Ep. 1 - Chinese New Year

Episode 1 of the Global Marketing Calendar focuses on Chinese New Year. Hosted by Avielle Breen, episode 1 features Oban International's Chinese LIME (Local In Market Expert) Yue and Oban's CEO Sarah Jennings discussing this interesting global event. The episode also features our Untranslatable Word segment featuring Az Ahmed from Oban.

Chinese New Year is often referred to as the largest human migration in the world, where millions of people travel home for family reunions called 'Chunyun'. The rate of air travel was significantly hampered in 2020 due to Covid-19, but in pre-pandemic years there have been as many as 73 million air passengers during the celebratory period. The holiday also presents a huge opportunity for the luxury gifts market, with China accounting for 32% of global luxury consumption. Listen to the episode to learn much more about this holiday and how it can benefit marketers.

Transcript

00:16

Hello, and welcome to The Global Marketing Calendar, growing your business in a digital world. I'm your host Avielle Breen. And this podcast is brought to you by Oban International, the digital marketing agency specialising in international expansion. In each episode, we'll look at an upcoming event from around the world. We'll find out how the event is celebrated and talk about its cultural significance. And we'll also discuss how your business can use these insights to create compelling global marketing campaigns. At the end of each episode, I'll be joined by fellow Oban member Az Ahmed, where he'll be bringing an untranslatable word and making it translatable. Today we're focusing on Chinese New Year, a holiday that's celebrated by more than 20% of the world's population. And with me to discuss all things Chinese New Year is one of our Local In Market Experts, or LIMEs as we call them here at Oban. I'm joined by Yue from Shanghai. Hello, Yue, thank you for joining us. Welcome.

01:20

You're welcome. Glad to be here.

01:22

Wonderful. So, do you want to kick us off by introducing our listeners to what Chinese New Year is and what it means to the Chinese population.

01:33

So, Chinese New Year is the new year in the lunar calendar. And usually, there's no fixed date. But it's between January and February. And it's a week-long holiday for all of the Chinese people. And it's the most important Festival for Chinese people. It's kind of like a mixture of Christmas and New Year. But it's not religious. It's just all about family getting together to celebrate the New Year. And for most of the Chinese who don't have means they have to travel back home. Because they, many of them, they work in a city. That's not their hometown, so they have to travel. So is a huge amount of people travelling at the same time.

02:31

Do you travel quite far? To go home to celebrate it? Or are your family close to Shanghai?

02:38

I'm from Shanghai, so I don't have to luckily, I don't have to travel during that time.

02:44

That's very lucky.

02:45

Yeah. I just take a metro, you know, an hour and I'll be back.

02:49

And is it called the same thing across China? I mean, I imagine it might vary by region in some ways, but how do you call Chinese New Year in Mandarin, for example?

03:03

We call it Chunyun. Yeah. So, in direct translation, it means Spring Festival, so we don't normally call it Chinese New Year. In colloquial, we call it Konya, which basically means celebrating the year. So, yeah, that will be quite different in different dialects, but we all call it Chunyun.

03:27

And is that the same as a kind of greeting if you wanted to say, you know, happy new year.

03:33

Yeah. In direct translation, it is Happy New Year, which is Sr kwila. There are also other ways to say it for example, I know people in the south they tend to say come see Pattaya as well, I think it means have a prosperous year. Yeah, I think there are different ways of greetings. When people celebrating the Chinese New Years.

04:01

So do you always go home to spend it with your family? Are you always kind of spending that time of year in the family home or do you ever kind of go away together to a kind of holiday location or is it always going to that family home?

04:17

That depends in some years we travel? Obviously not this year. I think two years ago me and my parents went to Japan but most of the years we spend here at home with the you know family and so on a Chinese New Year's Eve. It's like Christmas Eve right? You just go home and you have a big feast with the family members.

04:48

Wonderful. Are there is there any kind of specific foods or drinks that you that you eat and drink traditionally for that meal?

04:56

It also depends on where you're from. For people in North China, the one thing they always have on a Chinese New Year's Eve is dumplings. So they always have dumplings. But in the south people have, I think, from where from the region I'm from, we tend to have sticky rice, or, fish. Because fish, the Chinese people love puns. Because fish sounds the same as surplus. So it has this kind of meaning of if you have fish on a Chinese New Year, then you will always have some surplus of food or money. In the New Year.

