Brand culture is not corporate culture
American marketing guru Milton Kotler said: "To establish a kind of 'love' loyalty between consumers and products requires a The platform for conveying emotions is the brand,” he also said, “For brand marketing, brands that connect customers with emotional value will ultimately win.
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In recent years, with the formation of the buyer's market for cigarette products and the impact on China's cigarette market after joining the WTO, the tobacco industry has formed a consistent view from top to bottom: Chinese cigarette brands must make great achievements and be able to compete with international Tobacco giants must form big brands to fight against each other. Cigarette industry enterprises have a deeper understanding that in order to form a big brand, the brand must be attractive and have cultural connotation, in order to form brand preference and brand loyalty and become a truly strong brand. Therefore, various cigarette industry enterprises have put a lot of effort into forming brand culture, such as the "Fu" culture of Qujing Tobacco Factory, the "Flying" culture of Changsha Tobacco Factory, the "Victory" culture of Ningbo Tobacco Factory and the "Beyond" culture of Hongta Group. "self" culture and so on.
However, the cultural connotation of many cigarette brands equates corporate culture with brand culture, extends corporate culture to the brand, equates corporate image advertising with brand image advertising, and grafts corporate image onto the brand. For example:
The connotations of "Big Red Eagle - the spirit of the new era" and "Eagle of Victory" are: the take-off of "Big Red Eagle" is the passion and passion that surged in the blood of Ningyan people in the 1990s. Confidence is the moving color that shines when the tangible and intangible assets accumulated by an old brand with a long history are activated. Everything is a true portrayal of the "spirit of the new era"! Victory is a kind of spiritual refinement, the diligent pursuit of a noble cause, the pioneering and innovative spirit of pursuing excellence; the philanthropic spirit of grasping the fundamentals, caring for everything, and caring for life; constant self-denial, and never-ending progress from victory to victory. (Excerpted from the website of Ningbo Tobacco Factory)
"Work hard to achieve good things": In order to adapt to the needs of modern corporate cultural operations and cultural management, Qu Tobacco Enterprise has comprehensively constructed a " It is a new corporate culture model characterized by "Fu" culture" and "competition culture" and "innovation culture" as connotations. (Excerpted from the website of Qujing Tobacco Factory)
"The crane dances on the white sand, and my heart flies": "Half a century of great changes has brought the crane dancing on the white sand, and sixteen years of spring and autumn have brought fruitfulness, and my heart flies." Through the persistent struggle of several generations, Baisha, Over time, we have accumulated a rich corporate culture and interpreted the value concept of "cranes dancing on the white sand, my heart flying". The company's core philosophy and brand image are deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. (Excerpted from the website of Changsha Tobacco Factory)
“The mountains are high and people make peaks”: Hongta people are alert to the self-examination of “there is a sky beyond the sky” and have the confidence after self-knowledge to do “the highest peak of the stretching mountain range”. ", inducing consumers to have the spirit of having products that "represent the highest technological level of China's tobacco", and also conveyed the company's new business philosophy. (Excerpted from Hongta Group website)
Cigarette brands have cultural connotations, which is a progress. Looking at the brand performance of 36 key cigarette brands, my country's cigarette brands have entered an era from a product function-based era to a brand image-based era. A few fast-growing brands have entered an era where personality is king, such as Baisha, Dahongying, and Liqun. wait. The shortcoming is that my country's cigarette brands have not fully interpreted the culture of consumers. To a large extent, they still look at brands from the perspective of enterprises and build brands entirely from the standpoint of consumers, or completely regard brand culture as corporate culture. , or brand culture and corporate culture overlap with each other, you have me, and I have you. As Milton Kotler said: "Chinese companies generally lack experience in building brands and have always pursued an industrial manufacturing culture rather than a consumer-oriented culture." If Chinese cigarette brands want to become international Big brands must clarify these vague understandings. This is because:
1. Brand culture is the culture of consumers
Brand culture represents the values, social status, style and temperament of a specific consumer group, that is, brand culture is followed by Customers; corporate culture is the sum of a company's values ??and behaviors. Corporate culture represents the values ??and behaviors of corporate employees, that is, behind corporate culture are corporate employees. The four major functions of corporate culture (cohesion function, guidance function, restraint function, and motivation function) will only work on internal employees of the company.
Consumers generally don't care about the corporate philosophy, how the products are produced, or how big or powerful the company can be. What they care about is what kind of brand the company provides them and whether it is what they need. Does it represent their ideas and dreams, and does it satisfy their consumption? What they really care about is the functional and emotional benefits that consuming this product can bring to them by choosing this brand.
The Coca-Cola Company does not mention the company's business philosophy at all in its marketing communications, but only disseminates brand culture and brand image to society and consumers. Many people know the cosmetic "Olay", but they don't know that it is also a product of Procter & Gamble. The most successful Chinese cigarette brand in this regard is the Furong King brand image advertisement of Changde Cigarette Factory - "Deliver value, achieve you and me". Both the advertising words and the pictures express the lifestyle and pursuit of the target consumer group, which is the most commendable. Unfortunately, they did not pass on the company's "'Five Leap' strategic ideas for the new century" through King Furong.
