Place

 

Tesla needs to increase their presence in the Chinese market – more stores, chargers and service centers around the country will expand their reach and visibility. On the short term, the focus should be on tier 1 city’, since these are well developed and have a large number of wealthy Chinese. After that, on a medium and long term, Tesla should expand along strategic locations, in order to make it possible to travel longer distances, everywhere in the country, especially popular routes traveled by the target group, such as Shanghai-Hangzhou, for example.
Tesla should continue to place their stores in highly visible and accessible locations, with the purpose of helping Tesla to further strengthen the brand awareness and memorability in China, making consumers more familiar and confortable with the brand and products.

The limited service offered in China also needs to be addressed. It is not necessary that service centers exist in every city, yet it is mandatory to ensure seamless service experience to all customers, even if this involves sending repairmen to more remote locations or bring the cars to the service centers. As an option, Tesla can limit the risk by restricting sales in areas that have no Tesla network available. 

Also, the pace for the brand expansion has to be carefully planned - Tesla is still growing and has limited resources and production volume, so it is necessary to balance the expansion with the amount of resources and cars available. This is important to ensure that the perceived quality does not suffer with the limited current resources and network. At the same time, Tesla has a first mover advantage being the pioneer in the segment, but is important to keep the developments before the competitors catch up.   

A strong online presence is also important in China. Chinese consumers are highly engaged online and are also the most willing to purchase a car online, compared to rest of the world. The website should be used as a sales and information channel where customers can tailor their Tesla according to their preferences.