05:46

I would certainly like a surplus of food and money.

05:52

Oh, and also, the special drink is Baijo. I don't know if you have heard it before. But it's basically like vodka for Russian people. It's a very high. Very high liquor, alcoholic liquor. I think 50% is crazy. People have it on a on a Chinese New Year's Eve dinner with family, they, you know, a lot of toasting and speech.

06:23

Is it something that when you're, I don't know, 12 or 13 years old, you say to your sibling or your cousin, Hey, I'm gonna, I'm gonna try some of that that drink this year? Or do you have to kind of wait until you're an adult to get to join in the celebration?

06:39

I don't think kids or like, younger generation like it because it's too strong. I think people prefer beer or cocktail in general, because Baijo it's too strong. It's unbearable for many people. Wow.

06:58

Yeah, I can imagine 50% is unbearable even to think about. Yeah. So in the family home is there kind of special ways that you decorate the house or the flat with special decorations that you put up for that for that time of year.

07:12

Definitely, there is a thing that we call it. I think in English, it's called spring couplets. It's a long swipe, it comes, comes in pairs, and you write some good wishes or messages on it. You know, with Chinese brush, you know, the calligraphy and then after that, it's always read. And then you write it on those swipes, and then you stick it to the two sides of your doors. And there's also a square one that you put in the middle of the door on top. And usually right for which is one character in Chinese meaning blessings. And it's usually upside down because it's another pun. That means if it's upside down, it means it will come. So it means the blessing will come to the door. And so that's what people normally decorate their houses.

08:20

What kind of wishes would people be writing on the stripes? Is it kind of, you know, health and wealth?

08:27

Yeah, it's a really depends. Because it's usually because it's a pairs, there's usually two sentences, and it's usually Chinese poems. It could be some existing ones that are written by, you know, people from 1000 years ago, or it could be improvised or written by the owner of the house. It really depends, but they usually have some, you know, good wishes of either health or happiness. Money. Yeah.

09:05

What other kind of traditions on the New Year's Eve are there? I've heard about the New Year's gala on TV. Tell me a little bit about that. Sounds really exciting.

09:14

It's a TV show. It's comes with streaming light. And it starts at 8pm. On the Chinese New Year’s Eve, and lasts for an hour and a half. And it's a whole marathon of all kinds of performances, including dancing singing, comedies. And, and it's it's a it's a very big thing. As you said it's part of the tradition now to watch it with the family. And almost everyone watches it and older shows. If there's a song or there's a line from a comedy show and it will be trending you know, four months after the gala, so it's also if you're a singer or an actress, if you're invited to be on a show, it's a big big thing for them too because means like a huge exposure to like to almost everyone in the country so yeah, definitely it's a big thing.

10:22

Do they run adverts like commercials? Oh, yeah. Is it kind of like in the in America when they have the Superbowl big sporting event?

10:32

It's not really the same as the Superbowl because the Superbowl you expect something very creative or, you know, funny or anything for the commercial. But I think for the gala, it's usually just a sum. I it's not as interesting. I think in terms of ads, it will be just the hosts saying the names of the brand saying they send some messages to the people, you know, or I think there were some interactive campaigns they did. For example, they asked the people, the audience to use an app on their phone, and there will be some banners on it, showing whichever brand it is. So people are, yeah, there is a huge opportunities for many companies to promote themselves. Definitely.

11:26

And at the end of the celebrations, or of the kind of event is the main event fireworks that happen after the kind of countdown or are the fireworks more kind of spread out across the week?

11:41

Yeah both. So it starts from the Chinese New Year’s Eve, you are right past 12 o'clock, then you will hear fireworks and it will last it will last normally for an hour, sort of half an hour or so. And then on each day, depending on where you're from. I think there's different sayings and traditions in different regions. People light fireworks on different days. But now not anymore. Because sadly, in many cities like Shanghai, it's banned. You cannot do fireworks in the central part of the city for safety reasons. So you do not hear that anymore.

12:27

I guess one of the key elements of a Chinese New Year is the fact that it's welcoming in a new zodiac sign. And this is going to be the year of the Ox. Can you tell us a bit about what the year of the Ox means and what kind of characteristics I guess of the ox we should expect to find?

12:47

Oh, yeah, there are preferences over those 12 zodiacs obviously, because I am a snake and it doesn't sound good to me. And my colleague, he's a rat. I don't think he's happy too you know, he's from the UK as well, but I don't think he's happy to know he's a rat. So there's obviously there is definitely preferences over zodiacs and there's also pigs. Rooster is good. Okay, it's considered to be hard working because you know, Rooster usually wakes up very early. So people consider to be hard working diligent. But pigs, nothing really good can come up when people think of them or, but dragon is the coolest, the coolest Zodiac you can get. And ox I think people think of as fears or a good fighter. And so there are many. And also depending on the Zodiac. Companies or people always say good wishes or brand messages related to the Zodiac and usually comes up with puns acts because when you say someone is very Oxi in Chinese and means he's very powerful, very strong. It's a very positive word. So, companies and brands, they come up with those lines with ox to say good wishes about you know, being powerful, fierce.

14:29

Interesting. I'm curious to know if there's ever any times that you've seen when brands who, you know non Chinese brands if they've they're trying to market to Chinese consumers. Is there any other times where you think they've really missed it? They're they've missed the mark or, or they've made an obvious mistake.

14:50

That kind of just isn't related to Zodiac actually, I think was in a year of dog. Because dog in Chinese culture isn't really a favoured animal. I mean, its loyal and everything. But then there's a red envelope from Dior. I think they put just one character on the front of the envelope, dog. And I don't think it's a good idea because when you give the red envelope to someone, and it says dog on the front, then it's an insult. So that's a bad example of you know, a Chinese media campaign.

15:38

And so that's Dior branded, red envelope, so they kind of made their own red envelope and use that character. Yeah.

15:45

Interesting. Yeah. So at the back it says dog.

15:49

So instead of being a nice gesture to pass some nice money to a family member or friend, you just kind of insulting them and calling them a dog?

15:57

Yeah. My dad is a dog. I wouldn't say that to him saying you're a dog. But I would say his Zodiac is a dog.

16:08

Yeah, it seems like there's a fine line between stating someone's zodiac sign and potentially insulting them. A kind of fine line there. So with the red envelopes, or the red packets? What are they called? Am I right in thinking they are called hongbao? Have I mispronounced that? Or is that?

16:28

Yeah got it.

16:29

I've got it in one. Got it. So what's the what's the tradition around that is that normally kind of elders giving it to the younger generation in the family or, or is it kind of whoever you want to give it to?

16:41

It's normally the kids who receive hongbao from their parents and uncles, aunties and grandparents from their other family members, and but also the other way around. So for people, the elderly people, you know, after they retire, they don't have income. Apart from their pension, so younger family members, they give hongbao to their elder family members. So anyone who doesn't have income, they are considered as good recipients of hongbao.

17:24

So it's kind of reversing the cycle, I imagine that you know, a child will receive it, and then 10 or 15, 20 years later, they'll then be giving it or returning the favour almost. Yeah. And now there are any kind of digital versions of that, that is still very kind of, you know, paper based, or the digital red packets, digital hongbo.

17:44

For my parents, I gave them the hongbao via digital wallet, like Alipay or WeChat wallet. But when you visit someone, physically, it's kind of awkward to you know, ask that person to give you a QR code, and then you can scan it and pay or I mean, wire the money. So people still carry a physical, red envelope when they visit their family. But I think those are like WeChat wallet, they have a feature called hongbao. So just that single feature, you use it to send people money not only on Chinese New Year, but also on other occasions.

18:36

So it's very commonly used. Wonderful. So that's kind of integrated as a feature in the digital wallet app that people are using day to day anyway.

18:44

Yeah, exactly. And for example, if I go have dinner with my friends, and then we will go Dutch and then we will send whoever pays to dinner, a hongbao with the money, you know that you ought to pay.

18:59

That sounds so much more convenient than the way that my friends and I do it over here. You know, get out a calculator and try and split it and then say no, you owe me four pounds.

19:10

As matter as a matter of fact, I haven't used cash for years. I really like how I don't even know how the cash looks like now because I know they have new versions of RMB. But it's just cashless everywhere. And there are even new saying there are shops that refuse to accept cash. So, yeah, it's paperless.

19:36

Has that been kind of advanced by the process of becoming a cashless society? Has that been sped up by COVID? Do you think or was there already?

19:48

It's already there for it's been a few years. I think at least two or three years.

19:58

It must be just hugely convenient, I imagine because even you know, if I can see, you can't see, but in the background, I've got my coat hanging up on the wall. And it's got about four different pockets. And every time I go into it every year, when the winter comes around, I find so many different coins and like, what, why is this? Why have I got money to start with, but I miss that feeling when you find money in places you didn't expect? Like, that is a good feeling. If it's more than, you know, one penny. So in terms of like giving gifts and also buying things for yourself, is there in terms of like luxury items or kind of expensive, more high end things? Is it common for people to get expensive gifts for other people or maybe even treat themselves with a kind of luxury item for Chinese New Year.

20:54

Chinese New Year is definitely a, you know, the time when people are more likely to buy luxuries, just because that's the time of the year when they are getting paid for their year end bonus. So people could receive a lot of money during that time, and they are more willing to, you know, buy. And I think it's more about people treating themselves during that time buying nice stuff for themselves or for you know, after a year's hard work.

21:30

And is there anything that you're planning on buying for yourself to treat yourself with some luxury? luxury goods?

21:39

No really. Because I'm not really into the luxury brands. But I, I definitely bought a lot of things more than usual during this period of time. Because there are a lot of discounts going on as well, if you open the apps, you know, there are tons of promotions going on. And yeah, I bought some stuff, but not very luxurious.

22:04

Is it that kind of time of year when you know that those promotions and those discounts will only last a certain time. So do you kind of feel like oh, I have to I have to make the most of it? Because you know, after this day, everything will be expensive again, or does it not really.

22:23

Normally, I think Chinese New Year isn't as big, like the promotion isn't as big. But I think this year is really like there's a massive campaign going on and promotions everywhere just because of the COVID. I think that ecommerce websites are making full use of making the most of this situation and they have kind of encouraged people to buy things because people can’t travel and they have some money left. So they are more likely to purchase online, especially online as well. But there's no I think the Chinese New Year isn’t such a date sensitive thing, per se, not as much as the Singles Day November 11. And people know that okay, will only last for a week or so.

23:21

Yeah, this is more of a kind of focus on making the most out of promotions on Singles Day as opposed to the Chinese new year period.

23:31

Yeah, there is a timeline for Singles Day, two weeks maximum, but not on Chinese New Year.

23:37

Interesting. If you could give any advice to a non Chinese marketer, as we were kind of saying before with the zodiacs as well. You know, a non Chinese marketer who's trying to target Chinese consumers, is there any kind of piece of advice that you think those people should really bear in mind something that's important that people often forget that that could really make a difference in their international marketing campaigns?

24:04

I think the main point is to stand out because you know, so many brands are doing promotions at the same time and they do you normally use the red colour. For example, you see, Starbucks having their red mugs with ox on it or, you know, Daniel Wellington have their watches with the red band, it's red everywhere. And so you need to find a way to stand out. I'm not saying don't use red, but you need to find a way but also do not, do not take the risk of you know, going against the traditional. I know, for example, Burberry, they had this campaign with a group of celebrities, a family standing together with a very solemn serious looking faces and people started to mock, you know, the people could understand why do they do that, because the Chinese New Year is all about family being happy together, you know, very warm holiday, but then they, I think they wanted to go an unconventional way to, you know, to, because everywhere you see ads with smiley faces with the family, so they think they want to stand out by looking sad, then it didn't work, it didn't work at all. So you need to stand out, but you don't want to be too risky, there is a fine line between it. So you will have to have someone local to kind of give you some feedbacks and who really understand the market and the culture to tell you, okay, this is good or not. And be respectful to our culture. So people are very sensitive and our way, especially with rising patriotism, over the past few years. So just be very careful when you play with the cultural elements.

26:36

I guess it's that, as you say, finding that fine line between being able to stand out, as you know confidently as a brand, but also having a real in depth understanding of those cultural implications of trying to stand out from, you know, using those really important elements like yes, do stand out, but don't stand out by mocking the importance of family, for example. And is there anything kind of on a slightly less marketing topic? Is there anything about Chinese New Year that you think our listeners might not have heard of, but that they might find interesting?

