5 major growth types of brand marketing!

First, let me say the golden sentence:

Five growth types of new consumer brands

Low-price vacancies, price killer: Mixue Ice City-type growth (Helens, Perfect Diary)

Quality iteration, better and more expensive, Zhong Xue high-end growth (Xiaoxiandun, Santonban)

New generation, new category: Ubras-type growth (Neiwai, Bananain)

Satisfy Generation Z and occupy new humans: BUFFX-type growth (Daily Black, Ramen Says)

Discover small categories, brands occupy: Micoland multi-type growth (Meijian, Longmi)

01What’s new about new consumption

In the past two years, the word "new" has been added in front of consumer goods, which is quite interesting. This new word did not exist around 2016. At that time it was called: mass entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship by all. Today, the new consumer brand, this new font is reflected in two aspects:

On the one hand: externally facing new consumers, with those born in 1995 and 2000 as the main target customers

On the one hand: internally, the direction of breakthrough is to differentiate categories, and differentiated categories occupy the track

Almost all the new consumer brands you see have carved out a niche in a large category with unique and differentiated functions and characteristics. The products, designs, ingredients, functions and packaging are developed around these functions and characteristics, and the original users are driven to generate market resonance through KOL/C, Internet celebrities and stars.

02 Three major challenges for new consumer brands

What is the competitive environment that new consumer brands face? Simply put: three mountains

Traditional head brands, suppression

Local regional brands, siege

Low-priced products in the industry, random prices

Now, the competitive structure of the major industry in which any new consumer brand is located is roughly as above. Faced with the pressure of the "three" mountains, how new consumer brands can escape and find the blue ocean is not only a matter of survival but also a matter of development.

03 Five growth types of new consumer brands

Low-price vacancies, price killer: Mixue Ice City-type growth (Helens, Perfect Diary)

Quality iteration, better and more expensive, Zhong Xue high-end growth (Xiaoxiandun, Santonban)

New generation, new category: Ubras-type growth (Neiwai, Bananain)

Satisfy Generation Z and occupy new humans: BUFFX-type growth (Daily Black, Ramen Says)

Discover small categories, brands occupy: Micoland multi-type growth (Meijian, Longmi)

Low-price vacancies, price killer: Mixue Ice City-style growth

The market pricing of an industry can be simply divided into three levels: high, medium and low. The milk tea brand market is no exception: new-style tea drinks represented by Heytea and Nayuki are priced at more than 25 yuan per cup; those represented by CoCo and Guming are priced at 10-20 yuan; and those represented by Mixue Bingcheng are priced below 10 yuan. Heytea and Nayuki adopt high-price strategies to target the core business districts in first- and second-tier cities, CoCo and Guming are positioned in the mid-range, and Mixue Bingcheng sticks to the low-price + "surrounding the city from the countryside" strategy.

Each brand has chosen its own path based on the different factor endowments of the organization. The question is whether you can build a complete set of operational features around brand positioning so that consumers will feel that your products (brands) are cool (HEYTEA, NAYUKI), very worthwhile (MIXUE), and definitely not mediocre. In the milk tea market, there is never one more cup of milk tea, nor one less cup of milk tea. The question is: how to make consumers choose you. This is true for the milk tea market, as well as other markets.

The reason why low-priced vacancies exist is due to the consumer demand in the sinking market. Young people in small towns have gone from drinking bottled water and concentrated beverages to drinking a cup of milk tea. The so-called sinking market, in a real consumption motivation, may not mean "sinking" but rather "upgrading" of consumption - what really brings value to business is demand and customer choice.

In fact, the higher the price goes, the more valuable it is not necessarily. A business that looks sexy and one that is actually profitable are two different things. Do you want to run a profitable business or a sexy business? For 90% of business owners, they may not have thought it through. According to the financial report: Naixue's revenue in three years was 5.7 billion yuan and its loss was 138 million yuan. In 2020, Naixue's net profit was 4.484 million yuan, and the overall net profit margin was only 0.2%.

Another thing that needs to be reminded is that simply low prices are not a strategy; the low cost behind them is the strategy. Only the low-price advantage brought by total cost leadership can enable your organization to form a strategic advantage (total cost leadership, differentiation, and focus: from Porter's competitive strategy).

