WPIC Marketing + Technologies Logo
  • Careers at WPIC
Let's talk

Pantone Builds and Protects Its China E-commerce Presence

How WPIC helped Pantone launch on Tmall, improve the customer experience, and protect its brand from counterfeit and unauthorised sellers.

Industry

Key Deliverables

Pantone Case study 1

About Pantone

Pantone is an American company whose colour systems are used by brands, designers and manufacturers around the world.

The company partnered with WPIC to establish a stronger commercial presence in China while protecting the Pantone brand across major digital platforms.

Building an Official Presence in China

Pantone needed more than an online storefront.

The company wanted to build awareness, drive direct sales, and give Chinese consumers a reliable way to purchase authentic Pantone products.

At the same time, counterfeit products, trademark infringement, and unauthorised resellers were creating a separate challenge. Without stronger control over how Pantone appeared online, unofficial listings could compete with legitimate products and weaken the customer experience.

The strategy therefore needed to address both sides of the problem: build the official channel and reduce the visibility of unauthorised alternatives.

Launching and Customising the Tmall Store

WPIC built Pantone’s Tmall presence, integrating its product catalogue, imagery, and customer service functionality into the storefront. The store also included custom product and colour-finding tools designed to help customers navigate Pantone’s range more easily.

These features required deeper technical integration with Tmall than a conventional marketplace storefront, allowing Pantone to create a more useful digital experience around products that often require careful comparison and selection.

Following the initial launch, WPIC continued optimising the storefront, introducing updated products, design improvements and new marketing activity.

Protecting the Pantone Brand Online

Alongside the official store launch, WPIC conducted a programme of marketplace monitoring and brand protection.

The team audited major Chinese e-commerce and digital platforms to identify where Pantone-branded products were being sold and distinguish approved sellers from unauthorised or infringing listings.

WPIC developed approved and restricted seller lists and worked with platforms including Tmall, Taobao, and JD.com to address trademark infringement identified through the audit.

This allowed Pantone to strengthen control over how its products and trademarks appeared online while directing more visibility towards legitimate channels.

Driving Traffic and Sales

WPIC also developed a digital acquisition strategy to bring qualified traffic to Pantone’s official store.

Search optimisation helped Pantone achieve number-one rankings for targeted competitive keywords, while paid search and marketplace advertising expanded the store’s reach further.

The combination of store optimisation, search visibility, and targeted digital marketing contributed to rapid growth in both traffic and sales.

The Results

Within 6 months, traffic to Pantone’s China e-commerce presence increased by more than 2,600%.

Over the same period, in-market revenue increased by 2,200%.

The brand-protection programme also reduced the presence of infringing and unauthorised Pantone listings on major marketplaces, helping strengthen the visibility of legitimate products and the official Tmall store.

Together, the work gave Pantone greater control over both sides of its China e-commerce presence: how consumers discovered and purchased the brand, and how Pantone itself was represented across the wider digital marketplace.

Related work

PMD Beauty

Hunter Boots

Arc’teryx Builds and Protects Its Digital Presence in China

Get content like this in your inbox.

Subscribe