How to reach Chinese consumers through my website?
1. Is the Internet slow in China?
As China has a large population with fewer peering points than that of the U.S and Europe, this creates backlogs and may lead to slower Internet speed. China’s 710+ million Internet users are dispersed over vast distances and certain rural areas still rely on 2G networks. To overcome these connectivity barriers, Alibaba Cloud has seven data center regions in-country, with multiple availability zones in each region, as well as 1,000+ CDN nodes across Mainland China to provide network bandwidth peak at 200 Mbps.
2. Can users within Mainland China access my overseas-hosted website?
Your website should be accessible in Mainland China but may face constraints in regards to latency, unavailability, and limited SEO visibility depending on the location of where your website is hosted.
3. Why is my overseas-hosted website slow to load in China?
Numerous issues could be affecting your website's load speed. Common issues include latency caused by the distance between your server and end-users in China and limitations to international bandwidth. Your website rendering speed may also be affected by integration with third-party services that are not accessible in China.
4. Will my website be blocked if integrated with social media channels that cannot be accessed in China?
Your website should be accessible in Mainland China but social media icons and other third-party integration will experience lost functionality. This will affect your website's rendering speed and user experience. To optimize your website for China, it is recommended that you disable integration with social media and other platforms that cannot be accessed in China.
5. What are the advantages of hosting in Mainland China?
Hosting in China is the best option to reduce latency and improve load speed. Load speed is crucial anywhere in the world and especially in a mobile-centric market such as China. In addition, hosting a website in China will improve search engine visibility. Chinese search engines typically rank websites hosted in Mainland China higher than those that are not.
6. Do I need a Chinese domain name for my China website? What are the requirements?
A Chinese (.cn) domain is optional and is not required to host in Mainland China. Purchasing a Chinese domain (.cn) is straightforward, as it requires only passport identification. A Chinese domain name application takes approximately 2-3 days to process.
7. We are worried about affecting users in the U.S/ Europe, should we switch our website hosting to China. Do you have a recommended solution?
A popular solution for companies wishing to serve multiple markets from one location is to host in Hong Kong. Hong Kong has low setup requirements and provides effective coverage for Mainland China and international regions. An alternative is to continue hosting in the U.S. and deliver your website in China via a Content Delivery Network (CDN). CDN offers a high performance caching network to speed up your website delivery and manage spikes in traffic. Finally, there is the option of hosting your website in Mainland China or Hong Kong and linking to CDN nodes in the U.S. To deploy your website on a hosting server or CDN located in Mainland China you will first need to obtain ICP certification.
As China has a large population with fewer peering points than that of the U.S and Europe, this creates backlogs and may lead to slower Internet speed. China’s 710+ million Internet users are dispersed over vast distances and certain rural areas still rely on 2G networks. To overcome these connectivity barriers, Alibaba Cloud has seven data center regions in-country, with multiple availability zones in each region, as well as 1,000+ CDN nodes across Mainland China to provide network bandwidth peak at 200 Mbps.
2. Can users within Mainland China access my overseas-hosted website?
Your website should be accessible in Mainland China but may face constraints in regards to latency, unavailability, and limited SEO visibility depending on the location of where your website is hosted.
3. Why is my overseas-hosted website slow to load in China?
Numerous issues could be affecting your website's load speed. Common issues include latency caused by the distance between your server and end-users in China and limitations to international bandwidth. Your website rendering speed may also be affected by integration with third-party services that are not accessible in China.
4. Will my website be blocked if integrated with social media channels that cannot be accessed in China?
Your website should be accessible in Mainland China but social media icons and other third-party integration will experience lost functionality. This will affect your website's rendering speed and user experience. To optimize your website for China, it is recommended that you disable integration with social media and other platforms that cannot be accessed in China.
5. What are the advantages of hosting in Mainland China?
Hosting in China is the best option to reduce latency and improve load speed. Load speed is crucial anywhere in the world and especially in a mobile-centric market such as China. In addition, hosting a website in China will improve search engine visibility. Chinese search engines typically rank websites hosted in Mainland China higher than those that are not.
6. Do I need a Chinese domain name for my China website? What are the requirements?
A Chinese (.cn) domain is optional and is not required to host in Mainland China. Purchasing a Chinese domain (.cn) is straightforward, as it requires only passport identification. A Chinese domain name application takes approximately 2-3 days to process.
7. We are worried about affecting users in the U.S/ Europe, should we switch our website hosting to China. Do you have a recommended solution?
A popular solution for companies wishing to serve multiple markets from one location is to host in Hong Kong. Hong Kong has low setup requirements and provides effective coverage for Mainland China and international regions. An alternative is to continue hosting in the U.S. and deliver your website in China via a Content Delivery Network (CDN). CDN offers a high performance caching network to speed up your website delivery and manage spikes in traffic. Finally, there is the option of hosting your website in Mainland China or Hong Kong and linking to CDN nodes in the U.S. To deploy your website on a hosting server or CDN located in Mainland China you will first need to obtain ICP certification.