Breaking into the Chinese ice-cream market - an untapped

business opportunity

-overview: a thriving/burgeoning arena for commercial

dealings; growing affluence: increased spending
power and per-capita income levels; increase in
disposable income has brought about a shift in
favor of branded and packaged food; wider
acceptance of new products.

-entry mode decisions:

1. setting a price: target profit margin, sales

volume, product differentiation advantage,
type of customer you wish to attract?
2. marketing the product nationally or in one/two
selected cities: expansion of a business isn’t
something to take on without careful
understanding of the pitfalls of growing too
fast.
3. local joint-venture partner: (plus side) helps
you bypass some regulations for newcomers
(trade barriers); low risk factor: fairly easy to
pull the plug on the JV should business not
prove to be as successful as hoped; may have
a sound customer base. (negative side) due
diligence on a foreign partner is harder, will
they choose appropriate sale channels?
4. advertising: whoever understands the
customer best wins.
Digital Advertising in China is far different from what you’re used to in other
countries. The entire digital landscape is much more fragmented, with users jumping
from app to app and ecosystem to ecosystem making it difficult to track users
effectively. China is also dominated by mobiles so that should come first! As for social
media, WeChat and Weibo are the most popular, but in reality there are hundreds if not
thousands of social media platforms. Search engine advertising can be incredibly
powerful as well. Unlike countries like the US and United Kingdom, Chinese
consumers do not have a huge aversion to clicking ads on search engines. However,
Chinese search engines do feature a lot of advertising in search results, making
competition higher than what you’re used to on Google.