What kind of marketing plan can be implemented?

My personal summary is that the marketing goals can be achieved and the links in the middle can be executed, which means "the goals can be achieved and the links can be executed."

Let’s first say that the goal is achievable.

When a plan comes out, it must have a goal, so the plan should be designed to achieve this goal. But is there a solution that can achieve the goal 100%? Won't. But at least it has to make sense from a business logic perspective.

For example, Yun Gengwu came to us to make brown sugar ginger tea with the aim of increasing sales and product repurchase rate. We believe that they have several basic conditions:

1. Good product. 2. Team execution. 3. Brand and reputation. 4. Tmall’s e-commerce foundation. 5. Promotion expenses.

This is because there is a good foundation on the customer side. We also see that there is room for improvement in its packaging and strategy, so logically it can increase sales and repurchase rate. For the case, see the previous article "Insight into the strategic focus and becoming the number one in the brown sugar category."

Later, Yun Geng’s sales volume increased by 50% and the repurchase rate increased by 30%, which is an achievable goal. Moreover, its basis is the room for improvement that can be seen with the naked eye. Otherwise, the only way to increase sales is to increase advertising costs, which has nothing to do with planning ability.

What if the client’s goal is to “set the entire Internet on fire and become famous”? We believe that we cannot achieve this goal and we do not have the ability to do such a thing. So if someone comes with this kind of demand, we simply won’t take this kind of work.

The second is the feasibility of the plan.

A plan may be feasible for customer A, but not for customer B. Although logically they may both achieve the "goal", because customer B does not have the conditions to implement the plan, the plan will not be implemented either. Let me explain this with a few small examples.

I once saw a company develop a "social liquor" for a well-known liquor brand. I read the planning proposal, and one of the activities was planned in collaboration with Duoduo. But at that time, Duoduo did not accept cooperation from brands at all. This was just a plan "for customers to see" rather than an executable plan. No matter how good or brilliant your plan is, if you can’t execute it, it’s worth nothing.

For example, you design packaging for a bottle of sparkling water. If you design a plastic bottle with patterns or a flat bottom, etc., it will not fall to the ground because there is positive pressure inside the sparkling water bottle, which will make the plastic bottle bulge. The complex patterns you designed will be "ironed" and the flat bottom will also bulge. So when you look at the bottles of Coca-Cola and Yuanqi Forest, they have flat bottoms, four legs, and the bottle bodies are smooth.

If you are planning for a date cake shop and want to use membership to lock in customers and use recharge to increase repeat purchases, then this makes sense logically, but is it feasible?

It turns out that our customers, Manman Yuanqi Zao Gao, asked the waiter to recharge at the time of checkout and attracted customers to recharge through preferential activities. But there is a problem. This jujube cake shop has only one waiter, and he has to complete several steps including taking orders, packaging, promoting sales, and collecting payments. Promoting recharges will take up a lot of his time, and as a result, the sales of the jujube cake shop will decrease. Because customers have to wait too long in line, many customers don’t wait and simply leave. Reference: "Review of the Manman Zaogao Case"

This is simply not feasible in terms of execution.

For example, some customers come to us to "enhance their brand", but we find that the customer's product capabilities are too poor, so we don't do the so-called "brand building" things immediately, but first help customers improve their product capabilities. Marketing can solve the problem that customers come to the store to try it for the first time, but if the products are not good, they will never come back again. Therefore, the product comes first. At this time, we find external agencies to help clients design several good products that are in line with the client’s brand direction, and then do the marketing and communication design.

For example, if you are designing a restaurant's doorhead, the more eye-catching it is, the better, and it would be best if it has a special shape and dynamics. But it’s not possible in Beijing, because the urban management is too strict and it’s impossible to make special-shaped doorheads. For example, it is feasible in Changsha because Changsha is tolerant of urban commercial diversity.

We wanted to improve the quality of our customers' milk tea, so we designed frosted cups, which do have a good feel and quality. However, because the price of customers' milk tea is relatively low, if we also made frosted cups, the gross profit would not keep up, which is not feasible in terms of cost.

For example, if you make some cups with interesting copywriting for milk tea customers, but there are too many copies, the mass production of the cups will be problematic, so a more feasible solution is to make them into cup sleeves, which is relatively flexible and feasible.

If an IP is designed for a brand, its most important task in the future will be to participate in offline activities, which requires it to appear in the form of puppets. The IP image should be designed to be simple, the production should not be too complicated, and the actors should be able to wear it conveniently during performance. Overly complicated headgear and body parts are not only inconvenient to make, but also very costly. For example, the Snow King of Mixue Ice City has a basic structure of two balls, so it is easy to make it into an inflatable doll. However, some brands’ IPs are too delicate, so it is difficult to make inflatable models, and the actors need very complicated costumes and makeup, which increases the difficulty of offline execution. Sometimes it is not cost-effective, which makes it unfeasible.

Another example is the planning that has frequently failed in advertising in the past two years. Although it may attract attention, it violates public order and good morals and challenges social concepts. Although this kind of planning is easy to "go viral", it is not good for the brand, so it is also called unfeasible.

Last year, a fast-moving consumer goods client (who requested that the client’s name remain confidential) asked me how much he should invest in outdoor or TV advertising. This issue is actually a problem of implementation. My answer is very simple. If you don’t have much money, you can invest slowly, but focus on areas where you have advantages, or focus on performance advertising first. If you have a lot of money and can afford it, then double your investment than you expected, but still give priority to investing in core sales areas. If you don’t have money, you’d better test the performance ads first.

If we have a great idea, but it requires tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars to be effective, but the client does not have that much money, then this idea itself is not a great idea, it is just an idea.

The Allied attack on Germany was a large-scale group operation involving millions of people, while China's resistance against Japan was a war of harassment and a protracted war. You cannot say that the former was a great strategy and the latter was not a great strategy. A great strategy is one that suits the conditions of the moment, not one that is measured by the results and scale of war.

The same goes for a good plan. Not all big-money sponsorships of the World Cup are good plans or great ideas, because some brands are suitable for sponsorship (for example, Coca-Cola, whose users are widely distributed around the world, has relatively low costs), and some brands are not suitable for sponsorship (for example, Chinese local brands sponsoring the World Cup waste 80% of the attention).

Our company doesn’t know everything. However, before making a plan, we should also fully communicate and conduct research with the clients, and use common sense to think about work problems. This way, we can accumulate experience in continuous service and continuously improve the quality of service to our clients.

A good plan, one that can be implemented, is one that is tailored to the individual's situation, just like Chinese medicine, where the right medicine is prescribed for the right disease, rather than one-size-fits-all approach.

Author: Xiaoma Song

Source: Xiaoma Song