Chinese Content · Native editors, Shanghai

Content is the brand. Especially in 中文.

Translation gives you words. Building a brand in Chinese takes editorial judgement. We decide what your brand should say in Chinese, how the website should be structured around that, and we write it. Editors writing in Mandarin.

15
Years editorial
50
Brands launched
SH
Shanghai team
Talk to our content team See how we write
Translated EN → ZH
Baidu rank: drifting
Native ZH brand-cn.md
H1 内容即品牌
H2 荣誉资质 · 企业历程 · 生产基地
H2 质量认证 · 合作伙伴 · 媒体报道
P 由本地编辑撰写，符合广告法，面向 Baidu 与 AI 搜索优化。
Baidu
Indexed
广告法
Compliant
AI search
Ready
9 seconds

Median time a Chinese visitor spends on a translated foreign brand site before bouncing.

Why it matters

The most important decision in the project.

You can pick the right hosting, the right framework, the right ICP filing path. If the content doesn't land with Chinese readers, none of it matters. The page loads in under a second and visitors leave in nine because nothing on it speaks to them.

We treat content as the upstream decision. Before design, before development, before templates, we figure out what the website should actually say.

Content IA Design Build
What to write · 写什么

What your brand should actually say in China.

The global messaging hierarchy that works in Munich or Boston almost never works in Shanghai. 5 things shift, every time.

No. 01 / 05
信任
3-bullet → 中国

The trust signals are different

Chinese readers scan a brand site for things foreign teams under-emphasise: founder credibility, year of founding, factory location, certifications, partnerships, awards, named clients, media coverage, team size. A clean 3-bullet hero reads as empty rather than sophisticated. The reader assumes the brand is small, new, or hiding something.

Foreign default
3-bullet hero
"Build better. Faster. Together."
Chinese reader expects
Dense trust panel
Founded · Factory · Partners · Awards · Media
No. 02 / 05
决策
Aspiration → 中国

The decision frame is different

Western messaging leads with aspiration. Chinese readers buy on a different sequence: practical proof first, credibility second, aspiration last. Same content, reordered, reads as a credible brand instead of a brochure.

Foreign default
Aspiration → proof
Vision, then specs, then case studies
Chinese reader expects
Proof → credibility → aspiration
Specs first, partners next, vision last
No. 03 / 05
语言
Translated → 中国

The category language is different

Translated SEO keywords almost always miss the phrases Chinese users actually search. We do the keyword research in Chinese, from scratch, before any copy gets written.

Foreign default
Translated keywords
"enterprise software solutions"
Chinese reader expects
Native search intent
企业级软件 / SaaS服务 / 数字化解决方案
No. 04 / 05
形式
Minimal, → 中国

The format is different

Long-form, dense, scrollable. Chinese product pages routinely run 3 to 5 times the length of their Western equivalents. Density reads as a trust signal in this market.

Foreign default
Minimal, whitespace-led
One claim per scroll
Chinese reader expects
Long-form, dense
3 to 5 times the length of the Western page
No. 05 / 05
法律
Superlatives → 中国

The legal language is different

Chinese advertising law (广告法) regulates what foreign brands routinely say without thinking. Superlatives like "best" or "first" (最, 第一, 最佳) are restricted. Industry-specific claims (medical, financial, food, cosmetics) have their own separate rules. We write to compliance from the start.

Foreign default
Superlatives everywhere
"World-class. Best-in-class. First."
Chinese reader expects
广告法-compliant claims
Specific, evidenced, audited language
How to structure · 信息架构

Information architecture is content.

Get the structure wrong and the best copy in the world doesn't rank, doesn't convert, and doesn't build trust.

