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Why Online Marketing For Chinese Manufacturers Is A Key PuzzlePiece

Ever made a jigsaw puzzle?

You spend ages finding the sides and building the frame, and then the fun starts. Countless hours could pass as youtry to find the missing pieces and complete the puzzle.

But what happens if there is a piece missing right from the start?

You don't know, and so you spend all of that time building your puzzle only to be thwarted at the end by not being ableto complete it!

Disaster!

In the same way that just one missing puzzle piece could wreck your chances of building a puzzle successfully,missing out on any important elements from the entire production and sales process could also be very harmful formanufacturers in China who're planning on becoming globally recognised brands.

One such often-missing puzzle piece is online marketing for Chinese manufacturers.

Why is not focussing on marketing as well as manufacture is an issue, and how can changes be made to make surethat it is harnessed correctly? Keep reading as Oxygen 2.0 explores...

The Importance Of Online Marketing For Chinese Manufacturers

As I mentioned, just one tiny missing puzzle piece could ruin a huge puzzle. A manufacture, sales, and brandingprocess only works if all elements are present and correct, and one of the key puzzle pieces here is marketing.

Consider this, you may have an excellent product, great after-sales,and the ability to design and manufacture and stillturn a profit, but if people around the world cannot get to know who you are then how will get any sales?

Because manufacturers specialise in production they can often tend to concentrate their efforts on doing just that. Butwhy would you build a product or products that you are not ready to sell yet?

The only reasonable explanation for being a manufacturer is that you want to create and sell products, and so 50% ofthe whole point of doing this is the selling part.

Whilst it is natural to focus on our strengths, in order to become a bigger global brand there needs to be a change inethos amongst many Chinese manufacturers.

Marketing can no longer be an after-thought following the design and production of your products.

Be Prepared

Before a new product is signed-off for production, the sales and marketing team should get to work to be ready to startmarketing it globally. In this way your company dictates its marketing strategy, and not the market.

When a new product is in the pipeline, you should:

Create a 'source file' containing all of the information, specs, etc about it that are likely to be needed in future

Create its site page (and schedule it to go live)

Write a preview blog that teases readers

Plan other blogs which cover related topics offering advice, but can link back to the product (which is a solutionto the issues discussed)

Create promotional images to be used in blogs, advertising, etc

Create a video or podcast

Decide where you are going to share your blogs and other content to get seen by more foreign prospects

Make sure that you have access to and pages on relevant foreign social media sites (such as Facebook,Twitter, etc)

Research keywords that relate to the product and can be used in content about it to improve SEO

The wide range of tasks that need to be followed is one of the reasons why this can often be a missing puzzle piece.Why? Because it's difficult, and it's made even harder by the fact that everything has to be done in English, not thefirst language in China.

But you can see that by paying attention to this before production you will stand a much better chance of attractingleads and making sales abroad as and when your products are launched, rather than scrambling to catch up andspread the word while there are many units sitting in warehouses waiting to be sold.

However market research can not only help us to devise a marketing strategy, but also to get a better feel for what ishot on the market at the moment.

By deciding where to be marketing our products, it's going to be possible to gain some ideas that could help us tocreate and produce even better products either this time or next time around.For example, doing competitor researchcan help build a marketing strategy, but why stop there?

It may be that by seeing their latest products and their reception (in the West) you can get a feel for what potentialcustomers outside of China are looking for today.

One of the issues that manufacturers in China can face is not having a very broad understanding of foreign customers'mindsets. For instance, how can a Chinese person know how foreign people feel about a type of product when theyhave never been outside of China, and don't speak or read good English?

Luckily it's all there for you in their latest marketing efforts.

Not only will their website tell you what they're producing, their blogs will give you an idea of their keyword strategy forSEO, and the reception of them on social media will serve as a barometer of how popular that kind of product is.Again, this process should be taking place before or during your product launch, and not afterwards.

Why Online Marketing Is Achievable For All

The good news is that, even if you're not familiar with marketing abroad and becoming well-known in other globalregions, the internet can help you.

All you need is:

An internet connection

A PC or Mac

An ability to write in English

Information and images of your products

A website

None of these items are unusual in China, and so in fact you are most likely already prepared to begin marketingonline because the barrier to entry is quite low.

Possible issues are the know-how to start marketing online and the ability to use English.

But overall it's possible to dive deeply into creating content and spreading the word about ourselves in many more

places than the typical Alibaba or Global Sources page that many manufacturers in China rely upon.

Imagine if you could:

Post helpful information exactly where your customers are likely to be

Speak directly to foreign customers

Learn what foreign customers want

Attract more foreign customers to your company

This is what online marketing can do for you.

"How To Get Started With Marketing Abroad?"

No marketing, no sales.

Marketing abroad is hard enough for Chinese manufacturers, but it's as crucial as production. In fact, this key puzzlepiece could make or break your sales even if you have a great product.

How do you create quality content? Is your English good enough? Where should you be active online to be found byforeign customers?

So where do you turn for help?

If you're starting out on your journey to becoming a recognised brand in the West you'll need to do a lot of thingsdifferently, but do you have the necessary time, experience, and staff to succeed with this project?

Oxygen 2.0 is a bilingual Chinese and English-speaking marketing team who have decades of experience in helpingChinese manufacturers become brands and market themselves to the West effectively.

Click below to request a FREE website, branding, and marketing assessment where we will examine yourcurrent situation and offer free advice which your business can use to improve its sales abroad: