OPPO, vivo, Xiaomi, Huawei: Among the four domestic companies, who is the marketing veteran?

OPPO and vivo , which were ridiculed as factory girl phones, surpassed Huawei and Xiaomi in Q3 2016 and took the first and second places in market share. In Q3 2016, the annual shipment growth of OV and Huawei doubled, with Huawei’s 5.1% YoY growth being better than nothing, while Xiaomi’s plunge was 42.3% (src: IDC).

In the third quarter, OPPO and vivo surpassed Huawei and Xiaomi in terms of shipments to top the list. However, considering the number of mobile phones in stock, it is still unclear who will be number one.

An analysis of 93,025,501 Weibo posts and 18,661,516 Weibo users in September 2016 shows that the number of Weibo users among the four domestic companies is distributed as follows:

Judging from the data on Weibo, if the number of existing machines is taken into account, among the four domestic brands, Huawei has the highest share, and the gap between the four major brands is not much.

The competition among the four domestic brands is fierce. The good sales of OPPO and vivo Q3 naturally make the other two unable to sit still.

Finding young and handsome men to sponsor, sponsoring variety shows, and soft product placement in TV dramas - isn't that just spending money? Xiaomi has recruited Tony Leung, Liu Shishi, Wu Xiubo, and Liu Haoran, while Huawei has spent 150 million to sponsor a reality show and collect stamps from Wu Yifan, Zhang Yixing, and Guan Xiaotong - the two tycoons, Xiaomi and Huawei, have proved with their actions that as long as the problem can be solved with money, it is not a problem.

Is the core competitiveness of OPPO and vivo just spending money on endorsements and sponsorships? Can Huawei and Xiaomi's imitation really hurt the foundation of OV? Behind the battle between the four domestic players, who laughs last and laughs the best?

According to the types of moves made by the four major brands, we divide today's discussion into the following four units:

– Fresh Meat

– Seek downward

– Searching for the best

– Veteran Driver

Fresh meat:

What is most impressive about the promotions of OPPO and vivo is their cooperation with the “fresh meat”.

The logic behind OV's move is straightforward: use fans of young idols as seed users of products and as water armies to spread Amway products for free outside of traditional marketing methods; fans' independent dissemination can often penetrate into intimate social media and offline social relationships that traditional marketing is powerless to reach, thereby amplifying the impact of products.

The key to maximizing the effectiveness of this cooperation lies in whether there is a large overlap between the brand's target customers and the fan base.

Here, we use the fan groups of young idols who have received olive branches from mobile phone brands, Li Yifeng (OPPO) and Wu Yifan (Huawei Honor) as the sampling source, and select about 160,000 Weibo comments (June to September).

When there is no particularly important news about a specific star, fans who leave comments on the star's Weibo are usually more active and loyal. Therefore, it is reasonable to use this group of people as the fan sample population.

The distribution of Weibo users is as follows:

OPPO is one step ahead of its competitors, while the good student Huawei is at the bottom here.

Let’s take a look at the portrait of the fan group:

It can be seen that the proportion of female fans of Li Yifeng and Wu Yifan is much higher than that of male fans. Users in the four super first-tier cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen account for about 10%, and more users are located in other cities.

——These consumers who like good-looking young idols are the core user group of OV. OV's marketing promotion resonates with the aesthetic tastes and social environment of consumers, so its success is justified. Perhaps realizing its disadvantage among these people, Huawei started its own journey of collecting “fresh men” and seeking downward trends.

Search downwards:

After successfully occupying the mid-to-high-end market, Huawei is looking downward. Its Honor brand aims to compete with OV and attract those who are fond of mid-to-low-end phones but whose overall purchasing power cannot be underestimated. Wu Yifan's fan base is indeed the group that Huawei wants to attack.

Is the effect what Huawei expected?

In July, Huawei announced its collaboration with Kris Wu. Here we select the comments from Wu Yifan’s fans on Weibo from June to September to observe the development of this action.

Read the comments first:

Look at the user again:

The proportion of comments posted through Huawei clients has increased significantly; the number of users using Huawei clients has also increased, but it still cannot shake OPPO's dominant position.

Users of the Honor 8 model endorsed by Kris Wu posted 2.155 comments per person, which is much higher than the average number of 1.367 comments among his fan base. The higher the number of individual comments, the more often fans report on their idols’ Weibo, which usually means higher loyalty. From the cooperation between Huawei and Kris Wu, we can see that the promotion of the fan route often drives the consumption of hardcore fans.

It is interesting to note that among Wu Yifan's fans, the proportion of Huawei has increased, while the proportion of Xiaomi has decreased, while OPPO and vivo are still strong - it can be seen that the strong status of OV among young idol fans cannot be reversed by simply collecting "fresh meat".