27:03

I think there's an interesting, a recent interesting trend, some of the young generation they are becoming very stressed when it comes to Chinese New Year, because they know that they will face a big group of family members. And in our culture there's always questions being asked, for example, when are you going to get married? Or when are you going to get, you know, have a child or have a second child, and this becomes super stressful for many young people. And so they find ways to avoid spending new year with the family. Just so they don't have to be asked. Or people ask like how much money you earn as well, that's very, that could be shocking to some of the people from outside China, because but that's very commonly asked.

28:04

I've heard that sometimes people might either ask a friend or kind of hire a fake boyfriend to just kind of go with them to see their family.

28:15

I've seen it on a news story. But I've never had a friend who did that. Yeah, never happened to me, or people I know. But I do see that. Sometimes in articles and news.

28:29

Interesting, it could be a good way to make some money to pretend to be someone's fake boyfriend.

28:35

That could be a good way to treat yourself.

28:44

And now I'm joined by our wonderful CEO at Oban International, Sarah Jennings. Hello, Sarah, welcome to the podcast.

28:51

Hi Avielle. It's nice to be here.

28:53

So we've been talking about Chinese New Year, as you know. And it's an interesting one, because it's obviously such a well known holiday around the world already. But there are elements of the holiday that that certainly myself and I imagine some of our listeners as well weren't aware of. So I'd be interested to know from your point of view, what makes it such a significant event. And, you know, especially for global travel marketers in particular.

29:20

I think the reason it's so important is because the Spring Festival actually triggers the largest human migration in the world. Everybody goes back home for their family reunion, and pretty much everybody wants to get back home in time for dinner. But in modern China, most elderly parents live right out in rural villages while their children are working in the cities. So it means there's a very, there's a huge number of people trying to go long distances in a very short period of time. And there is some sort of strange quirk so for example, the earliest you can buy your train tickets is 60 days prior to travel. And that means there's a mad rush for tickets when they go on show and the trains are hugely crowded. There was in fact, some research done in 2015, that showed around 1000 tickets were sold every second as soon as they went on sale. So you've got this huge number of people wanting to go back home. The other thing that Yue mentioned with her trip to Japan a few years back is quite a lot of families take this opportunity to go on holiday instead of travelling home. So it's a really key period for tourism. People either go somewhere new, and obviously want to see all the attractions or they go back home and have family days out. So it's a peak time for attractions as well.

30:33

And looking at things from the point of view of kind of luxury ecommerce brands, I imagine it's a huge opportunity for them as well.

30:40

Absolutely. I mean, the luxury market is shifting rapidly towards e commerce. And China really leads the way in that and is a hugely growing market. In fact, China accounts for over a third of global luxury sales, and it's the fastest growing market. So there's a huge opportunity for luxury ecommerce marketers. And people often buy new clothes for the holiday fashion brands quite often provide complete collections of clothing and accessories. They'll often do things in red things with sign of the zodiac on them, stuff like footwear, handbags, jewellery, perfume, makeup, compacts, and so on. And so there's a huge opportunity to launch a collection specifically around Chinese New Year.

31:21

And so for digital marketers in particular, how can they really take advantage of this time of year?

31:29

Well, the opportunity is greatest for specific sectors. You know, we've already mentioned, travel and luxury and holiday brands. But obviously, there's opportunities for food, clothing, and so on as well. Quite often, marketers will produce quite specific Chinese New Year campaigns that run in China. And sometimes they run these globally as well to reach Chinese customers who are living outside of China. So it's a really big sales opportunity. And if you do run a campaign, and make sure you localise it, it is really worth running it past someone in market, and brands run brilliant campaigns. But you know, even the best brands occasionally can go off piste. And I think Yue has mentioned that the Chinese love using puns and humour. But she's also highlighted to us in the past some mistakes that brands have made where they either overdo the Chinese elements, they sort of stack up too many references to Chinese culture, they really, really push things like traditional costume, so it starts to feel quite forced to a Chinese consumer. And then there's been other times where brands have either tried to make a pun slightly got the language wrong. And again, campaigns that are probably costing a lot of time and energy to put together have had to be withdrawn. So it's definitely worth before you get into expensive production, running it past somebody in market.

32:50

And so alongside the importance of having a real cultural awareness, you know, by using someone local and in market, what’s something else that that's really crucial for digital marketers to keep in mind when they're preparing for their international campaigns.

