Marketing promotion: How far are "HEYTEA" from Starbucks?

At the beginning of the year, Ma Dong accepted an exclusive media interview, which had nothing to do with "The Rap of China". The topic was about the tea brand he invested in and supported - "Thank You Tea". The first store opened in Sanlitun, Beijing on December 16 last year. On that day, Ma Dong also brought Yan Rujing, Xiao Xiao and other "The Rap of China" members to the stage. Qichacha information showed that Ma Dong personally holds 75% of the shares.

It is not uncommon for celebrities to start businesses in the catering industry, but Ma Dong is also the founder of Miwei. It’s not that he doesn’t understand business, but he chose the controversial new tea beverage industry. The new tea beverage market has been extremely hot in recent years, giving birth to two major leaders, Heytea and Nayuki. They are also called "Internet celebrity tea" . "Internet celebrity" is a derogatory word, meaning that it comes and goes like the wind. Heytea has made it clear that it does not like to be labeled with this label.

Judging by the facts, looking back at new-style tea drinks at this point in time, there are at least two things that are relatively clear: first, the rise of the new-style tea drink market has become a trend. According to iMedia Research data, the scale of China's new Chinese-style tea drink market exceeded 90 billion yuan in 2018, and it is very likely to exceed 100 billion yuan this year; second, Heytea and Nayuki have not shown obvious signs of decline, and have been expanding steadily and rapidly. Currently, the number of their stores exceeds 140 and 130, respectively.

It is not difficult to find that Heytea and Nayuki are not satisfied with being "Internet celebrities" and they have greater ambitions for their brands. Of the two major beverage markets, the neighboring ready-to-drink coffee market has long formed a situation of "one super and many strong" such as Starbucks, Costa, and Pacific, which gives the tea beverage market great room for imagination in brand building.

It is not a good attitude to label "Heytea" as "Internet celebrities" and hope that they will fade away soon. It is better to compare the success of Starbucks through their development path. This will be more meaningful to the development of the tea industry. After all, the latter has withstood the test of time and the market, and there is no essential difference between tea and coffee.

"Taste good" is not that important

It is actually meaningless to discuss whether Heytea tastes good or not.

Under the shaping of the media, the public's perception of "Internet celebrity restaurants" is mainly reflected in two distinct labels:

1. It all started with hype , whether it was celebrity endorsements or the queue effect;
2. The product is not good , or it does not meet psychological expectations.

Let’s talk about the product first. New-style tea drinks are an overall upgrade to traditional street milk tea. Traditional famous tea is used to make the tea base, and fresh milk is used instead of powder. The quality is not much different. The difference between brands lies in the quality, formula and blending of tea. As we all know, this is not an industry with a high threshold. As long as you put in some thought, the product will not be too bad. The biggest variable is actually that consumers’ tastes are diverse, and this is a problem that is difficult to establish standards for.

Since taste cannot be quantified, how can we establish a product’s competitive advantage? One is to continuously launch new products and create "explosive items". Heytea's milk cap and Nayuki's European bread are typical examples of using the new to defeat the old. One is to focus on a few products and take the boutique route, so the phenomenon of single product explosives has frequently occurred in the catering industry in recent years. The last is to make itself the standard for delicious food and build trust in taste. This is what Starbucks does. Consumers will take its taste as the standard, which means it is invincible.

Therefore, the biggest advantage of new tea beverages, apart from the products themselves, is their brand. Of course, there is a premise here, that is, there are no standards in the industry. Traditional tea and coffee have been consumed for thousands of years, and the industry has countless standards, but this is not the case for new tea drinks. This is where the biggest opportunity lies. Let me add one more thing. Even if coffee has taste standards, why is Starbucks, which is not particularly outstanding, so popular in China? The reason is simple. Chinese people have a short history of drinking coffee, and Starbucks took advantage of being an early arrival.

In China, Starbucks has completely completed the brand building process of product (taste shaping) - scene (emotion sedimentation) - brand (symbol shaping), and has established a stable foundation through a long period of time. After all, people generally believe in the power of time. Judging from the actions of new tea drinks, they are basically continuing this approach, but the speed is generally much faster. Because of competition, consumer changes, the power of capital, etc., and due to the acceleration of the Internet, consumers feel the marketing most obviously, and people subconsciously question how good the popular things can be.

However, product research and development, supply chain management and marketing are actually carried out simultaneously. Milk tea is not like wine that becomes more fragrant with aging. The cycle of catering entrepreneurship can be shortened technically. With the accumulation of industry experience, it is theoretically feasible to create brands that become "explosively popular" and have strong "vitality". "Internet celebrity catering" will become an inevitable trend. In an age of information overload, effective marketing is an essential skill for completing a cold start. Otherwise, Ma Dong would not emphasize "product strength" while standing up for his entrepreneurial brand.

Doesn’t Starbucks have any marketing? It’s just that it doesn’t do much hard advertising. Where did the concept of the “third space” come from? Without this concept being implanted in consumers’ cognition, there would be no Starbucks today. If we compare it with Jonah Berger's classic "Six Principles of Virality" , we can see how successful Starbucks' marketing is:

1. Social currency: The way you sit in Starbucks and chat with your friends makes you look like a high-end business elite.
2. Trigger: When I see coffee, I think of Starbucks. Where should I go to work overtime on weekends? Starbucks.
3. Mood: “Third space”, to relax, unwind, meet friends and enjoy city life.
4. Openness: The most lively places can be found in the aroma of Starbucks coffee.
5. Practical value: Refreshing, resting, holding meetings, working overtime, Starbucks is your must-have.
6. Story: The legend of the mermaid. Do you want to know what is in the mysterious hidden menu?

The medium is the message, and the communication tools will "influence our habits of understanding and thinking", and even social life and behavior . McLuhan's famous theory is constantly being verified today, and our lifestyle is constantly being reshaped by the Internet. From this perspective, marketing, as an invisible clue to Starbucks' success, should also be compared as a separate dimension. This is also a major weapon of new tea brands and should not be simply labeled as "hype" and then returned to the circular argument of discussing product strength.

The first logic:

Product – scenario – brand, can new-style tea drinks work?

• Products: There are many ways to play with tea drinks

No one would deny the huge potential of the tea beverage market, which is not just a tradition of eating habits.

Both the types and the exquisiteness of traditional teas should be better than coffee. There are so many possibilities for combination and innovation. Starbucks has classic fancy coffee combinations such as latte, mocha, cappuccino, Heytea has milk cap, Nayuki has fruit tea, and Luckin Coffee has brown sugar pearls. New tea drinks are much more fun. In addition to milk, there are countless combinations to create a variety of flavors. As for side dishes, European bread is just the beginning. There is no need to say much about the company’s ability to innovate in the tea beverage category.

If the previous milk powder and milk tea were not up to par, the upgraded new tea drinks are not inferior in terms of quality, category or appearance.

Starbucks was able to cultivate the habit of drinking coffee among the tea-drinking people in China. The development of new tea drinks will only be faster, and the market data is there. Don't forget, Starbucks has also been selling tea in China.

• Scene: Awkward situation

New-style tea drinks represented by Heytea and Nayuki have obviously made heavy investments in space creation based on Starbucks ' "third space" approach. They all open stores in core business districts, and are generally large in size, well-decorated, and have a strong sense of spatial design.

According to the survey by "Retail Boss Insider", the new store type of "Nayuki's Gift" introduced AI and facial recognition technology, with a cost of up to 6 million, while the original standard "Four Seasons" theme store cost about 3 million. Another tea beverage brand, Lelecha, which recently received over 100 million yuan in Pre-A round of financing, also had a one-time investment of around 3 million yuan per store, and the investment in its first store was as high as 5 million yuan. Ma Dong’s Thank You Tea has its first store in Sanlitun, Beijing, so the cost is naturally not cheap, as Heytea also has a Black Gold store there.

A good environment only meets the hardware standards. The key lies in the creation of atmosphere and rendering of culture in software, which is very important for brand positioning. HEYTEA’s slogan is “A cup of HEYTEA inspires inspiration”. The core concept it wants to convey is coolness, inspiration, Zen and design. The standard store adopts a simple style dominated by white and gray. In addition to keeping the main tone unchanged, there are also theme stores such as pink theme store, black gold store, LAB store, etc. to try various styles. Naixue’s main customer base is young women aged 20-35, with an overall feminine aesthetic. It creates a "sparkling and exquisite box" and tries to present a bright and warm feeling, reflecting the tea brewing process in the details.

