Marketing is an art about distinction, which requires you to create real differences, including psychological and emotional differences. And branding is such a way.

Chinese companies must build brands

Everyone knows Total Quality Management (TQM). It has become something that companies around the world are flocking to, making the quality of products around the world now relatively high. . So how do customers choose a product? Either look at the brand or which one saves him the most money. So what we need now is TBM, which is total brand management.

A brand is a promise, a statement that my brand is different from others and better in some way, even if the competitor's products look the same as yours. Marketing is an art about distinction, which requires you to create real differences, including psychological and emotional differences. And branding is such a way.

Now, many American companies have come to China, such as clothing, and various brands will enter China. But in fact, the things they sell are all produced in China, but the brands belong to others. I just read an article about a very large luxury goods exhibition held in China, which means that there are relatively many wealthy people in China, and they have bought Ferrari sports cars. These global brands are favored by everyone. Therefore, Chinese companies must build their own brands.

Now there are some cheaper brands in China, and they are also competing around the world. This is of course good, but low-price competition will not last long. Everyone knows that the world is flat, and we are all looking for places with lower manufacturing costs, such as Laos, Cambodia, and Africa. Products produced in Africa must be cheaper than those produced in China, so in the end you must build a brand.

Pay attention to new changes in channels

Nowadays, companies need to incur more and more costs in promotion and distribution. A big change is that there are more and more distribution channels. In the past, you had to go to a department store to buy some food. Now you can also buy some food at a gas station because the gas station itself is equipped with a food store. Take TV, for example. In the past, people only watched one or two channels, but now there are more than 150 different channels per day. Therefore, if I made an advertisement and put out a message in the past, half of the people in the country could see the message I conveyed to them, or even half of the world's population. Now, you can't use your information to block other information.

For example, the development of commercial enterprises such as Wal-Mart may not be good news for manufacturers, because these giant retailers occupy this space. They can only sell Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola, and customers also I can only buy these two. Giant retailers are also increasingly inclined to launch their own brands, sometimes even dividing their own brands into two or three types. For example, in a British supermarket, its own brand biscuits are more expensive than the products of the world's largest biscuit manufacturer. So when retailers themselves become manufacturers, many manufacturing brands are in trouble, because the mall's own brands do not have to pay advertising and sales expenses, and the younger generation is becoming more and more skeptical of advertising.

Also pay attention to changes in customers. In addition to their increasingly higher education levels, they also have access to the Internet. In my country, no one now buys a car without going online first. Should I choose a Mercedes-Benz or a BMW? Compare online first, and you can also directly negotiate with the dealer online, plus depreciation, the possibility of resale, etc. All this information can be found online. This is true for any product, now the customer is the king! They are the ones who have the final say, so there is no way you can trick them.

For example, there is a customer who is very dissatisfied with the service of United Airlines. He immediately created a special web page called the anti-flight web page. All netizens are welcome to post dissatisfied information on it. And then disclose it to the entire public. Now that we all have our own blogs, the influence of blogs is very, very large, so we must treat our customers well and not make mistakes.

Position your market

I have a friend who is a professor. He believes that corporate strategy is to define the company's position in the market. In other words, what is your position in the current market? Are you the best company? What is your strategy? What should you do if you are the second or third company? If you are a company targeting a specific market, what should you do?

He said: If you are the number one company, you should first make more customers pay attention to you. In addition, you should pay attention to your competitors, because they may have some new and better products. or service, you may need to imitate him. You might say that leaders need to innovate, but innovation sometimes brings a lot of waste. It is best for leaders to focus on the market.

Companies in second place, such as PepsiCo, either coexist with the first company or challenge it. If you want to challenge the first company, you don't attack it directly, because it has more "weapons" and "armies", you have to attack its weaknesses from the side, and maybe become the first company.

In many cases, the third-ranked company can replace the second or first-ranked company through proactive innovation. The best example is Chrysler. Chrysler created the SUV model. Companies in third place are often innovative companies.

If you are a very small company, at least be an expert or a market participant. For example: I want to make microscopes, but only for universities. I am an expert in the market. I have a very good relationship with the university. I understand their budget and I will provide the university with a variety of equipment. Either you make the best product or you provide the best service to the market.

Eight winning strategies

Concerning market positioning, there are eight successful strategies that I would like to introduce to you.

The first is a strategy that China is practicing: making its products cheaper. Some companies have also launched new business models in terms of low prices, such as IKEA and Wal-Mart.

The second is to design an optimal customer experience. For example, if you want to buy coffee, there are many coffee shops, but Starbucks has convinced everyone: Starbucks is your third home. You will have a different experience here, there are different coffees to choose from, you can also work on the computer there, etc.

The third is that you have the best product quality. There will always be a market that requires the highest quality products, such as the luxury market. Some Italian shoe designers are very good at this, and their products are a symbol of high quality.

The fourth is how to become a leader in a specific field in the world. There must be some people in the world who buy a specific product, such as fish food for tropical fish. You just need to seize a specific market and become an expert in the industry. I am not asking you to be the only expert here. There may be some new competitors in this field. In this case, you need to have a certain combination of specific markets and have two or three areas where you are specialized. For example, your car has With four tires, even if one tire bursts, the car can still drive forward.

The fifth way is to win through a new business model. The kind of business I'm talking about is still the same business you did before, but in a completely new way. A man in France invented a hotel with no one to manage it. You put your credit card on the door and you can enter. There are various facilities inside, so the cost is reduced. Research shows that most billionaires invent a new business model and find a way to control costs.

The sixth type is product innovation. For example: fashion watches, you can own several at the same time, wear different watches with different clothes, and it is a collectible item. The driving force for a company's continuous development and success is not to have enough customers, but to have enough creativity.

The seventh type is to have a very good design. Very good design means creating a way that works for you, makes the product look better, and brings a good image in all aspects.

For example, if I want to buy a computer, the experience of most people is: you will get one or two boxes and move these two boxes home. This box is difficult to open, and then you don’t know which wire should be connected to which wire. You must also know how to install software. None of us like the experience of buying a computer. If the design is very good, it will be easy to open the box and learn how to install and use it.

The eighth method is to obtain more customer information. You can have a customer relationship management system, and you know what each customer needs better than your competitors, and you can tailor it. We know that there are two skills that companies must have, one is tailoring and the other is personalization. For example: the customer is a woman and she wants to buy a swimsuit, then if you take a photo of the customer, then put the photo into the computer, put her in different swimsuits, and help her design on the screen, this is the real of personalization. Personalization means that you know and care about your customers