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Seize the opportunity
Brand Family:
Coca-Cola Marketing Campaign in China
August 3, 23. The Temple of Heaven in Beijing once again attracted the attention of countless eyes around the world on this midsummer night. BOCOG held a grand unveiling ceremony directed by Zhang Yimou for the new emblem of the 28 Beijing Olympic Games, which attracted worldwide attention.
On the same day, 1 million Coca-Cola limited-edition exquisite commemorative cans with the new emblem were officially launched. Coca-Cola Company became the first top sponsor of Beijing Olympic Games to be authorized to use the new Olympic emblem. On that day, the Coca-Cola billboard on Chang 'an Avenue in Beijing was replaced with the latest congratulatory advertisement at the fastest speed, and the major shopping malls in Beijing, Shanghai and Qingdao also began to decorate all night. Coca-Cola commemorative cans of the new Olympic emblem have instantly become the latest collection enthusiastically sought after by the public.
Zhao Yanhong, deputy director of the Foreign Affairs Department of Coca-Cola (China), said that in the following days, the shipments of Coca-Cola in these cities were five times as high as usual.
As the "chief" brand in the world soft drink industry for nearly a century, Coca-Cola's limelight this time is just a silhouette of its numerous opportunities to seize the market. In June 2, on the third day after the United States announced the partial lifting of sanctions against North Korea for 5 years, a news that interested the world media came from Dandong on the border between China and North Korea: a truckload of Coca-Cola crossed the border between China and North Korea and was sold to North Korea. At that time, a Reuters reporter with a keen sense of smell kept watching Dandong and caught Coca-Cola being loaded on a North Korean truck. This photo was later widely adopted by the international media.
The most symbolic preemptive battle for Coca-Cola in China was its return to the mainland market in 1979. On the third day after Deng Xiaoping signed the Sino-US Joint Communique in Beijing, the first batch of 3, boxes of Coca-Cola products arrived in Guangzhou from Hong Kong. Coca-Cola became the first foreign consumer product to enter Chinese mainland after China opened its door to the outside world.
If the production of the new emblem commemorative jar shows a kind of strength, then the successful Beijing Olympic bid commemorative jar, which was put on the market on July 13th, 21, shows the keen market awareness and foresight of this global enterprise. In order to make the implementation of its own commemorative cans quick and effective, long ago, Coca-Cola dispatched elite personnel from various departments to discuss and plan commemorative cans. After a long period of preparation, on July 13th, when Samaranch announced that Beijing was the host country of the 28 Olympic Games, the production line of commemorative cans for Coca-Cola Beijing bottling plant was fully started, and 4, boxes of commemorative gold cans were sent to major supermarkets and retail stalls overnight with the residual temperature just retired from the production line.
As the "boss" of the beverage industry for many years, Coca-Cola has formed a highly alert sense of touch and unique and rich operational experience in these major events in the fields of politics, economy and sports. Grasping these opportunities may not bring immediate market effects, but it will strengthen its position as a leading brand again and again in the relevant regional markets. According to trout's positioning theory, it occupies the "site" left by consumers' mental resources for this kind of products, and it is very difficult for other brands to enter again.
the market performance provides a good proof of the significance of this kind of preemptive competition. Wahaha Group, which introduced Coca-Cola, once conducted a survey on "rating Coca-Cola" among consumers across the country through China Business News. According to statistics conducted by Beijing Bureau of Statistics, 63% of people preferred Coca-Cola, 34% preferred Coca-Cola, while Pepsi, the old rival of Coca-Cola, was only 3%. Coca-Cola and Sprite have been rated as the most popular drinks by consumers in various national surveys for six consecutive years.
In terms of actual market share, although Pepsi entered the China market only three years late, the market share of the three major brands of Pepsi (Pepsi, mirinda and 7-up) in China is only about 4% of that of the three brands of Coca-Cola. In fact, the preconceived rules in regional markets are also very obvious.
Price Dominance
Market leaders with economies of scale are generally price leaders. After entering the China market, Coca-Cola has always adopted the osmotic pricing method, which "maintains a low price of concentrated solution for a certain period of time, so that canners can enter the market to the maximum extent, and the price of concentrated solution will gradually increase when the sales expansion is completed". It is estimated that the price of concentrated solution in China market is about 6% of that in the United States. This strategy has made Coca-Cola create huge profits in Latin America.
