Chinese consumers prefer online shopping, finds report

E-commerce has been identified as the preferred shopping channel for Chinese consumers, according to a recent report. Mobile e-commerce is driving the growth of online shopping, as customers can easily access shopping platforms anywhere and at any time. Further, it is seen that the Chinese consumers are becoming more conscious about branding and quality.

Around 36 per cent of the surveyed adults choose to shop from pure online players, with Tmall and Taobao, the preferred online destinations, said the report, ProsperChina Quarterly Survey—the largest online survey of consumers in China.

Taobao is China’s largest online consumer-to-consumer (C2C) platform. It has one of the lowest net promoter scores (NPS)—a measure of customer experience and a proxy that helps predict business growth—with a value of -32. Chinese consumers’ preference for branding and quality is one of the reasons for the low score, as well as the fact that Taobao’s main customers fall into the lower-income group. Taobao has positioned itself as a marketplace for the mass market.

"Of the surveyed, 51.5 per cent cared about branding and 45.6 per cent cared about the quality of the product, versus 40.9 per cent who considered price as a factor in their purchase decision," the report said.
Tmall is the largest business-to-consumer (B2C) platform in China and attracts high-value customers, the report stated. It is the preferred e-commerce site among both the high-income group and people born in the 1980s. The e-commerce group has positioned itself as a higher-end marketplace.

"With both Taobao and Tmall in its portfolio, Alibaba is considered an e-commerce powerhouse. The two platforms are complementary—one captures the low-price consumer (Taobao), while the other (Tmall) increasingly differentiates on quality and branding and captures the high-price consumer. With the ongoing upgrade of Chinese consumption, Tmall is better positioned for sustained growth, but one cannot rule out Taobao with its low-value proposition," the report said.