With news that Alibaba’s latest Singles’ Day extravaganza had generated $38.4bn in gross merchandise volume worldwide in only 24 hours, it is little wonder that international brands are clamouring to carve out their own slice of the lucrative Chinese consumer market.
Online retail sales in China totalled an estimated £1tn in 2018, an increase of 24% year-on-year, and that momentum is expected to continue. Chinese consumers are growing in affluence, with 76% of its urban population expected to be considered middle-class by 2022, according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China.
Social commerce is key to...