The economy in 2021 is driving the power of consumption towards digitization, brand personality and product efficiency. 


The report relies on the precise insights of Baidu search big data, Baidu index and stargazing chart to fully present national consumption trends, interpret brand marketing changes, and help you calmly cope with the ever-changing consumer market.


In recent years, there have been some new trends in China’s consumer market. Thanks to the improvement of the overall living standards of the people in the town, the rapid development of new townships, and the support of various township consumption promotion policies, the market has become more mature. The report shows that there are low-tiers cities that are driving new consumption upgrades.


According to Baidu’s big data statistics, the growth rate of consumers in entertainment, beauty, life, learning, finance, and health is increasing. The growth rate is even more impressive, and the potential for market launch is even greater, presenting a "dual upgrade" trend of upgrading the consumption of necessities to optional products and upgrading basic needs to development needs.


It can be seen that with the continuous increase of residents' income in low-tiers cities, the consumption-ability of residents in cities below the third tier is also increasing. Young people in small towns, represented by the post-80s and 90s, have been positioned as a group with more spending power and willingness to consume. They express their demands and demonstrate their individuality through consumption, and they have become a new generation of consumers in the consumer market.


At the present, the trend of younger consumers is becoming more and more influencing. The "Gen Z", the main force in the market, is gradually forming its own unique consumer values ​​and dominating the future consumer market. According to Baidu's big data, the 18-24-year-old generation Z is happy to try new things and prefers novel and fun experiential consumption. 


The consumer decision-making is worth paying attention to. In terms of healthy lifestyles, younger consumers show calmness and sophistication that is not equal to their age. Not only do they care about dietary health and safety dimensions such as low-fat and low-sugar, calories, and calories, but in the choice of skincare products, products full of "green" natural ingredients such as marigolds, camellia, and Centella Asiatica are also more popular in among Generation Z. Keywords such as "fabric", "composition", "environmental protection" and "pure cotton" have also become an important consideration for young people to improve the quality of consumption.


With the rapid popularization of mobile Internet, fragmented lifestyles give consumers more time to think about consumption. Diversified and integrated content resources have also become an important factor in guiding users' consumption decisions.



  • For low-frequency demand

Take education as an example. In the decision-making process of the Baidu platform, consumers will compare 3 brands on average, browse 28 times, search 30 times, and the average decision-making cycle is 3 days.


  • For high-frequency demand

Taking beauty as an example, consumers’ decision-making concerns involve more than 20 dimensions such as category, brand, word-of-mouth, and ingredients, with an average of 28 searches every two weeks; for “tutorials” and “stars of the same category” The viewing and browsing of grass-growing content such as "Product Collection" and so on have climbed to an average of 44 times every two weeks.


Regardless of low-frequency demand or high-frequency demand, it can be seen that consumers present a multi-dimensional search, browsing and comprehensive comparison experience in the process of considering consumption decision information.



In line with the above consumption trends, many companies are paying more and more attention to brand marketing, and they are paying more attention to the value of product and effect in their marketing methods.


Mainly as follows:


First, use digital upgrades throughout the product life cycle.


Second, pay attention to the personalization of the brand, and the company will narrow the distance between the consumer and enhance the interaction between the brand and the consumer through the establishment of the personalization of professional talents, KOC, KOL and other types of brand influencers. 


Third, brands began to use diverse knowledge content and information forms to spread knowledge across dimensions, and radiate to more target groups through innovative marketing scenarios.


Fourth, with the right marketing funnel, we will build good marketing of cutting-edge brands and reshaping of product efficiency. 


Baidu Marketing continues to expand the breadth and depth of the content ecosystem, and the rapidly developing content ecosystem will bring more empowerment to enterprises. In the field of content creation, Baidu increases content suggestions in various vertical fields related to marketing decision-making, helps brands build a foundation, and uses knowledge scenarios as brand endorsements to influence user decisions. 

In the future, Baidu Marketing will actively seek innovation and change, promote the accelerated upgrade and iteration of marketing brands and AI marketing, in order to achieve multiple effects to empower brand customers and help business growth.