Different from new-style tea drinks such as Heytea and Nayuki’s Tea that focus on fresh fruits and fresh milk, Mixue Bingcheng’s products are mainly prepared with ingredients such as jam and milk tea powder. This also greatly reduced the material costs required for the cold chain. By cooperating with the supply chain construction (previously, Mixue Bingcheng was the only company in the industry that built its own logistics), Mixue Bingcheng achieved the ultimate cost-effectiveness and created Xiangpiaopiao Plus+.

In June 2020, Mixue Bingcheng’s official Weibo account announced that the number of its stores worldwide had exceeded 10,000, making it the first tea beverage brand to have over 10,000 stores. The resulting supply chain and upstream and downstream premium capabilities have in turn enhanced the low price of its products. Ice cream and lemonade can be copied, but the prices of Mixue Bingcheng are difficult to imitate.

In the process of quantitative change to qualitative change, Mixue Bingcheng has always accumulated organizational resources and coordinated operations around brand positioning, thus establishing a set of industry-leading low-cost strategies that belong to it. The more stores it has, the more successful its low-cost strategy is, and the more successful its low-cost strategy is, the more stores it has. When Mixue Bingcheng was the first in the industry to break through 10,000 stores, it also successfully cultivated its left-handed fighting skills, and from then on it became a school of its own, the Mixue Bingcheng school.

Quality iteration, better and more expensive, Zhong Xue high-end growth

From 2007 to 2013, with the rising costs of raw materials such as milk, sugar, chocolate, as well as labor, transportation, and refrigeration, ice cream officially bid farewell to the era of one yuan pricing.

After 2013, traditional ice cream brands needed to find a new growth curve. They have always positioned themselves in the mid-range market, and digging into the high-end market has become the only way for traditional ice cream brands to grow. In 2016, domestic brands began to push up prices, taking a high-end route and competing for market share with foreign brands such as Nestlé, Baskin-Robbins and DQ. Ice cream entered the 3 to 8 yuan range. In 2018, internet-famous ice creams flooded the market, and ice cream moved from offline to online, with prices also entering the 10 yuan+ era.

In 2019, ice cream brands collectively went online. Aoxue opened a flagship store on Tmall in early 2019. In April, Yili, Wall's and Nestlé also opened flagship stores on Tmall. In August, Unilever’s ice cream brands (including Wall’s, Magnum and Grom) also entered the Tmall store. The main battlefield of Yili’s high-end brand Xu Jinhuan is also online - fish swim in the shallows, eagles soar in the sky, and all creatures compete for freedom in the frosty sky.

In 2018, there were only more than 60 online ice cream brands, but in 2019 this number had increased to more than 140. With such competition, brand is the only logic, and branding is the only rule of survival. For new consumer brands, the key is to redefine the value of the category.

In terms of physical properties (use value): there is never one more or one less ice cream in the world. French sociologist Jean Baudrillard once said: “People never consume things for their own sake (use value), they always use things as symbols that can highlight themselves.

It is human nature to get bored with the old and love the new: the needs are always there, waiting to be better met. In fact, to better meet the needs of consumers, we must first have better products and breakthroughs in products, so that there will be a greater consensus on going against common sense. There has never been a so-called logic that marketing is good enough - what goes into your mouth cannot influence you; there has never been a logic that a good product means it cannot be marketed. Product and marketing are two sides of the same coin.

In May 2018, Zhong Xuegao’s first product was launched. From the very beginning, Zhong Xue Gao was determined to create an ice cream that was different from the previous ones. The classic tile-shaped appearance, plus a "proverb" on each ice cream stick that can only be seen after eating, have become the labels that distinguish Zhong Xue Gao from other ice creams on the market.

Zhong Xuegao has transformed ice cream from a basic ego category at a relatively low level in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to an ego category, or even a superego category. The brand’s consumer groups are divided based on its positioning, and consumers then form a dramatic “differentiation” from others in the symbolic consumption of ice cream, realizing symbolic consumption and symbolization of consumption, thereby enhancing the product’s premium ability and transcending the physical properties of ice cream.