It is not difficult to find that both are trying to find a balance between traditional tea culture and modern trends. Conceptually, they are equally balanced with Starbucks' style of "coffee culture + modern design". The advantage is that as an emerging brand, there is still a lot of room for design exploration, and the changing styles help to capture young people; the disadvantage is that the functional attributes are not as clear as Starbucks. Starbucks has a very strong business and work atmosphere, the white-collar population is highly sticky, and the demands of work and life are different. The former requires stability, while the latter pursues diversity.

The problem facing new tea brands is how to retain fickle young people if they only have social space attributes. If the style is too vague, it will not be recognizable, but if it is too precise, it will lose potential consumers. But at least tea culture has a foundation, and the next step is just a matter of time. An interesting trend is that while new tea drinks are constantly innovating in spatial experience, Starbucks, which pioneered the "third space", has been constantly compressing the comfort of the space due to capital pressure. The increasingly hard chairs are obviously not intended to keep consumers sitting for long periods of time, which will gradually cause it to lose its spatial advantage.

Where will the guests who are driven away by low floor efficiency go? Some of them were taken over by Man Café, which values ​​open space and even provides smoking areas, and some of them flowed into new-style tea shops. After all, the quality of these two places looks quite high.

From products to space, from the imprint of taste memory to the sedimentation of emotional culture, the dilemma of new tea drinks is that, on the one hand, they must be based on traditional tea culture to ensure their authenticity, and on the other hand, they must be bold in innovation to continuously pursue the changing inner demands of modern young people. This puts it in an awkward position from the moment it is born: if it wants to inherit the tradition of "teahouse", it seems too "frivolous", but if it wants to cater to young people, it seems too "internet celebrity". Unlike the coffee shop next door, what is imported from overseas is not only coffee beans, but also the foreign style and literary style, a seamless sense of modernity and "class".

But looking at it from another angle, isn’t the entanglement of new tea drinks between “new” and “old”, “trend” and “tradition” just like China of this era? It will always move forward, because wherever it goes is forward.

The second logic:

How new tea drinks can take advantage of the six principles of virality

The communication laws that made Starbucks successful also apply to new tea drinks.

• Social currency: Creating a “personality” is still on the way

People want to show their good side and make themselves look smart, interesting, professional, or decent, so we carefully select the content we share to maintain our "personality" in front of others.

WeChat Moments is the place where the biggest social currency is created. Why do popular restaurants pay special attention to appearance or set up special photo spots? Isn’t it just to let you post on Moments? The reason why new-style tea drinks put so much thought into space design is, on the one hand, to create a pleasant feeling for you on the spot, and on the other hand, to stimulate your desire to share. Whether it is vision, price or sense of space, it is all about creating a high-end feeling.

Social currency is a reflection of brand power. Starbucks has already become a symbol, and new tea drinks are still on the way.

• Trigger: Getting rid of “Internet celebrity” is the key

Triggers refer to factors that can prompt people to think of related things, such as chocolate to love and Aquaman to Yin Zheng. How to make consumers associate themselves with the product in their daily lives is a psychological issue, so the promotion of the concept of the "third space" is really a brilliant marketing.

Incentives are also an extension of the brand image. Why did Luckin Coffee invite Tang Wei and Zhang Zhen to be its spokespeople? Heytea is eager to get rid of the label of "Internet celebrity" because it does not want people to think that it has no substance and is of poor quality. As a leading representative of new-style tea drinks, Nayuki has fewer negative reviews than Heytea, which is closely related to the conceptual binding of "queue marketing" and "Heytea".

New-style tea drinks have complicated feelings towards “Internet celebrities”. If they want to establish good incentives for a positive cycle, “de-Internet celebrityization” is the only way to go. However, it is not easy to remove the label once it is attached. Continuous content construction and output, and polishing the corporate style in every detail, is the long-term solution.

• Emotions: “Tap water” takes time to cultivate

How to mobilize consumers' emotions and make them willingly serve as the brand's "tap water"?

