I was originally asked to prepare a piece to share thoughts and experiences on our work in China with that of colleagues in Europe and the US, and this post revisits the piece I did a few weeks ago on www.b2binternational.com.
After two and a half years being back in Beijing permanently, there are obvious similarities between our work here and that of colleagues, ad fellow researchers in other markets: we have to win and design projects, identify respondents and sources of information, collect data and analyse data, the same as my colleagues elsewhere. This is pretty much as you may expect anywhere.
Things get slightly different, however, on the type of projects: for the first two years the majority of projects have been market analysis and market development, with less interest in more quantitative projects like customer satisfaction. There is though more and more customer satisfaction work, as clients become more established, and of course we become more established with existing companies. In our experience market analysis tends to focus on both the factual (size, structure and trends), and the analytical, i.e. what does it all mean for developing sales. These projects tend to feature more qualitative investigative techniques and in some ways are more akin to a jigsaw, but where you first have to find the pieces, before you put them together.
Full service clients have included Western multi-nationals, larger medium sized foreign companies, Chinese domestic companies and companies from elsewhere in Asia. There is about a 50/50 split between those commissioned from abroad and within China. Both types, present some practical differences related to project delivery and client liaison. Firstly projects focussing specifically on China, are, in our experience, commissioned from abroad for different reasons. Firstly, this is often the case, because the MR function or strategic decision making unit is located in corporate headquarters. Another reason for foreign based commissions is the need for third party verification (or otherwise) of information coming from their China based operations. On a practical level, having a large proportion of clients based in Europe and North America means that face to face meeting for commissioning and presentations are not so common, and telephone conferences and web presentations form a larger part of communications. This also means that interesting hours are often worked at commissioning and presentations.
An increasing number of clients are from within China and other parts of Asia. Again, the overlying characteristics of working with them, i.e. understanding their needs, proposing a suitable methodology, negotiating timescales and price, are the same. Where differences occur, however, is in lead times (often longer) and very often in the brief itself. We have seen an increase in the number of very specific written briefs, but these are still very much in the minority. Another interesting characteristic is how these clients prefer to communicate. After initial contact, many, particularly more middle level or junior staffs, who are liaising with us on a day-to-day basis, prefer to rely on instant messaging over the internet, mainly QQ or similar services, for day to day communication, rather than telephone or e-mail. This is also having an impact on research methodologies.
Methodologies for data collection here include all the usual suspects and, language aside would be largely familiar to clients and colleagues in the other countries. There are though some differences in application, for example focus groups tend to work better in smaller numbers, 6 to 8 being optimum. It is often argued that especially in business, face to face interviews are necessary. Very often this isn’t the case. We recently had a project looking at the market in the “bio-solids” industry, meaning we had to talk to respondents in Chinese sewerage works. Initially this seemed quite daunting, until it became clear that these people were extremely receptive, no pushy sales people come and call (for perhaps obvious reasons), and they are seldom asked about the intricacies of their work. Recruitment was aided by the incredible take up of social networking and bulletin boards among Chinese professionals. As a country undergoing rapid change, it is perhaps no surprise that methodologies and attitudes to them are changing too. From a “consensus” of f2f being the only acceptable technique just a few years ago, telephone and indeed online have moved in importance incredibly quickly, with instant messaging even being used for in–depth qualitative work. Whilst respondents are often very keen to work with different approaches, the market outside China and occasionally inside sometimes sticks to believing outdated truisms.
In this short space available, it is clear that the many principles and approaches are of course similar there are nuance affecting all aspects of the process. Where this may be more complicated or even contentious is around how this is manifested in every day work, for example the amount of time required on quality check and HR issues and administration, and this will be covered soon.