Visual difference: Different from traditional ice cream, Zhong Xuegao has made a breakthrough in product appearance, changing the outdated visual sense of traditional ice cream forms such as square, round, strip and stick. Combining with traditional Chinese architectural elements, the tile shape was chosen to break everyone's perception of traditional ice products. Whether a product is good or not first depends on whether consumers are willing to share it with you. Because of the huge difference in appearance recognition, Zhong Xuegao is naturally qualified to be "showed off" - when making products nowadays, if they are not "Internet celebrities", they are not qualified to become a hit.

What you put in your mouth can't deceive you, and warmth is hidden in the details: Compared with traditional ice cream brands that have dozens of SUKs, Zhong Xue Gao chose a short, few and refined product route from the beginning. Its regular products only have about 8 types, such as Light Milk, Velvet Cocoa and Ghana Black Gold. The others are mostly co-branded and seasonal limited editions. By strategically deploying the product structure through a small number of SKUs, the seasonal and random characteristics of ice cream have been changed, and the consumption time has been extended.

If consumers are happy at the climax and end of an experience, then they will feel happy about the entire experience. The feeling in the mouth is true, and there is warmth in the details. In addition to the special nature of the chocolate flavor ingredients, Zhong Xuegao's other products do not contain any food additives, stabilizers, etc. Dairy products and cream are the result of repeated trials and tests. In order to ensure the peak taste experience, one ingredient has to undergo 70 tests. In addition, in order to make a good popsicle stick, he invested 20 million yuan in the supply chain to support his suppliers to carry out standardized and regular operations in terms of equipment, technology, management, and funding. He was the first to change the popsicle sticks from wood to biodegradable straw that meets the national edible grade.

Group suggestion and group imitation constitute the underlying logic of popularity. Communication is essentially group imitation behavior under group suggestion. That is: not through direct persuasion or coercion, but through indirect suggestion to make people accept a certain point of view or engage in certain behavior. According to a survey conducted by Clour Research, 67.8% of users believe that content that promotes good products has a great influence on product selection and eventual purchasing behavior, 74% of users have purchased products that have been promoted, and 80.7% of users will complete the purchase within a week after being promoted.

Avoid the crowded offline world and stand out online with symbolic elements: In the past, ice cream was purchased in supermarkets, hypermarkets and convenience stores, which have long been occupied by brands such as Yili, Mengniu and Lu Mengxue, making it difficult to break through. In the early days, Zhong Xuegao avoided the offline battlefield and adopted online sales methods, turning ice cream into a symbolic phenomenon and phenomenon symbol with social attributes. We focus on deep penetration, product promotion and recommendation on Xiaohongshu, forming a positive cycle in the chain of posting orders-paying attention-purchasing. During the Double Eleven period in 2020, Zhong Xue Gao ranked first in sales in the ice category on Tmall. The number of fans of its Tmall flagship store has reached more than 1.8 million, and 34 million ice creams were shipped out in 2020.

Currently, there are more than 20,000 notes about Zhong Xue Gao on Xiaohongshu, most of which are from mid-level KOLs, and the others are mostly evaluation notes from ordinary people.

On April 1, 2020, Luo Yonghao's first live broadcast of selling goods attracted more than 48 million viewers and a transaction volume of over 100 million yuan, among which Zhong Xuegao was one of them.

Brand collaboration, hashtags: cross-border collaboration with well-known brands. Such as Wahaha, Luzhou Laojiao, Three Squirrels, Fiyta Watches, Roewe Automobile, Nayuki Tea, and Xiaoxiandun. By collaborating with Luzhou Laojiao to launch the "White Wine Blackout Ice Cream" and with Xiaoxiandun, the "Bird's Nest Lava Ice Cream", we have launched ice cream products with different flavors to meet the needs of different users. Cross-border collaboration is not about putting two LOGOs together, but about using and binding customers together. Through brand collaboration, we can create new scenes, stimulate new interests, generate new topics, and add new labels.

