The China Experts: Jimmy Robinson of PingPong Digital on Building a Brand in China
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
Updated: 3 hours ago
In this episode of The China Experts, Kristina Koehler-Coluccia speaks with Jimmy Robinson, Co-Founder and CEO of PingPong Digital. Jimmy built his career in China, came back to the UK to find that employers did not know what to do with that experience, and turned the frustration into a media agency that now helps foreign brands get noticed by Chinese consumers.
Who is Jimmy Robinson?
Jimmy Robinson is Co-Founder and CEO of PingPong Digital, a China-focused media and marketing agency he set up with two business partners. He spent the formative years of his career on the ground in China, and the agency exists because he saw how badly foreign companies needed help translating a Western brand into something Chinese audiences would actually respond to.
What this episode covers
How Jimmy started his career in China and what those early years taught him
Why returning to the UK was a disappointment, and how employers undervalued his China experience
The decision to go out on his own and found PingPong Digital with two partners
What a China media agency actually does for a foreign brand
Where foreign investors go wrong when they assume their home-market brand will travel
His advice for anyone at the start of their China journey
Why brand building in China depends on your entity
The part of this conversation that catches most foreign investors out is the link between marketing and corporate structure. In China you cannot simply open the accounts that matter and start posting. A verified WeChat Official Account, a Douyin or Xiaohongshu corporate account, an ICP filing for a website hosted on the mainland, a Tmall or JD storefront - each of these is gated behind a Chinese business licence, and in most cases behind a licence held by a locally registered company rather than an offshore parent. Agencies like PingPong Digital can do outstanding creative work, but they cannot conjure a business licence, and a brand that arrives in China without one ends up renting access through a distributor or a third party that owns the customer relationship instead.
That is why the sequencing matters. Deciding whether you need a WFOE, a Hong Kong holding company, or a lighter-touch arrangement is not a back-office question to be settled after the campaign is signed off. It determines which channels you can own, whose name sits on your trademark, and whether the audience an agency builds for you is genuinely yours.
Watch the full interview
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Woodburn Accountants & Advisors helps foreign companies register and run entities in China and Hong Kong, covering company registration, trademark protection, accounting, payroll, tax and audit, plus recruitment and employer-of-record support for local hires.