Want to launch your beauty brand in China but keep visibility and control?

In this interview I talk to Rob Robertson. He runs Star Brands Asia, they are a total brand partner for China.

They focus on 4D brand creation:

Here are some of the fascinating topics we talk about:

1. Why do some brands struggle in China – have a plan & do your research & FOCUS:

2. Picking your brand partner in China

3. Animal testing changes

4. Hainan

5. Trends

Here I talk to Holly Kim, from Measure China – Measure China helps brands make Data based decisions to accelerate their growth in China.

We talk about a wide variety of topics from C-Beauty, to emerge trends that international brands can capitalise on.

1️⃣Premium Skincare continues to grow exponentially +40% yoy in China and international brands dominate here

2️⃣ Clean Beauty is growing but still remains niche. Consumers are looking for products that don’t contain certain ingredients like Fragrance and alcohol. Cleansing, masks and acne products are the most popular for Clean Beauty.

3️⃣ C-Beauty popular rise is mainly focused on colour cosmetics. The way they spend is different from International brands. Generally very little on R&D as they white label many products and focus on marketing and tech investment

4️⃣ Scalp care

There is a Chinese saying “Your scalp and your hair is one skin” -  if your scalp gets saggy then the skin on your face will also sag 😱 It is becoming an important step in your anti aging routine

5️⃣ Hair care market in general is growing rapidly as consumers increase their level of sophistication and start multi step routines.

If you want to hear more about measure China please contact Holly Kim on Linkedin

https://www.linkedin.com/in/holly-jh-kim/

Do you want to avoid making mistakes you haven’t made yet?

I am sure you do.

Josh Gardner has been operating International brands in China for many years and he is king of an example!

In this episode of my interview series we cover A LOT of ground but two highlights:

1️⃣ 3 tips for working with distributors

     ⏩ TRADEMARK: Your English and Chinese brand name ➕ any nicknames that the Chinese have given you!

     ⏩ EXCLUSIVITY: Very sticky relationship, hard to get out of. Take time to make the decision ! Demand transparency

     ⏩ REFERENCES: Do not skip this step. Talk to distributors current clients to find out their POV.

2️⃣ Success factors and example success stories

     ⏩ Full control, high investment model – Supergoop!

     ⏩ Distributor wholesale model using Daigou, 3rd tier cities and Social selling in wechat groups

     ⏩ Elements of success – brand recognition, consumers talking about you, being sold through resellers on Taobao as well as ample investment.

We talk about so many other topics too – it is packed full of great information. Don’t miss this one!

Do you wonder how to manage your social media in China?

It can be pretty daunting:

All the channels are different 🤯

There are soooo many of them & new ones launching all the time 😳

Here I talk to Olivia Plotnick, founder of social media agency - Wai Social about how to manage this complexity for smaller brands entering China.

She gives lots of great tips. Here are a few highlights:

1️⃣Who is your target. This is crucial to narrow down to the most impactful channels for your brand

2️⃣ Some channels are non-negotiable like We Chat as consumers will always cross reference and need reassurance

3️⃣ Xiaohongshu 小红书 (little red book) is a good place to work with KOLs and to amplify your content through KOCs using product seeding.

4️⃣ KOCs want to be the first to introduce brands and discover them so if you pitch it in the right way you can get good coverage

5️⃣ Don’t overlook Taobao and Tmall – engage with customers there, look at it like a social platform

6️⃣ Instagram and YouTube are blocked but many young Chinese have studied abroad and still get on these channels through VPN. Use Chinese influencers on these channels!

7️⃣ Content strategy and management is extremely important to keep costs down and ensure you can use it across platforms as formats are very different.

8️⃣ We chat private groups are a great way to build a super engaged core community by offering them real value through tips, pre-launches and getting their feedback

Olivia is working with lots of smaller brands helping to build their social tribe in China, optimizing and maximizing their content and budgets.

To get in touch with Olivia add her on Linkedin or visit her website Wai social

This episode of the Clean Beauty Asia interview series is with George Henein - head of business development at IMS, a leading digital transformation agency in China. 

The focus of the interview is IMS’ new health and wellness platform Orghive. 

It gives international brands in Beauty, health food and wellness quick access to targeted Chinese consumers. 

What is Orghive?

Orghive is a Social & Content platform. It’s advantages:

 ✅ Strong purpose to help the Chinese make better, healthier, more informed lifestyle choices

 ✅Curated content and brand selection 

 ✅Gathering consumers who are specifically looking for the best natural and organic options 

 ✅Their scanning app on wechat allows consumers to verify the origin and authenticity of products which in turn gives them access to highly interested user base

 Orghive is not a sales platform it is a way to get your brand to stand out and your Natural/Organic messaging to be given social proof without paying 1000s to KOLs. 

 Who are Orghive’s users?

 Sophisticated Chinese consumers who are looking for a point of view they can trust specifically when it comes to natural and organic products for them and their families.

 Most of their users come to them through their scanning app that uses blockchain technology to allow people to authenticate their products.

 When in the brand’s China Journey should you contact Orghive?

There is no wrong time but if you are starting from scratch you want to build awareness in Chinese market at least 3-6 months ahead of your Tmall launch. Orghive is a good place to position your brand’s credibility in this niche.

 Finally We talked about how long and how much investment it takes to be successful in China:

🥇 Do you have your China trademark? If not, this will definitely slow you down!

🥈 What budget are you able to commit to China in the next 2 years?

🥉 How dedicated are you to making this work – your time and flexibility?

 Orghive is highly curated, targeting consumers who are searching specifically for the best natural and organic products.

 Whilst choosing a highly targeted platform may not be the fastest route, it will allow you to balance investment and return.

