DIGITAL MEDIA ACROSS ASIA

About China

Contents
Brief Overview Demographic Information Online Behavior Religion and Culture Economic Growth Business Culture

Contents

Brief Overview
Demographic Information
Online Behavior
Religion and Culture
Economic Growth
Business Culture

1. Brief Overview

歡迎光臨 ! Welcome !

In this wiki, our team strives to provide the most comprehensive information on digital media in Mainland China. We hope you will be able to obtain all the information you need here.

In the age of Globalization, technology has played a pivotal role in evolving how businesses and stakeholders communicate with each other. This has caused the business-stakeholder communication model to change drastically. Businesses no longer push their message out to customers. The goal, with regards to social media, is to start a conversation with the various constituencies and to make a business look good in that conversation. With so many popular channels such as web logs (blogs), bulletin boards and online video sharing, social media channels are gaining momentum and are becoming a part of mainstream culture in China. China has seen a huge increase in the number of people online. Social media in China is definitely influencing opinion. Indeed social media is “alive and well in China”.

Understanding the extent to which Social Media can and does play a part in Chinese society is impeded by the level of controls imposed upon internet access in the country. China now has the largest number of internet users in the world, albeit at a restricted level. The development of social media for both business and daily life often faces barriers at the level of language and access control, largely isolating the internet community within China from that of the rest of the world.Our team hopes that after going through the data we have aggregated from various sources, your understanding of social media in Mainland China will have been greatly enhanced. We have included some data from websites in Mandarin, with summaries in English for your convenience.

2. Demographic Information

China is the most populous country in the world, making up for an approximate of 20% of the world’s population. Population growth rate, though, is slowing.

Population (July 2009 est.): 1,338,612,96
Population growth rate (2009 est.): 0.655%

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Sex ratio for total population (2009 est.): 1.06 male(s) per female

Source: China Internet Network Information Center

Median Age (2009 est.): 34.1 years

Source: China Internet Network Information Center

Literacy of total population (2000 census): 90.9%
Language: Mandarin (Putonghua), plus many local dialects
Work force (2006 est., 798 million): Agriculture and forestry--45%; industry--24%; services--31%

3. Online Behavior

3.1 Why they access the web

3.2 Some Interesting statistics

73% of Chinese netizens agreed with the statement: “I feel free to say and do things online (that I wouldn’t do or say offline)” compared to only 32% of US netizens.*
54% of netizens own a blog. However, only 35% have updated in the past 6 months.
Over 100 million netizens use online forums (aka BBS), and 96% of these users spend at least 1 hour a day
124 million SNS users in 2009. Each user has on average 2.8 accounts.
An estimated 15 million urban white-collars spend more than five hours a day on Happy Farm (a game similar to Facebook's Farmville)
81% of BBS and blog users check online word of mouth before purchasing a product
A simple comparison between China and U.S in terms of online behavior:

Source: CNNIC’s 24th Statistical Report, June 2009, The Hive, China Internet Watch, Forrester, Making Sense of Internet Word of Mouth,

4. Religion and Culture

Religion plays a significant role in the life of many Chinese. While religious toleration is affirmed, the Chinese Government places restrictions on not officially recognized organizations. Official estimates are shown below; unofficial estimates are estimated to be higher.

Buddhism – mostly widely practices with 100 million adherents
Traditional Taoism
Muslims – 20 million
Protestants – 15 million
Catholics – 10 million

5. Economic Growth

China has changed gradually from a centrally planned economy to more of a free market economy. China’s Renminbi has also been reformed from being pegged to the US Dollar to being pegged to a basket of currencies.

GDP (Purchasing Power Parity) (2008 est.): $7.973 trillion
GDP per capita (PPP) (2008 est.): $6,000
Foretasted GDP (2009): 8.2%
Labor Force (2008 est.): 807.3 million

6. Chinese Business Culture & Guanxi

“Guanxi” is relationship in Chinese. In the business context, it refers to the network and the exchange of favors among parties. China is rated the 89th country in the world for ease of doing business in the year 2010. Key areas of the business culture are as follows:

Confucianism – maintaining harmonious relationships, and aversion to conflict
‘Face’ – the importance of maintaining or increasing one’s reputation
Giving Gift Etiquette – controversial in the West, but the norm in China’s business context

The Edelman Trust Barometer 2008 finds “businesses less trusted than the media and government in every region of the globe surveyed”. This has generally been the case in the other Asian countries covered by this wiki such as Japan and South Korea. In the case of China though, a great deal of trust is placed in the government, followed by the media and business. Despite the strict role that the government plays in the media, it is still the most trusted institution in China.

About China - Social Media and PR across Asia

yaycaffeine	Latest page update: made by yaycaffeine , Nov 16 2009, 12:03 PM EST (about this update About This Update Edited by yaycaffeine 9 words added 6 words deleted view changes - complete history)
	Keyword tags: None More Info: links to this page

Threads for this page

Post a new thread

There are no threads for this page. Be the first to start a new thread.