2. Brands cannot afford corporate culture
Many cigarette companies in my country attach their corporate philosophy to their brands in a far-fetched way, advocating "giving brands rich corporate cultural connotations." In this way, brand culture is regarded as corporate culture, corporate culture is imposed on the brand, and the brand conveys the corporate philosophy. This makes the brand carry too much content, the hopes of employees, the wishes of the company, and the expectations of leaders, while the product (brand) really carries less of the expectations of consumers. Consumers are unwilling to accept such education and do not accept such concepts. Companies can only achieve half the result with half the effort in building brand image, or achieve nothing. TV advertisements, street sign advertisements, and magazine advertisements are bombarded, which superficially affects consumption. Or, consumers remember the brand, but this is a force-feeding method. It does not arouse consumers' enthusiasm, does not produce deep memories, and does not occupy a certain position in consumers' hearts. The impact is not profound. Yes, it cannot last long.
Chinese cigarette brands should learn from the management methods of major international brands. For example, the corporate philosophy of the famous multinational company Unilever is: "Continuously create sustainable profitable growth for the enterprise, and create long-term value addition for shareholders and employees." However, Unilever's product brands do not convey this information. In China, smooth, elegant, beautiful and shiny hair has always been the perfect image of hair in the minds of consumers. However, in daily life, sunlight radiation, polluted air, wind, dust and air conditioning will damage the hair and lose its soft and shiny hair. . Hence the "Lux" shampoo: with the constant protection of "Lux", your hair will always be soft and shiny! Procter & Gamble has many values ??in motivating, uniting, and constraining employees, but they are not reflected through the brand. Only when reflecting the company's image, it uses "Procter & Gamble, high-quality products" to convey "producing and providing world-class products, beautifying consumption" The corporate purpose of "the lives of readers".
3. Brand connotation should be based on the consideration of consumers, rather than wishful thinking
The message conveyed by a truly strong brand expresses the pursuit and expectations of consumers and represents consumption. The lifestyle of the consumer can resonate with consumers. As a carrier of communication between enterprises and consumers, brands should not convey what the enterprise wants to do and how to do it, but should convey what consumers want to do and how to do it. Brand culture must reflect consumers' thoughts, behaviors and pursuits. In this regard, P&G series products, Unilever series products, and Coca-Cola, which are also fast moving consumer goods, are almost perfect teaching materials.
P&G's "Rejoice", "Pantene" and "Head and Shoulders", Unilever's "Sunsilk", Coca-Cola Company's "Coca-Cola", etc. interpret the benefits of a better life to consumers from different angles. Benefit. Their ability to do this is based on the concept of caring for consumers. Before P&G launches business around the world, it must first conduct research on consumers and markets. The research enables them to meet consumer needs as a starting point and lay a good foundation for the brand. P&G uses a variety of market research tools and technologies to communicate with more than 7 million consumers around the world every year, and understands consumers through multiple channels, such as: home visits and observations, holding consumer symposiums, questionnaire surveys, store visits, Tracking survey system, receiving consumer letters, answering consumer calls, etc. P&G has used this to build a huge database to capture consumers' opinions in a timely manner.
These opinions help the marketing department create persuasive advertisements and formulate powerful marketing plans, help the product development department develop new products, and help the sales department formulate sales plans to ensure that products are distributed to various places for the convenience of consumers.
What most cigarette companies in our country lack is an in-depth understanding of consumers. The will of the company exceeds the will of the consumer, and the will of the leadership exceeds the will of the market. In this case, the brand image generated must be consistent with consumption. If the consumers are far apart, the brand cultural connotation cannot reflect the needs, preferences and pursuits of consumers.
4. Advertising is an in-depth communication with consumers, not talking to oneself
The role of advertising is to communicate effectively with target consumer groups, and to influence the target through appeals and performance information. Consumers exert influence and cater to consumers' purchasing motivations. Since advertising is a kind of communication, there are issues such as "to whom", "what to say", "how to say it", and "in what environment to say it". If you want to achieve effective communication, you must consider using the methods, languages, and familiar or yearning scenes that are acceptable to the target consumers to form a gaze and dialogue relationship with the target consumers. If the advertisement does not care about the other party's feelings, it is self-inflicted. Talking to oneself will not achieve the goal. The successful experience of successful brands is to find ways to please consumers, be considerate to consumers, and constantly improve to represent consumers' changing lifestyles, aesthetic tastes, and values.
In order to show the rugged temperament of men, Marlboro used the image of the western cowboy that Americans have deep feelings about: In the development of American history, the development and expansion of the west went through an extremely difficult process. The government In order to mobilize people to go west, a large number of preferential policies were even introduced. But facing the desolate West, only the brave will regard it as their own paradise. They forged ahead unyieldingly, and then enjoyed the freedom and joy of conquest. This is a major event that really happened in the lives of the American people. This has a strong resonance and inner feeling in the hearts of Americans. This is consistent with the American culture that advocates freedom and respects individuality.
Most brand image advertisements in my country do not reflect consumers' lifestyles, aesthetic tastes and values. Therefore, it is impossible to arouse consumers' desire to consume from the heart. Instead, the exquisite pictures, unique creativity, and magnificent momentum make the audience feel pleasing to the eye and moved.