 You can burn cash in China to gain quick results (sometimes;) using high profile livestreamers and KOLs but if you don’t have a loyal fan base in the background the success will be short lived 🙀

 So find a way to activate sales whilst you use your budget to build a loyal fan base then you will have a real chance of sustained success.

Here  I am talking to Jack Porteous  from Samarkand Global. Jack is Samarkand’s Client service director. He previously worked at the Department of International Trade for the UK government and for the China British Business council. So has a wealth of experience.

Samarkand have offices in the UK & China and their mission is “To make Chinese eCommerce as easy as selling on your own .com”

We covered a range of topics starting from:

What are the 3 biggest hurdles for foreign Beauty brands entering China:

Firstly, partners - it can be very difficult to find the right fit:

Competition is fierce in China

Animal testing - Jack outlines the very latest info in regards to CSAR and how this will change animal testing.

Samarkand Global are an e-commerce solutions provider for brands. They offer 3 main types of services:

Contact Jack on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackporteous/ or go to Samarkand’s website

This interview is with Mark Schaub from the law firm King & Wood Mallesons. We discuss Trademarking your brand in China, animal testing regulations and trends in the Chinese beauty market.

Mark has extensive experience with the China market and has worked with numerous Beauty brands on their market entry.

The first area we discuss is trademarking for China and why it is important:

🎯 China is a first to file system vs. most western markets where it is a first to use

🎯 Relatively inexpensive to file around 700 USD per category/class

🎯It takes around 12 months to get the trademark – do it early

🎯China is the No1 Trademark country in the world – so there is a lot of competition

No1 Action – check if your trademark is available & file even if you are not ready to enter the market.

Trademarking your Chinese name is also important but that can be done down the track but BEFORE you start to market your brand to the Chinese inside or outside China.

For brands who run into problems where someone has filed their brand trademark already Mark’s advice is it is often quicker and cheaper to buy it back rather than litigate!

For English name trademark you can go through the Madrid treaty route but for Chinese names you will need an agent in China. It is safer to go through an agent for both to make sure there are no issues with classification.

Mark & his team very kindly put together a short presentation on trademarks so message me if you would like a copy of that. I will be happy to share.

If you are wanting to trademark your brand get in touch with Mark and he will refer you to the trademarking department. It is usually a pretty automated and straight forward process so the costs are within the range above.

This week I am talking to Michael Norris from AgencyChina. Michael is a research and strategy manager, he and his team spend a lot of their time conducting fieldwork across China observing first-hand consumer behaviour and preferences.

This gives him a rare and highly valuable insight into the way many consumer sub-sets think and act. 

A few insights that we covered:

GENERAL

💡The extending of the beauty category – beauty from inside out, wellness, gadgets to keep your products at the perfect temperatures

💡Mask factor – Needs to help resolve/avoid maskne (mask + acne) – daily care and emergency response to solve breakouts

INGESTIBLE BEAUTY

💡Ingestible Beauty – long standing tradition in China to use food to strengthen beauty health – skin, hair, nails

💡Smaller brands - can standout using a hero SKU approach to focus efforts and avoid confusion

💡Formats for ingestible beauty market have moved away from basic collagen powders and has rapidly expanded including gummies, fortified foods, hydration – infused waters.

MALE BEAUTY

💡Male Beauty market growing faster than female

💡Products – some consumer groups starting to move from pure cleansing and hydration to more sophisticated products

💡Assortment – bundles is the dominant way consumers like to purchase. But what to put in those bundles requires more research.

💡Packaging – Larger formats, reduce repeat purchase rates.

💡Ease – how to make it easier for consumers to repeat purchase could be a very important innovation

Michael is doing a joint research project in the new year on Male beauty in the China market. This is an innovative way of more brands being able to get access to the research without compromising confidentiality all whilst keeping costs low.

Contact Michael through his Linkedin

This interview is with Byron Constable of Avenue 51. Avenue51 is an online retail solution for selling in China used by more than 100 British brands including Waitrose, Aspinal of London and the beauty brand ThisWorks.

Byron is working on a new project to make entry to China more accessible for smaller beauty brands called 10.10.

The 10.10 project is aimed at brands who want to either test Chinese consumers’ receptiveness to their products or who want to start building buzz as part of their market entry to China.

Avenue51 has a database of 40,000 Chinese consumers who have used their shipping services – mostly based in the UK. These people provide a fantastic way for brands to get their products out to local Chinese consumers who will then advocate for them with friends and family back home (as long as they like the product;).

The idea behind 10.10 is it is an accessible and affordable way to get Chinese people to try your products and if they like them, they post about them on social media so therefore starting to create reference points and conversations for other consumers who may want to buy your products.

In this interview we cover several interesting topics:

If you want to find out more about Avenue51 and how they help brands in China, see their website: https://www.avenue51.com/ or connect on Linkedin with Byron directly.

This interview is with Elisa Harca of Red Ant digital agency. We talk about lots of different topics from which social channel should beauty brands focus on to a key trend they see brands being able to leverage locally which is the “Tribalisation” of Beauty.

In just under 30 mins we packed a lot in! 10 different sections with lots of fabulous tips and tricks that brands in China should look at implementing.

1. SOCIAL NETWORK FOR BEAUTY - LITTLE RED BOOK

2. THREE TIPS FOR LOCALISATION

3. ORGANIC REACH

4. SEEDING APPROACH

5. DAIGOU – PRE MARKET ENTRY

6. IMPORTANCE OF HOME MARKET SUCESSS

7. C BEAUTY

8. LEVERAGING LOCAL TRIBES

9. FINDING YOUR NICHE FOR CHINA

10. TEST & LEARN & TRY - FAST

If you want to find out more about Red Ant and what they do in China have a look at their website: https://asia.redant.com and connect on Linkedin with Elisa directly https://www.linkedin.com/in/elisaharca/.