In this other post we gave some tips for price negotiation in China. However, we wanted to expand the information a little with this pentalog with some essential tips that we left out:
1. Do not send young people to negotiate. In Chinese culture, age is a symbol of wisdom and power, so it is not a good idea to send a twenty-something to a face-to-face negotiation.
2. Negotiate between workers at the same level. A Chinese may find it humiliating to be the owner of his company and the person who pretends to negotiate with him is a mere salesman without any decision-making power.
3. Do not go to negotiate alone, because they will never be alone. China has a collectivist culture, which implies that they tend to do things in groups rather than individually. Appearing alone in a negotiation denotes lack of interest and also puts us in a situation of psychological inferiority in the case of sitting with five or six strangers at the same table.
4. Take the time to find out who is in charge. In China they have to give all employees pompous titles to make them feel good. The consequence is that we will find departments where everyone is a “manager” of something. We have to talk to people to find out who is really making the decisions in our negotiation arena.
5. Appearance. Stay in a good hotel and rent an Audi or a Mercedes, invite them to eat at a good restaurant, dress with branded clothes and accessories. Appearance is much more important in China than it is in the West, so we should not hesitate to use this weapon to our advantage (as long as we can afford it, of course).
I think these are not the typical China negotiation tips you will read everywhere, we hope you find them useful!
If you want to import from China, do not hesitate to contact us without obligation.
