A recent trend in web commerce is the steady expansion of websites to international markets. A huge amount of sites have opened Chinese versions, to reach a larger market that has previously been untapped by western companies. Opening a Chinese web site requires lots of hard work, but it can certainly pay off for your business. There are several things that can make or break a Chinese website startup.

The first hurdle is finding domain registration and hosting. There are some companies that help business owners to register their Chinese domains. It is important to find data hosting that is physically located in China. This is mostly for the benefit of Chinese search engines that look for things such as loading time and geographical location. There are quite a few Chinese hosts that have realized the western market, and translated their websites to English.

You also must realize the cultural differences between westerners and Chinese people. You may have the most excellent copy written for your English web site, but it won’t work to simply translate it. You will want to find a native speaker who can understand the subtleties of the language in order to write something that will appeal more to that culture – also, you can avoid ridiculous mistranslations.

Marketing is another important aspect of an international website. Traffic isn’t going to simply show up at your site. You should make an attempt to network your site with other established Chinese sites, and create business relationships. This will be especially difficult because of linguistic and cultural barriers, but it is still possible.

One option is to hire a webmaster that is native to China. You can find all sorts of potential employees on freelancing websites. Offer a weekly or monthly rate to register and maintain your site. This can be a great idea if you find the right person, since he or she can register with the companies, call customer support, and take care of whatever other localized business you need done.

So if you want to start a Chinese website, you should consider all of the things that I have gone over. If you overlook the small details, you may end up with a site that lags behind in the search engines, and as a result loses out on potential profit. Make your site market itself not only to the users, but also to the Chinese search engines and the other Chinese businesses that could offer links to your site.

Gabriel J. Adams
http://www.bizpal.cn/