Here in the U.S., a big shopping day is coming up in just a couple of weeks, Black Friday. China, however, will be seeing a big shopping event even sooner, this upcoming weekend in fact.
This is Singles Day, which is Nov. 11. It has grown into a major day of online shopping in China. Chinese consumers made billions of dollars worth of online purchases on this day last year.
This big Chinese shopping day could provide some unique opportunities for U.S. retailers. PayPal survey data indicates that the U.S. is a favored online shopping destination among a large majority of Chinese consumers. So, U.S. retailers who have online sales to China could be in a good position to tap into the large amount of online sales activity China sees on Singles Day.
How U.S. retailers that make cross–border online sales to China or do other business in China adjust to the unique shopping landscape of China, including its particular major shopping days, can have big implications regarding their goals for selling in China. Among the things U.S. retailers may want to give careful thought to when looking to take advantage of the opportunities Singles Day could provide include:
- How to best reach out to Chinese customers on this day
- What needs to be done to tailor their outreach efforts to China’s culture
- How to address the concerns Chinese customers can have related to online sales, including the security of purchases, shipping times and shipping costs
As this underscores, there are a variety of opportunities that the Chinese market could present for U.S. retailers. How able a company is to pursue such opportunities and realize benefits from them can be affected by many things. This includes how their efforts to navigate the legal matters unique to doing business in China go. So, having solid guidance when it comes to such matters can be important for U.S. retailers who sell in China.
Source: FierceRetail, “Singles Day 2017 offers new opportunities for U.S. merchants,” Jacqueline Renfrow, Nov. 7 2017