33:07

So I think the piece of advice is to really make sure you get the basics right, you'd be surprised how often we find that people haven't got their language either written or spoken correct in China. For Mainland China, everybody speaks Mandarin, primarily. And they communicate with simplified Chinese. And that's what you would use for your advertising. If you are to go to somewhere like Hong Kong, then most people speak Cantonese, and they communicate in written ways using traditional Chinese. That isn't always the same in Greater China. So you really need to work out what is the right mix for your specific geography. And I think the other thing is that people just forget sometimes just how big China is and how huge the audiences. So you really need to be thinking about either where in China you want to be advertising, or a specific audience, because it's, you know, it's a fifth of the world's population. Nobody has the advertising budget to speak to everybody at the same time. And nor should they.

34:12

Amazing. Well, thank you so much for joining us to talk about Chinese New Year. This has been really interesting, and I hope that our listeners will also find it valuable as well. So thank you very much.

34:23

Thank you. You're welcome.

34:27

And to wrap up the episode, I'm joined by a fellow Oban team member, Az Ahmed for our Lost in Localisation segment. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

34:36

Hi Avielle, it's great to be here. Great episode so far. I just been listening and it’s fascinating.

34:41

Very interesting, wasn't it? I'm glad that Yue said that my zodiac sign as a rooster was a positive thing.

34:49

Yeah I know, and it was interesting to find out like, you know, some zodiac signs aren't as great as others. Apparently I'm a goat. So that's cool.

34:56

That is very cool. The greatest of all time. Yeah. So this is going to be our Lost in Localisation segment. And for our listeners who are unaware of either what localisation is or why it's important, can you give us a little overview of why it's so significant for us?

35:17

Yeah, sure. So, I'm going to be bringing an untranslatable word and the interesting thing for marketers is that you get untranslatable words in every language and marketers should be aware of that because direct translations of words are sometimes not possible and you can get the meaning wrong and so localising is always better you can capture the nuances of words you can use them properly in marketing and advertising campaigns and things so, so always localise.

35:48

Perfect. So our Lost in Localisation segment is when you will be giving me an untranslatable word in an attempt to make it translatable. So for this episode Az what is your untranslatable word?

36:02

Yeah, cool. So this episode’s untranslatable word is Yuan fun, and it's an untranslatable word used in Chinese and Vietnamese cultures, it roughly means fate in the context of human relationships. One way to think about it could be, you know, some sort of mysterious force that causes two lives to cross paths. It's nothing to do with even people who aren't superstitious or religious use it. So it's pretty common.

36:30

And how would you use Yuan fun in a sentence? Or a phrase?

36:37

Yeah so for instance, if against all odds, you bump into somebody you haven't seen in a long time, you might proclaim we have Yuan fun, or, you know, similarly, if you make a new friend, whom you just click with instantly, and you feel like you've known them forever. You may chalk it up to Yuan fun.

36:54

Nice. I'm curious Az have you ever had a Yuan fun moment in your life? Looking back?

37:02

Oh, yeah, I have actually. So basically, this happened to me a few years ago, I was at a party and met this guy, and I just clicked with him. And you know, we just talked about all kinds of stuff for hours. I'd never met him before. And I felt like I'd known him for years. We had similar interests. We were about the same age. And yeah, it was it was really interesting to meet somebody like that, and we just clicked and you know, we're really good friends now. So you know, chalking that up to Yuan fun.

37:30

Oh, that's lovely. I love that when that happens, and you're still friends. That's definitely that sounds like it qualifies as a Yuan fun moment.

37:36

Yeah.

37:37

I'm now going to spend the rest of the day looking back through my head. Thinking that was Yuan fun. No, that wasn't Yuan fun. We're gonna make a little checklist. So that was wonderful. Thank you very much as I now have a previously untranslatable word that is now translatable. Thanks to you. So thank you very much for joining us on the podcast and I'm looking forward to next episode.

38:01

Yeah thanks Aville. Nice to be here.

38:04

Well, that's it for our episode on Chinese New Year. I hope you've all enjoyed listening to what Yue and Sarah and Az all had to say, if you'd like to learn more about other important Holidays from around the world, or if you're interested in finding out how Oban can help you drive international growth, then get in touch by visiting obaninternational.com Bye for now.