Celebrity endorsements, customized products: signed contracts with Tong Liya, Zhou Yiwei, and Ao Ziyi as brand spokespersons. Through the influence of celebrities, we can reach a wider range of people, step out of the "niche" circle, and quickly expand brand awareness and influence, as well as the reach of brand information.

Redefining the value of the ice cream category, integrating products with social attributes, deeply penetrating Xiaohongshu, creating topics through brand collaboration, and increasing coverage through celebrity endorsements. Since the launch of its first product in May 2018, Zhong Xuegao has blazed a trail of its own and also paved the way for traditional ice cream brands. There are no secrets in marketing, and the brand will survive to the end.

Driven by Zhong Xue Gao, other ice cream brands have followed suit. Guangming and White Rabbit jointly launched milk candy ice cream, taking the national trend route; Yili NOC Xu Jinhuan used brand spokesperson Zheng Yunlong to boost brand awareness; Mengniu Green Mood crossed over to the national comic IP "Jiang Ziya"; Wall's, Heytea and Nayuki have jointly launched milk tea flavored ice cream; Madiel has also gradually become popular with the influence of top anchors and food KOLs such as Wei Ya, and the most expensive ice cream sells for 22 yuan; Zhongjie Bingdian launched a new brand "Zhongjie 1946", and the top of the product uses an iconic standing relief, which soon became a hit.

New generation, creating new categories, Ubras-type growth

Nothing has greater potential for growth than a new category. If this category also happens to come with its own dividends, it is likely to produce a "hot commodity".

In 2010, Liu Xiaolu, who was on maternity leave, opened her closet and couldn't find a comfortable piece of underwear. 40% of the European underwear market is without underwire, and the figure is even higher in Japan, at around 50%, while in China, only 10% is without underwire. She quit her high-paying job at a consulting firm, rented a small office on Wuding Road in Shanghai for 5,500 yuan, founded the brand "Neiwai", and launched its first underwire-free bra in 2014.

Two years later, Ubras was founded in 2016, which innovated the category and launched size-free bras based on underwire-free bras. Size-free bras are an upgrade of underwire-free bras. The “no need to try on” feature solves the pain points of traditional bras being difficult to try on and women having to repurchase bras as their body shapes change.

And established a "size-free" standard (PR). Ubras has worked with industry associations to establish a set of corporate standards for "size-free" product series to promote "size-free" products to become an "accessible" underwear choice for more Chinese women. From this point of view, Ubras is obviously more skilled and knows better how to build a brand and lead the new category.

Building a high-end brand should be like religion, compassion for the world and people, I think therefore I am

Mid-range brands should be like the Godfather, teach the middle class, and pretend to be moderate

Low-end brands should be like clowns, coaxing the public to be happy and giggling

The entry-level brand should be like Haonan, who looks like he can conquer the world.

Product side: Upgraded no steel ring, innovative one size

Upgraded to no underwire, innovative one size. The "one size" bra was launched in August 2018. In the Ubras Taobao flagship store, the sales volume of underwear endorsed by Ouyang Nana reached more than 400,000, and 50,000 pieces were sold in 30 minutes during the Double Eleven period alone. By building brand awareness among consumers through one size, the hot sales have helped to strengthen its brand positioning.

Innovative one size, no size underwear. Ubras extends its product line to focus on women's underwear, of which bras account for as much as 55%, and can basically be classified as size-free underwear. In this way, it is easy to form consumers' cognition. When Ubras is mentioned, it is easier to associate it with Ubras size-free underwear.

For new product categories, consumers tend to understand and recognize the brand through products and complete their initial brand recognition through specific experiences with product functions and benefits. Therefore, for a startup brand in a new category, the product is the brand and the brand is the product.

Pricing: Low-price strategy

Pricing is not just a strategy. For a company that creates a new product category, pricing is more about occupying a position and controlling the price segment.

An industry will eventually form its own unique price band, which is formed through competition between consumers and brand companies. Through the industry price band, we can see the overall brand price ecology of the industry and then find market gaps. That is: the price range is relatively less competitive among brands, and there is a potential for profit in the market, with the possibility of entering through high-price or low-price flanks.