The reason why people want to go to a cafe is not because of the cup of coffee, but because of enjoying the comfortable and relaxing atmosphere, or even exploring their inner world. "If a city has no people willing to open a coffee shop, then no matter how rich the city is, it is just an empty city inside." Haruki Murakami's words have been quoted by many literary and artistic young people. The coffee shop has been endowed with too many spiritual and cultural attributes, which has turned it from a consumption place into a spiritual necessity. Driven by the cycle of commerce and culture, with the combination of space design, item arrangement, and decoration style, the coffee shop has become a consumer product independent of its product "coffee", which allows it to mobilize the deepest emotions of customers. Starbucks is obviously not an artistic coffee shop, but humanistic spirit is also one of its core values.

Strictly speaking, the "third space" was proposed by sociology professor Oldenburg. In China, the right of interpretation has long been dominated by coffee shops, especially Starbucks. New tea brands are trying to break this situation, looking for new ways of definition among new and old concepts such as "Zen", "inspiration", "fashion" and "technology", and shaping new emotional memories among young people who are eager for a more diverse and flexible living space.

• Openness: Site selection and promotion are a must

How to ensure sufficient exposure to build public awareness, and how to effectively utilize the herd mentality?

The much-criticized "queue marketing" model is a typical example of the herd effect, but it is not a long-term solution. Building flagship stores and experience stores in core business districts is a more sustainable approach, and is also a common route for brand promotion at present. In 2017, when Gu Ming Milk Tea had 1,200 stores, Heytea and Nayuki had only dozens of stores. However, the latter two were much more popular than the former because the former were mainly located in fourth- and fifth-tier cities, while the latter two started from first-tier core business districts. Yidiandian, which also has a first- and second-tier city layout and far exceeds the latter two in number, does not gain much advantage in terms of voice. This is because most of Yidiandian stores are street stores and the stores are generally small, unlike the large stores in shopping malls of Heytea and Nayuki.

In terms of propagation direction, it generally spreads from high to low, from the core to the edge. Later, Lelecha and Thank You Tea both followed this route. Whether it was the cold start of the brand or the establishment of brand trust, they were all ways to take shortcuts in marketing.

Starbucks’ “Six Principles of Site Selection” are widely circulated, and Heytea and other companies are obviously already using them. What they need to think about more is what to do if all the good locations have been taken by Starbucks?

• Practical value: not only delicious, but also with atmosphere

How important is practicality?

In his 2019 New Year’s Eve speech, Luo Zhenyu mentioned that the articles with the most collections on WeChat last year were "Remember These 1,582 Words to Master Mind Maps" and "How to Think Independently?" Here’s a full guide. Jonah Berger studied 7,000 articles from The New York Times and found that education and health articles were forwarded more than sports and politics. From the perspective of interestingness and usefulness, interesting articles have a sharing rate of 25%+, while useful articles have a sharing rate of 30%+.

New tea brands have been emphasizing that their drinks are healthy and delicious, but they still lack consumer awareness in more competitive scenarios. After all, drinking comfortably, chatting happily, and working attentively are the practicality of Starbucks.

• Story: Beware of the collapse of "personality"

People generally don't like watching advertisements, but most of them will not reject stories.

Since the beginning of Internet entrepreneurship, the founders of domestic companies have stepped out from behind the scenes and started to drive the spread of their businesses through their personalities. Heytea has Nie Yunchen’s entrepreneurial story, Nayuki has Peng Xin and Zhao Lin’s love story, and Thank You Tea has Ma Dong personally coming out to endorse it, all of which are typical examples of content marketing.

In this regard, the new-style tea drinks that originated in China have greater advantages than Starbucks, and are more friendly and topical in terms of culture, people and time.

However, the founder’s “personality” story is also very risky. Once the image collapses, the brand will also suffer a huge impact. After the initial marketing boost, how to make the characters fade behind the scenes in the later stages and let the brand’s concept and cultural image come to the fore is an important issue that requires a good sense of proportion.

Finally, as the new tea beverage market is about to exceed 100 billion yuan, we should also step out of the context of self-criticism and deconstruction of "Internet celebrity tea" and face up to the rise of this industry. Starbucks has dominated the ready-to-drink beverage market for many years. Whether it is Luckin Coffee's similar disruption or the rise of Heytea and others, full and diverse competition is not a bad thing for consumers. What's more, in a country that has been drinking tea for thousands of years, shouldn't there be several tea brands?

Source: Tanglang Finance (ID: TanglangFin