Building A Brand

By June Ramli

If you are an avid TikTok user, you would have come across some videos that encourage Australian brand owners to tap into the Chinese market.
Seeing that now I am an Australian brand owner myself, I did just that, only to realise that I had been duped by all of those TikTok videos.
What these TikTok videos fail to mention is that it is super hard to enter these Chinese markets.
Being an Australian licensee holder myself, I recently got an invitation to attend a webinar which was organised by the Australian Made Campaign, a not for profit organisation based in Victoria.
I can’t reveal too many details from that webinar session because as an Australian made licensee we pay to get all this information, so it is unfair for the other licensees if I let most of this information out for free when many of us pay to obtain it.
But all I can say is this, onboarding products to China is hard if you are a startup because you will need a local agent based in China to get the brand into all the right places.
Next, if you are unable to converse in Mandarin, it’s best to avoid this market altogether, as your brand would need a whole new look and feel once it enters the Chinese market, talk about an all Mandarin sounding name and even the labelling needs to be translated to Mandarin too.
Entering the Chinese market from Australia would only be feasible only for Australians who are of Chinese descent, that have relatives in China or someone who can converse and read the Mandarin language otherwise it is best to stay clear from this market until your brand reaches the juggernaut stage. That is all the information I can provide right now. Also, the most profitable popular overseas skincare products in China are held by the French. Australia currently stands at number 13. I guess it is because every other brand holder like myself had the same inclination too, that it is too hard of a market to penetrate so it is best to stay clear from the market until your brand reaches a certain stage.
My only advice to all those thinking of starting a skincare business is to not do so, as competition is pretty stiff in this market no matter how good of a marketing plan you may have, people have a hard time trusting a new skincare brand, cause they are not sure how it would fair on their skin. 
I have noticed this, that is why you can see a lot of pictures of me littered on my social media feed testing the product and giving out testimonials because no one else will, although I am willing to part with the product for free people are still apprehensive to try the product.
So yes, the skincare business is not for the faint of heart but I am still going to give my idea a go, because of the investment I’ve made to date.
But my advice to the rest of you thinking of starting a skincare brand would be DON’T! It would be to stay in your dead-end job and perhaps invest your salary in the stock market. The simple route is always the best route to riches. Till my next update.