Searching up and down:

Compared with Huawei's efforts to improve its presence in the mid-to-low-end market, Xiaomi's selection of spokespersons has demonstrated a two-pronged strategy: actor Tony Leung Chiu-wai endorses Xiaomi Note 2, and Liu Shishi, Liu Haoran, and Wu Xiubo speak for Redmi Pro .

Let’s look at the endorsement by Tony Leung first. Under Xiaomi’s Weibo post announcing Tony Leung’s endorsement, the majority of active users are still Xiaomi users, accounting for as high as 89.96%.

In the search index related to Tony Leung, the two peaks pointed out by the red arrows are Xiaomi’s announcement of Tony Leung’s endorsement and Xiaomi’s press conference. Their heights are much lower than point B in the figure (rumor has it that Tony Leung will join a reality show), and are similar to point A (Tony Leung’s stand-in posted a photo, with a similarity of 90%). In other words, not hot enough.

If Xiaomi invited Tony Leung just to make its followers feel proud, say "My Mi is so awesome", and complete the evolution to mid-to-high-end products within the Xiaomi ecosystem, the effect would be good. If the intention is to attack Huawei's core user group and win the hearts of middle-aged consumers, it is still stuck in the stage of "the road is long and arduous, I will search up and down": the fact that Note2 has been out of stock alone cannot make middle-aged consumers pay for it with confidence.

Let’s look at Liu Shishi, Liu Haoran and Wu Xiubo’s endorsement of Redmi. When I see these three names, I always have a question in my mind: What shortcomings does Xiaomi want to make up for by doing this?

There is certainly a clever way to choose Liu Shishi, Liu Haoran and Wu Xiubo: their favorability among male consumers is generally higher than that of Li Yifeng, Wu Yifan and others.

However, the results of safe choices are often mediocre.

Take the comments under Liu Shishi’s Weibo as an example. After the endorsement was announced, Xiaomi's market share only maintained its original level - giving people the feeling that Xiaomi spent the money in a rather useless way.

Perhaps it is because Lei Jun's "endorsement for himself" is too amazing, so when Xiaomi invites a spokesperson, it always feels like adding unnecessary details. Who the new target customers are seems to be an unresolved issue for Xiaomi, which makes people feel that Xiaomi is so vague in the positioning of its spokesperson.

Veteran driver

Having said so much, let’s finally get back to the title : Who is the marketing veteran?

In terms of attracting young female consumers in mid- and low-tier cities, OV deserves the title of veteran driver. As mentioned before, Huawei's signing of the "fresh meat" is only a way to snatch Xiaomi's market share, and has little impact on OV.

Why is this happening?

Without mentioning OV's frequent appearances in various TV programs through sponsorship and cooperation, nor its sponsorship of online programs, award ceremonies, Weibo hot searches, and campus activities, just looking at the following screenshots, you can probably get a glimpse of the big picture.

Click on the red box in the left picture to jump to the right picture:

Huawei and Xiaomi are both very direct, with links to official shopping malls. Just click on me and you can buy from me.

The links for OPPO and vivo are to the official Weibo accounts of the brands. Encouraging clickers to follow their official Weibo accounts is beneficial for content marketing and establishing emotional connections. OPPO’s content marketing account “网绿小欧” is a rare gold V among brands (with over 10 million monthly readers).

Why are emotional marketing and content marketing important?

——What is love in this world? It makes people keep shopping.

Let’s end with a discussion of niche markets.

The mobile phone market is often a whirlwind. Although OV is the hottest star now, the scene of Xiaomi being praised to the sky is still vivid in our minds.

I have great respect for Xiaomi: Xiaomi has achieved perfection in its niche market. It’s just that this market segment is not big enough and its sustainability is not strong: the so-called “nerd losers” will eventually graduate from Xiaomi and move to higher-end products as their economic strength grows. Consumers in this market segment are more knowledgeable, picky, and always "unhappy" about digital things.

What OV has is a group of "leeks" who have entered university or society from their teenage years, have low requirements for mobile phones, and are somewhat "stupid" in the digital field. Wildfires cannot burn them all, and they will grow again with the spring breeze, so they can be harvested almost every year.

When Huawei was ready to go further, it chose the former over "no brains" and "unhappy", and the meaning is self-evident.

OV seeks upward, Huawei seeks downward, Xiaomi seeks up and down - no matter what the final result is, the spirit of exploration of the four domestic companies is a microcosm of Chinese manufacturing going global. Being able to witness them is enough to make one's blood boil.

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This article was compiled and published by @数据冰山(Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting! Site Map