Typical foreign brand IA
5 pages, product-led
Buries on Baidu
  • Home
  • About
  • Products
  • Resources
  • Contact
  • missing
  • missing
  • missing
  • missing
  • missing
  • missing
Chinese brand IA
11 pages, trust-led
Indexed + ranking
  • 首页 / Home
  • Brand Story Trust
  • Honors & Awards 荣誉资质 Trust
  • Company History 企业历程 Trust
  • Industry / Solutions
  • Cases & Customers Trust
  • Products
  • Factory 生产基地 Trust
  • Partners 合作伙伴 Trust
  • News 新闻动态 Trust
  • Contact
01

Page hierarchy that Chinese readers expect

Foreign brand sites typically lead with Home, About, Products, Resources, Contact. Chinese brand sites often lead with brand credibility, then category education, then proof, then product. The order matches how Chinese readers actually move through a brand they don't yet trust.

02

Trust pages most foreign brands forget

Honors and Awards (荣誉资质). Company History (企业历程). Factory or Office (生产基地). Quality Certifications (质量认证). Major Partners (合作伙伴). Media Mentions (媒体报道). News (新闻动态). Standard on Chinese brand sites and routinely missing from foreign brand sites entering China. We design them in from day one.

03

Baidu-friendly URL and content structure

Baidu indexes structured, original, fresh content from a single primary domain. We design URL patterns Baidu can crawl, internal linking that distributes ranking equity, and a publishing cadence that signals the site is active.

04

AI-search-friendly content structure

Doubao, Kimi, DeepSeek, and Wenxin parse content differently from Baidu. They reward clean factual structure, schema markup, llms.txt files, and content that maps to how a user phrases a query out loud. We write with both ranking layers in mind. Brands setting this up properly in 2026 will be the ones cited by AI engines in 2027 and 2028.

05

Editorial cadence baked into the structure

A site that hasn't published anything in 6 months stops ranking on Baidu. The IA needs places where content can keep coming: a real news section, a knowledge base, an editorial blog, customer stories. We build those publishing surfaces from day one, even if the launch content is light.

Content types · 我们写什么

What we write.

From core brand pages to monthly editorial output, written in Chinese for Chinese readers.

Featured · The brand spine

Core website content

The brand spine. The pages your Chinese audience will judge you on, written in their register, structured for their attention.

Home About Brand Story Founder Story Team History Honors Quality Factory Partners Contact
产品内容

Product and category content

Long-form product pages, technical specifications, application scenarios.

内容运营

Editorial and SEO content

Blog articles, knowledge base, industry insights, how-to guides for Baidu and AI search visibility.

品牌背书

Trust and proof content

Case studies, customer stories, partner profiles, award announcements, media mentions.

转化页面

Conversion content

Landing pages for paid media, lead magnets, gated whitepapers, contact forms.

微信生态

WeChat ecosystem content

H5 mini-site copy, Mini Program content, Official Account article briefs.

How we work · 工作流程

From research to ongoing editorial.

4 stages, each one feeding the next. Most engagements continue past launch into a fixed monthly editorial retainer.

01 Stage 1 of 4

Discovery and category research

We audit 3 to 5 direct competitors end to end, plus the category conversation on Baidu, Zhihu (知乎), and relevant industry sites. Output: a written content strategy naming what your brand should say, what it shouldn't, and where the white space sits.

Output
Content strategy doc
02 Stage 2 of 4

Information architecture

Site map and page hierarchy designed for Chinese readers, with the trust pages, editorial surfaces, and Baidu-friendly URL structure built in. Delivered as a written IA document so design and development know what they are building toward.

Output
IA document + sitemap
03 Stage 3 of 4

Native Chinese writing

Chinese editors writing in Mandarin to the strategy, in your brand voice rebuilt for Chinese readers.

Output
Page-by-page drafts
04 Stage 4 of 4

Editorial review and publishing

Every piece passes through internal review for brand voice, factual accuracy, SEO structure, and 广告法 compliance. After publishing we track performance on Baidu and the AI engines and iterate on underperformers. Publish-and-forget doesn't rank in China.

Output
Monthly performance + revisions

Who Is This For?