The advantage of adopting penetration pricing method is that it not only quickly occupies the market share, but also can effectively prevent competitors from entering the market with low prices and small profits. PepsiCo is a follower in pricing, and once fell into the unprofitable predicament after price reduction in several joint venture agreements.
The advantage of being a market leader is that in the competition involving price, followers often cannot be indifferent to the actions of the leader, but the leader can maintain a condescending "contempt" for the actions of his followers. For example, Coca-Cola took the lead in introducing Coca-Cola, Sprite and Fanta products with a capacity of 1.5 liters and 2.25 liters during the Ninth National Games in 22. Although Pepsi immediately launched Pepsi and mirinda products with the same capacity to the market, the products launched by Pepsi were about half a month slower than those of Coca-Cola, and at the same time, because Pepsi's terminal management ability was relatively weak than that of Coca-Cola, when Pepsi's added products were sold in the market, the first batch of added products of Coca-Cola had almost been sold out. Passive follow-up by Pepsi-Cola led to the introduction of additional products to the market without thorough planning, resulting in the backlog of the original 1.25-liter and 2-liter products.
on the other hand, if faced with the price offensive of the challenger, the leader after the brand position is established can and should use the relatively stable price to strengthen the confidence of the channel and express his calmness in the face of the challenger. After the introduction of Wahaha's Extraordinary Coke, an important means of competition is that its price is 1% to 2% cheaper than Coca-Cola. But at least in the primary market, we haven't seen the price of Coca-Cola affected at all.
In 1995, Coca-Cola changed its 3A strategy, which it believed in for many years, into a 3P strategy. The so-called 3A refers to making consumers Available, Acceptable and Affordable when purchasing Coca-Cola products, while the so-called 3P refers to ubiquity, Preferece and Price to value. You can say that it is only a progression in words, but people with keen minds can find subtle changes in their values. For example, "affordable" emphasizes making products cheaper on the premise of ensuring quality, but value for money tends to provide better products at the same price. The consumers who are relatively insensitive to price, or have low price elasticity, are those who often drink Coke and think of Coca-Cola when they talk about it. Therefore, from 3A to 3P, to some extent, a concept of leading brand strategic defense is revealed-not fighting for price and pursuing "consumer loyalty".
Everywhere
Coca-Cola Company has a famous sales motto: Where there are people, people will be "thirsty" and there will be a demand for drinks. Therefore, if the product can reach consumers, it will certainly occupy the market. The so-called "affordable" and "ubiquitous" are also the truth.
the concept of "ubiquitous" is embodied in the construction of channels and terminals, that is, it attaches great importance to the coverage of outlets and retailers' recognition of brands. As early as 1988, when Sprite and Fanta of Coca-Cola landed in Shanghai, there was a lively terminal revolution. Coca-Cola skipped all kinds of intermediate links and directly launched an impact on the terminal: each bottling factory established a huge team of salesmen, equipped with motorcycles, running around the retail stores in the streets, directly sending products to various terminals, investing a lot of freezers and cold water tanks, and providing them to retail stores free of charge.
In terms of building the second-and third-tier markets, which were relatively weak in the past, Coca-Cola began to implement the "11 Plan" in 21, with the aim of strengthening the control of the delivery flow of channels and the price control of terminals. The main content is to cooperate with distributors in the second-and third-tier markets to provide hardware and software services to terminal retailers. The hardware includes providing retailers with refrigerators, freezers, display racks and other equipment, while the software is mainly to train retailers on the knowledge of operating soft drinks. Although this knowledge is trivial, it has a subtle effect on improving the sales of retailers and the brand image of Coca-Cola. For example, Coke at 3-4 degrees Celsius tastes the best, and the training teacher of Coca-Cola should tell retailers how to always keep a lot of Coke, Sprite and Fanta at 3-4 degrees Celsius in the freezer.
it needs to be emphasized that the concept of "ubiquitous" not only means the huge sales network and the penetration rate of terminals, but more importantly, it is a concept of sending Coca-Cola to people in need at any time. A very enlightening example is a sales project of Coca-Cola in the Middle East in the mid-199s. At that time, the project leader found that the sales of Coca-Cola dropped sharply in January each year. The reason is that Muslims usually fast in January, during which they can't eat anything from dawn to dusk. For an ordinary beverage enterprise, this situation is acceptable. Millions of people don't eat or drink. What's strange about selling less? But the person in charge of Coca-Cola thinks this is the idea of lazy people, because Muslims didn't stop eating and drinking during this period-they just stopped eating and drinking during the day. So Coca-Cola changed a lot of promotional activities and advertisements to the evening during Ramadan. The effect can be imagined.