The price range of mid-to-high-end underwire-free bras is 200-300 yuan, while Ubras has chosen a relatively affordable low-price strategy with the initial price range of 120-190 yuan. In addition, by cooperating with promotional activities such as live streaming, it can bring consumers a higher cost-effective experience, which is critical for its initial sales volume.

For new categories, low prices can indeed attract a large number of potential consumers in the early stages of the brand. However, as consumers’ understanding of the categories becomes clearer (that is, their needs become clearer through product experience), high-end vacancies will gradually emerge, leaving new opportunities for latecomers - essentially, the stratification of user demand preferences.

There are three vacancies in any emerging category: leader, expert, and new generation.

Traffic side: Category bonus x live broadcast bonus

Ubras' sales on Tmall for the whole year of 2020 were 1.553 billion yuan. From May to July 2020, Ubras grew by 625% and sold 345 million. In fact, Ubras is not the only underwear brand that is selling well. Many underwear brands have achieved huge growth rates, with Clarkarida growing by 2212% and Huxi growing by 1907%. During this stage, the category of underwire-free bras has achieved a huge explosion, and welfare coupons are distributed as category dividends.

If Hua Xizi is the child raised by Li Jiaqi, then Ubras is Wei Ya’s biological daughter. From March to October 2020, Viya promoted products for Ubras in a total of 17 events, including 4 events per month from September to October before the Double 11 promotion. During the Double 11 pre-sale period alone, Wei Ya’s live broadcast room generated 34% of the pre-sale revenue for Ubras. Wei Ya was the main factor in Ubras’s direct jump from Tmall’s Top 10 to Top 1.

When category dividends and live broadcast dividends arrive

An excellent entrepreneur must have a sense of dividends

And you have to have the gambling nature to make a fortune

Media side: two Weibo, one Douyin and one Focus Media

Celebrity follow-up endorsement: Cooperate with many female stars (Zhang Hanyun, Meng Jia, Kan Qingzi, Xu Lu, etc.) to promote Ubras product videos on platforms such as Xiaohongshu, Weibo, and Douyin.

Signed Ouyang Nana, focused advertising occupied the minds. The day before the 2019 Double 11 pre-sale, Ouyang Nana officially became the first brand spokesperson for Ubras. Cooperated with many female stars (Zhang Hanyun, Meng Jia, Kan Qingzi, Xu Lu, etc.) to promote Ubras product videos on platforms such as Xiaohongshu, Weibo, and Douyin.

Weibo, mid-level influencer, mainly to cooperate with the brand's new product launches

Xiaohongshu, a mid-level influencer, focuses on daily recommendations

Douyin, placing information flow ads related to spokesperson Ouyang Nana

Station B, mid-level clothing and beauty UP

The essence of private domain is repurchase

In the traffic structure of Ubras’ Tmall flagship store in 2020, free traffic from Taobao accounted for more than 50%, and the transaction volume from independent visits accounted for more than 46%, which was due to its content seeding + private domain conversion.

Private domain conversion: placing an order in the live broadcast room - scanning the code upon receipt - private domain conversion - posting the order on Xiaohongshu - content conversion. It created the brand IP "U喵", using the image of cat to narrow the distance with young consumers, and its personal account in the private domain also continued the brand's cartoon IP.

Goal: Invite ordinary consumers to post their orders on Xiaohongshu, and open up the private domain to form a closed loop of traffic, users, and content

Personality: WeChat personal account “U的喵”, continuously reaching users

Tips: After receiving the product, scan the QR code to add your personal account, you will receive an invitation to post your order on Xiaohongshu. After posting product photos and content with specified keywords on Xiaohongshu, you can get a free piece of underwear at your own expense after successful review.

Operation: Post trial activities and other benefits in Moments, with a series of event previews to attract traffic back to the live broadcast room

Product line coverage, omni-channel layout

From size-free bras to underwear, from sports to body shaping, from Tmall to social e-commerce, the brand's first offline flagship store was opened in Shanghai in 2019. Currently, there are about 10 offline stores in first-tier cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Chongqing.

