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Taipei / DPA
Women are the most active customers in Taiwan’s online retail market, prompting local e-commerce operators to revise marketing strategies to meet the needs of female shoppers.
Japan-based Rakuten’s e-commerce platform in Taiwan sees women account for 70 percent of its membership, according to the United Evening News.
The paper cited the Taiwan Rakuten Ichiba as indicating that female shoppers on the platform mostly buy women’s clothing, cosmetics and food, while men usually shop for sports items, and outdoors products and consumer electronics. Another major local online retailer, PC Home24h, sees a similar trend. It said that in the past, online shoppers would mostly purchase consumer electronics on their site, but in recent years there has been explosive growth in the food, cosmetics and household goods segments because of a fast-growing number of women shoppers.
Another e-commerce operator, book.com.tw, which has a strong focus on selling books, said it has seen significant sales growths for small appliances, books and food products.
It said its online shoppers were mostly women from urban areas between the ages of 23 and 39, and now e-commerce operators in Taiwan are eager to design their services and product lines to meet the needs of female customers.
The United Evening News cited some market observers as saying that some online retailers saw the number of women members grow twice as fast as those for men last year.
One of the observers, Lin Chia-hsiang, was cited as saying that women customers are more apt to recommend good products and services to their friends, and that means that for every woman customer there may be 20 other potential women customers.
The observer suggested that restaurants, which see women account for 70 percent of their customers, should reserve areas or design their services specifically for women.
Lin said that for women, the top priority for choosing restaurants is a cozy atmosphere, followed by considerate and fast service, cleanliness, convenient location and quality food,
according to the newspaper.
He said restaurants will have more stable sales if they have a high percentage of women customers.
Meanwhile, hotels in Taiwan are also starting to design products targeting women travelers who come in groups of three.
The Taiwan hotels said their counterparts in Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan have also seen a similar trend where women like to travel in groups of three.