DATA POINTS: How to touch the unmoved Chinese shopper

Gone are the days when significant growth can be achieved by just building a large distribution footprint across more and more cities. The battle to convert the shopper into a buyer is intensifying as the shopper becomes more adept at ignoring conventional promotions, rejecting point-of-sale strategies, taking cues from the surroundings to jostle for freebies or perks.

For the first time, key cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu) saw a decrease in spending -1.9% in Q1 2014, mainly due to a reduction in growth of basket size. In this new economic context, marketers have to work harder to get a share of an increasingly smaller basket size.

Key recommendations in the report include: knowing the epicenter of each shopper continuum, defined as the moment in the 'pre-tail', retail and 'post-tail' stage when the shopper decides to make a purchase; leverage retailers' CRM programs to deliver targeted branded content; create 'shoppertainment' excitement and interactivity inside the usual retail environments.

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