Summarize the three stages of Ubras:

Cold start stage: category innovation, live streaming, celebrity endorsement, and hot sales

The stage of integrating brand, effect and sales: Weibo, WeChat, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili, Zhihu and other platforms strengthen online traffic and consolidate conversion

Seizing the mind stage: large-scale deployment of targeted elevator media to build brands and seize the mind space

Ubras' marketing model uses (positioning + traffic + content) X (two Weibo, one Douyin, and one Focus Media) to combine traffic + advertising, content + brand, social network + strong media, KOL/KOC/KOS and celebrities. This is the increasingly popular two Weibo, one Douyin, and one Focus Media paradigm for new consumer brands.

New works of old products, occupying Generation Z, BUFFX-type growth

In fact, the young people born in the 1990s are not so young anymore. Born in 1990, I am now over 31 years old. When people are over 33, they are like a broken boat entering a dangerous shoal. If they are afraid of being emptied, they should take care of their health.

The health care product industry is a much-criticized industry. Health care products are sold as if they can cure all diseases. This industry has always been operating in a gray area.

Find a county town, distribute eggs first, organize a meeting, and control it steadily. If you are sick, I have medicine. The medicine is very expensive, but it can cure the disease. By traveling across the country, one county at a time, a small team of only a few people can make a fortune. In the past 40 years, at least three of the richest people have made their first fortune from health products, such as Shi Yuzhu.

Selling the midlife crisis to women

Selling the neighbor to men

Selling longevity to the elderly

Selling horoscopes to the poor

However, such good days are over, but new good days have also begun.

The sale of life-saving health products is over.

It’s the right time to sell health products

Let’s look at a simple data: the scale of China’s health products market is expected to reach 330.7 billion yuan in 2021. In addition, according to the "2021 Emerging Brand Digital Growth White Paper" released by Ebang Power Research Institute, the post-90s and Generation Z consumer groups account for nearly half of the online functional food sales.

Maslow's need theory: Physiological and safety needs are basic human needs. Regardless of what generation they are born in, living longer and living better is the basic need of the general public. The demand has always been there, but the form of satisfying the demand must keep up with consumers. There are two major trends in health care products for the post-90s generation: snackization and instantization.

How to sell health products to young people, turning health products into fast-moving consumer goods + making health products trendy.

China has ushered in a new era of national brands. In the next five years, it is very likely that China will have the next national consumer brand, including a new generation of health products. This is a large market with low concentration. Most importantly, there are branding opportunities everywhere for those born in the 1990s, and this is where this hero can show his talents.

Old product x new design x new marketing x new channel = new generation of health products

First, the product

The more criticisms there are about old product categories, the more room there is left for the new generation of health products. The health care products in the past were not bad, but they were too good. We should treat health care products as health care products and return them to their category attributes, and build confidence in the category. Selling health products by charging an IQ tax is an ineffective strategy for those born in the 1990s.

Take health care products as the root, functionality as product planning, and scenarios as content creation. The root of the category is the basis of cognition, function is the form of the product, the scene is the depth of the content, and the form of the product lies in being close to the people. That is, it conforms to the aesthetic taste of young consumers.

BUFFX: Functional, candy. The iteration of dosage forms from tablets, capsules, powders to soft candies actually reflects consumers' demand for palatability.

Functionality-based product planning:

BUFF X EAT (Healthy Eating)

BUFF X SLEEP (stress relief and sleep aid)

BUFF X EYES (eye moisturizing and eye protection)

BUFF X SEXY (Male Boost)

BUFF X VC (Daily Immunity)

BUFF X ENERGY (refreshing)

Second, the new design

Regarding what is beautiful, or in other words, creating beauty, satisfying aesthetic standards has become the first hurdle for any new consumer brand on the road to success.

Ramen said, the picture of the long river, the sunset, and the desert sand is very beautiful

Santonban, a new packaging that is different from the traditional bar coffee

Zhong Xuegao, the tile shape is different enough

Buff, very cute and long-lasting

The aging of a brand is first and foremost the aging of its aesthetics. How different are mothers’ brands from new consumer products in terms of products? Each generation has its own aesthetic - you are born here, you die here, you come from the earth, and you will return to the earth.

The soil for new consumer brands lies in new consumers, because the different values, aesthetics, product concepts, and functional concepts brought by new consumers bring new opportunities, new tracks, and new wealth to new consumer brands, and the culmination of all this lies in the brand.

