January 2012 Archives

Can I be honest with you? Chinese consumers are just not that into us - foreign, domestic, big or small. We try to win their hearts with poetic propositions when we can't even gain their trust with the simplest of products. They're looking for more security than we've been offering thus far. Communicating respect for the consumer and responsibility for everything brands say, and do.

Once upon a time there was plenty of trust. A decade or so ago, celebrities were gods and foreign brands could do no wrong. Three years ago, we asked teenagers in tier three cities about advertising on television. "If it's on CCTV, it must be true," said one girl, and "CCTV is government TV. They censor everything."

Times have changed. Trust is on life support. With a smorgasbord of life-threatening foods on the tip of consumers' lips (tainted milk powder, paper-filled buns, contaminated pork and exploding watermelons), should we be surprised? In a recent interview with a group from Chengdu, one man said, "Nothing's reliable anymore. I feel like I can't even believe the weather report. Is there anything we can still trust?"

Are we moving too fast, buying and borrowing brands rather than carefully building them? Are we neglecting our responsibility as brand guardians to be fully committed to the safety and quality of the products that walk the brands' talk?

One high-profile CEO of a major Chinese internet company recently lamented that so many companies in China were sacrificing their people in the pursuit of pure profit; this after discovering that some of his staff had allowed 2,300 fake storefronts to swindle customers out of US$2 million and on hearing, in the same week, that four children, in an unrelated incident, had died from melamine-laced baby formula.

It is not just the root of the problem that has caused the crisis of trust but our response to it. We talk about how the customer is king, yet we treat him with great suspicion.

The recent debacle by a world famous cosmetics brand is illustrative. After traces of harmful ingredients were found in one of their flagship products, they offered customers refunds, albeit not immediately, if they signed a document saying that nothing was wrong with the product. Consumers in China have begun to brand together to keep companies on the straight and narrow. With few official and effective outlets to voice their concerns and complaints, they are turning to each other for support and action. And the internet is helping them to do it, coming together on a shared grievance, planning a course of action and executing it with precision.

A recent case invoking a giant German electronics company and a microblogging celebrity is a perfect example. After receiving a number of complaints about a refrigerator door that would not shut, the company issued a statement via their microblog saying they were in contact with the complainants, there were no design flaws and that they would not recall the product.

For the microblogging celebrity and his disgruntled followers, this response was the final straw. Last month, they marched on the company's office with sledgehammers in hand and refrigerators in tow and smashed them to smithereens. We should expect more of these responses as consumers begin to see the power of concerted acts of protest.

How do we re-build trust? The operative word is 'build'. There are no shortcuts. We have to do it brick by brick. Trust starts with respect, responsibility and transparency.

Respect: we give lip-service to respect for the customer. We can hear it in how we talk about, characterize and value him. To many, he is simply a faceless digit in a promising cluster. We should spend the time to uncover reasons to respect and like him, beyond his profit potential.

Responsibility: for better or worse, we are the sum of all associations we have in our ecosystem and we are only as strong as our weakest link. We should extend our influence and values to our associates and take responsibility for their actions, not just our own.

Transparency: one of those rare and prized finds in China. We should create opportunities to demonstrate transparency to gain trust and admiration for their courage, candor and authenticity.