in the survey is that 40 per cent of Chinese shoppers actively read and post reviews. This is more than double the number in the US and illustrates one of the interesting aspect of the Chinese ecommerce market we’ve come across: the hunger for data and information.

Shoppers, perhaps more mindful of what they are spending than their American cousins, want to know exactly what they’re getting and are obviously keen to share and encourage others to do so.

Comparing any of the above Chinese websites to virtually any British one illustrates the point instantly. The ordered chaos of Chinese sites compares to the smart, ordered restraint of UK sites.

So let’s pause for a minute to ponder whether the UK model is a good thing. Let’s be honest, British ecommerce sites have largely been driven by the marketing teams in the past whose very nature is very often image-led. How often have you come across a beautiful site only to find it doesn’t do or tell you half the things you need?

If someone has a sudden urge to spend you shouldn’t be leaving any obstacles in their way. So information should be the key as much as, if not more so, than design.

Clearly this depends on the type of product you're selling, but we see no difference between electricals, clothing or lampshades. Anything that is not a book or a CD. The more pictures, the more reviews (good and bad - we all understand that some people just have a bad experience - or a bad day that makes the experience feel worse than it was). And if the product really is bad, well, you most likely shouldn’t be selling it, or you should at least try to clarify in some way why people's expectations are too high and why there is so much disappointment.

Either way, as ecommerce spreads though tablets and smartphones ever further into people’s lives and xonsumers snatch opportunities thoughout the day to browse or buy on mobiles, tablets and PCs, it is time to grab them while you can. A little more information, surely, is never a bad thing.

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