I’ve posted 6 blogs about China and this is the last one for a while. I am planning my next visit and what needs to be done in order for our agency to succeed in helping Chinese companies market into the United States.
The numbers in China are almost hard to fathom. China has over 500 million that are internet users, over 300 million watch online video, nearly 800 million (http://bit.ly/bPPMqs) mobile internet users. While the CPM model has been dying a slow death here in the United States (and I say thankfully), it is alive and very well in China. Why? Because marketing in China does not need to advance past the CPM model right now.
This is not to suggest that there are not analytics companies in China or that they lack the ability to do deep drill downs of customer data and customer segmentation. It’s simply that there is no need for detailed analytics when the numbers coming into the funnel as the numbers continue to rise as fast as they have in this and in recent years.
When you consider the fact that there are half a billion Chinese on the internet that means that there are 900 million Chinese who are not yet on the web. Granted many of those are located in remote areas and are thoroughly unconcerned about internet access as having electricity and hot water is a much greater concern. But that will change. And as the world flattens (apologies to Tom Friedman) they too will be potentially connected on the web if not on mobile.
Professor Scott Galloway (founder Red Envelope) says that you can get just about everything else wrong but if you get China right you can still be a huge winner. The numbers certainly don’t lie.
It’s the wild, wild, west in China right now with ecommerce and interactive land grabbing reminiscent of the Oklahoma land rush of the 1880’s. An article in today’s New York Times (http://nyti.ms/cMXtUy) reported that a Dr. Oz. type show is being readied for broadcast in China. Also, that there are more than 850 million Chinese who watch television. To have a #1 show in China would result in 80 million viewers. Yet it’s only 1% of the viewing audience. 80 million viewers – that’s close to Super Bowl numbers!
It’s an exciting time and one that offers great opportunities for growth for companies that are ready to step and be counted. After all like I said, in China it’s all about the numbers.
Does this impress you as much as it impresses me?
The Way I See It - Mark Kolier 
Mark, your information is amazing to me. I would think that you would be so limited in what you can do in China but you put a different light on it. Best of luck with it all.
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Thanks for the comment John – before I got involved in this I had a similar opinion. But no longer. American businesses do have a very exportable product – our experience and understanding of best business practices. I hope to bring this to Chinese companies (and beyond China too). It’s fun, exciting and the best thing is it does not feel like work.
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