superficial article
Sergio Ziman, the famous former chief marketing officer of Coca-Cola, admired British Prime Minister Tony Blair's campaign strategy. When Blair ran for re-election, it was clear to both analysts and pollsters-he just said verbally, "This is a time of change, and my government will be different." The change he promised was limited to that narrow platform, and his actions were the same as before. But it was this superficial article that helped him win the election. Because the public is tired of the status quo, they may be interested in anything that changes the status quo. For an old brand with more than 11 years, consumers' trust and attachment to taste is deeply rooted, but they need constant new stimuli to stimulate their enthusiasm. This situation certainly needs superficial articles. So Ziman said, "We should follow Blair's example and change the medicine." So Coca-Cola constantly enriches its product positioning by changing the bottle shape, providing various sponsorship and other dazzling superficial articles. In addition, as an international brand, specifically to the China market with strong cultural personality, Coca-Cola also needs to be painted with more local colors. Judging from the series of operations of Coca-Cola in recent years, it is trying to combine the two routes into one.
Coca-Cola has always impressed China consumers with the most typical American style and American personality. For more than ten years from the early 198s, the American TV advertising version with Chinese explanations was basically adopted in advertising, and this strategy was adopted until 1998. However, with the rapid development of soft drink market in China, Coca-Cola's marketing strategy changed significantly in 1999. Last year, its TV advertisement launched in China was filmed in China for the first time, designed by China advertising company for the first time, and invited China actors to shoot advertisements for the first time, clearly giving up its consistent American identity for many years. In order to gain more market share, Coca-Cola is making great strides in China localization.
In the past, the core of Coca-Cola's Localization strategy was "2L, 3O", that is, Long term, local, confidence, Opportunity and civic responsibility. Based on these ideas, Coca-Cola's localization strategy has achieved great success. However, Coca-Cola did not stick to these principles, and it was the first in the world to put forward the localization idea of "Think local, Act local", the main point of which was to make relevant decisions according to local needs. Most of the more than 23 brands of Coca-Cola Company are regional brands. Coca-Cola India Branch launched iced tea, iced coffee, milk, mineral water and a series of juice drinks with local characteristics to enrich the local market. In the way of promotion, Coca-Cola has gradually changed the tradition of global unification in the past, and local companies are responsible for planning and implementing activities such as advertising and promotion. In the China market, Coca-Cola's promotional activities during the Spring Festival in recent years are refreshing. Fireworks, Spring Festival couplets, clay dolls "Ah Fu" and the Chinese Zodiac, which represent the culture of China, have become the theme of Coca-Cola Company's promotion and won the recognition of consumers in China.
In 23, Coca-Cola launched its new logo. The original "wavy ribbon" evolved from a single ribbon pattern to a multi-level and multi-color design; Coca-cola arc bottle is changed into a unique "bubble arc bottle"; The "flying red cover" was replaced by the English font of Coca-Cola Spencer; Coca-Cola's traditional Chinese font has been updated to a more modern Spencer Chinese font. According to Bao Yiqiu, president of Coca-Cola China Beverage Co., Ltd., "We have changed not only the logo, but also a new way of communication with consumers".
The most typical attempt of localization innovation of Coca-Cola brand image was the launch of Daafu packaging during the Spring Festival in 22. The festive red color and the traditional image of China's lucky dolls almost make people forget that the brown liquid in this jar is something imported from foreigners. In fact, this is also Coca-Cola's silent response to the challenges of local brands such as Coca-Cola.
It is worth mentioning that the rustic packaging and advertisements of Daafu may not be so cute to some marketing experts who take it for granted and are used to cursing melatonin, but they are afraid to talk because the invincible Coca-Cola is in use. If the same technique is used on Coca-Cola, it may attract laughter. In fact, what really makes people afraid to talk is Coca-Cola's respect for the opinions of consumers, not bosses or elites, in the process of choosing promotion methods or even the products themselves. Just like Sergio Ziman canceled the new formula and restored it.