Who hires us for content

Brands launching in China for the first time

Companies that need to make the foundational content decisions correctly: what to say, how to structure it, who to be in the Chinese market.

Brands relaunching after a translation didn't work

Foreign sites with translated content that's sat untouched for 2 or 3 years, watching Baidu rankings drift down. The fix is usually a content rebuild before any redesign.

Brands with a Chinese site but no editorial cadence

Companies that launched once, never built the publishing engine, and now wonder why their site has gone quiet on Baidu.

B2B brands with technical depth

Industrial, life sciences, pharma, B2B services that need long-form Chinese content with technical accuracy.

Luxury and brand-led businesses

Brands where the trust signals, founder story, heritage, and cultural fit decide whether the customer buys.

FAQ · 常见问题

10 questions we hear about Chinese content

Tap any question to expand. If yours isn't here, ask us directly.

Ask a different question

You can, and a lot of foreign brands do. It almost never works. Translation produces words; building a brand in Chinese takes editorial judgement. Chinese readers can tell within a paragraph. Baidu can tell within a crawl. If you only have the budget for translation, our honest recommendation is to wait until you can afford to do this properly.

Translation converts words from one language to another. Transcreation rewrites the message for the target culture while keeping the brand voice. What we do starts upstream of both. We decide what your brand should say to a Chinese audience in the first place, then we write that, in Chinese, from scratch.

Not always. About a third of our engagements rebuild the core brand pages and product pages. Another third start fresh. The remaining third use parts of the existing content as raw material and rebuild around it. The Strategy and Audit decides which applies.

Native Chinese editors based in Shanghai. People whose first language is Mandarin and whose career has been writing commercial content. Senior writers, every piece, every time. Every page goes through editorial review before it reaches you.

Yes, but not by translating it. We work from your global brand guidelines and a sample of your best existing content, then rebuild the voice in Chinese using equivalent registers and rhetorical moves. The result feels like the same brand, in a different language.

Upstream of both. The information architecture decides the design. We deliver the IA and content structure first, then design works against that, then development builds it. Reversing the order is one of the most common reasons foreign brand sites in China feel forced.

Tightly. Baidu SEO done well starts with a Baidu keyword map researched in Chinese from scratch, then a content architecture that matches search intent, then content written around those topics. Our content team and our Baidu SEO team work as one. Most clients book both as a single engagement.

We structure content for AI engines from the start. Clean factual answers, schema markup, llms.txt files, content that maps to how Chinese users phrase questions verbally. The brands setting this up properly in 2026 will be the ones cited by AI engines in 2027.

Both, and we recommend the second. Launching with content and never updating the site is the single biggest reason foreign brands lose Baidu visibility over time. Most clients move from launch content to a fixed monthly editorial retainer.

It depends on scope: rebuild versus new, page count, editorial cadence, whether the engagement covers Baidu SEO and AI search optimisation too. Tell us the scope and we send a real quote within 2 business days.

荣誉资质 · Honors · 企业历程 · History · 生产基地 · Factory · 质量认证 · Quality · 合作伙伴 · Partners · 媒体报道 · Media · 新闻动态 · News · 广告法 compliant · Baidu indexed · AI-search ready · 荣誉资质 · Honors · 企业历程 · History · 生产基地 · Factory · 质量认证 · Quality · 合作伙伴 · Partners · 媒体报道 · Media · 新闻动态 · News · 广告法 compliant · Baidu indexed · AI-search ready · 荣誉资质 · Honors · 企业历程 · History · 生产基地 · Factory · 质量认证 · Quality · 合作伙伴 · Partners · 媒体报道 · Media · 新闻动态 · News · 广告法 compliant · Baidu indexed · AI-search ready ·
Ready when you are

Ready to think about content properly?

Most projects in our pipeline start with a Strategy and Audit, where the content territory and information architecture get decided alongside the technology and compliance roadmap. If you already know you need content, we can also start there directly.

Talk to our content team Strategy and Audit Baidu SEO