INSIGHT
OPPORTUNITIES FOR
AFFILIATES IN CHINA
With involvement in traditional iGaming products carrying high risks in China, the strongest
opportunities for affiliates currently reside in forex and financial betting, writes Kathryn Farrell
from Digital Fuel Marketing.
AS OF DECEMBER 2014, China is now
the world’s leading economy in terms of
size, releasing the US’ stranglehold on the
top spot for the first time in over 140 years.
China has also experienced rapid social
development over the past few decades,
now boasting the most Internet users of
any nation in the world.
According to InternetSociety.org and its
Annual Global Internet Report for 2014,
46.03% of the population (or almost 642
million people) in China have Internet
access, which represents nearly 22% of the
total Internet users worldwide.
As a nation, China is increasingly
becoming an upper-middle income country,
with the middle classes expanding at a
rate not seen before in history and affluent
consumer households in China set to reach
the same proportions as the US by 2020
(see Figure 1).
Couple this statistic with the fact that the
population of China has largely embraced
the digital age and mobile technology,
“Social media, in particular Facebook
equivalent Weibo, has something called
‘sponsored influencers’, who you can pay
to promote your brand.”
and you have the perfect platform for
opportunistic online affiliate marketers to
step in and reap lucrative rewards.
Chinese online behaviour
The Chinese demonstrate similar online
behaviour to that of Western countries, but
display an unusually high level of online
trust (see Figure 2). This translates into a
strong receptiveness to affiliate marketing
and the messages being delivered online.
Plus, by February 2015, about 1.29
billion mobile users had been registered
in China, with 81% of them accessing the
Internet via their mobile phone.
So more than ever before, the affiliate
marketer can use digital marketing
techniques to reach out to a large portion
of the population in China, with somewhat
Figure 1: The expanding middle class in China
Urban household disposable income 2010
1
Households Millions
12
13
53
34
69
61
66
57
39
36
23
Household annual disposable income (USD) thousands
>$200
Upper affluent
Lower affluent
$16 - $31.5
Middle Class
$9.5 - $16
Emerging Middle
$6 - $9.5
Aspirant
$4 - $6
Poor <$4
44
Urban household disposable income 2020
iGB Affiliate Issue 52 AUG/SEP 2015
Households Millions