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Recently, Chinese food buying habits have changed and evolved significantly. According to a new study, the internet is the preferred source of information when customers look research food brands.

For the last few years, Chinese food shopping has changed drastically. In the modern Chinese food market, a company that wants to be successful must understand what platforms the Chinese use to purchase food products. In the following, the results of a study of 196 people in Shanghai and Beijing, conducted by Daxue Consulting and Gentlemen Marketing agency, will be discussed.

Based on the study, the internet is the primary source of information when Chinese customers research food brands on the internet, as nearly 60% of the respondents said that they gather information using China’s search engine, Baidu. The second source of information is friends and relatives, with 20% of the respondents claiming this as their preferred tool for gathering information on food, which is well below the number of respondents who said they use Baidu for the same purpose. Lastly, only 9% of Chinese consumers gather information on food products through social media.

The study also found that age does not appear to have a significant impact, but that those under the age of 34 appear to be more inclined to seek information on food brands from friends and social media.

Other surveys suggest that most of Chinese consumers have purchased food products online and that most of them trust such food purchases. With respect to imported food, safety is the most important criteria for purchasing food, as cited by 80% of the respondents. This implies that foreign brands wishing to penetrate the Chinese food market should not neglect the safety message when marketing to Chinese consumers. The second most important criteria with respect to imported food, is quality (66%).