The product is the form, including: appearance, packaging, design, and aesthetics; the brand is the content. BUFFX targets young consumers and must cater to their aesthetic tastes. Appearance is the primary productive force and even more so the primary sales force.

The key point here is: because of the change in consumers, the brand deserves to be redone, and it is definitely not based on the logic of the product.

New marketing, new channels

4P refers to product, price, channel and promotion. New consumer brands are brands that focus on channels and promotions. The decentralization of media, the advent of the short video era, and the accuracy of consumer labels under e-commerce data have all given new consumer brands room to display their talents.

It is not difficult to reach consumers by choosing channels that have both media attributes and channel attributes. Xiaohongshu’s grass-roots promotion, direct investment in the site, Douyin’s hot products, and targeted advertising, the strategy of a new consumer brand may seem like a world of difference between different industries, but in fact, the same principles apply.

At the practical level, it is the specific feel and the ability to perceive stages, data, and consumers. Nowadays, the word experience only works on a macro level, and on a micro level it is a physical sensation. The physical feeling of cutting and polishing is the new knowledge, new abilities and new judgments that grow out of specific stages and data.

The gap between people lies in understanding, discovering and applying new tools

The gap between new brands and old brands also lies in understanding, discovering and using new tools

The front-end Douyin short video buff combines products with life scenarios to open up new product concepts and functional points.

for example:

In the first round, buff will make 30 scripts, provide some basic information that they want to convey, such as sugar-free gummy candies are delicious, etc., and let 30 KOCs make short videos and distribute them simultaneously.

In the second round, buff will look at which short video content performs well, summarize it, and with the help of celebrity support, form the best content direction, which will then be given to 700 KOCs, allowing each KOC to create their own content and distribute it.

In the third round, we will find 1,000 KOCs to target the KOC video with the highest ROI among these short video contents. In round after round of testing, consumers have actually selected their favorite short videos for BuffX.

In terms of channels, BUFFX enters from emerging marketing channels. For its first marketing promotion, BUFFX chose to embed itself in e-sports scenarios and reached a cooperation with Tencent e-sports. In the Beijing auditions of the King of Glory National Competition in September, it interacted with young players through its eye protection and eyesight improvement products.

Discover small categories, dominate brands, and achieve multi-type growth

Consumers have a blank in their knowledge of product categories, and there are categories but no brands: once any product category market enters the stage of oligopoly competition, it means that the entry cost is very high. It's not just the production cost of the post-supply chain, but more about the cognitive education cost of consumers on the market side. Because once the mind is established, it is difficult to change. The competition is not about the shelves or the competitors, but about occupying the cognitive space of consumers.

——If you know the place and day of battle, you can fight a battle thousands of miles away.

Milk brands include Mengniu, Yili, and Bright

Room temperature yogurt includes Amul, Pure, and Mosilian

However, in the minds of consumers, there is no number one brand in the cheese category.

What you can see, your opponent can also see, and your opponent must want to win as much as you do. This is indeed the case. In 2020, more than 150 registered companies added their business scope or products including "cheese". In 2021, there are more than 49 cheese stick brands on the market, and it is very busy.

Cheese newcomer: Miaofei was founded in 2018. After its products were launched in 2019, it successfully obtained two rounds of financing in 2020. Its founder Chen Yun has served as general manager of Yili Cheese Business Unit and vice president of Miaokelando. Dr. Cheese, founded in 2019, completed equity financing in 2020 and 2021, including from well-known investment institutions such as Challenger Capital and Sequoia China Seed Fund.

An old brand is coming: Junlebao Group held a new product launch conference in Tianjin, officially launching the Cheese-enhancing formula cheese sticks and the newly upgraded Skech cheese sticks. Sanyuan, at the 2020-2021 Sanyuan Cheese Development Sharing Conference, also officially incorporated the cheese business into the company's "strategic-level" projects, and specially established the Cheese Academy of the Special Channel Business Department.

Faced with the pincer attack from new and old competitors, the question is not how to defeat the opponents, but how to quickly create the brand recognition advantage of Meiji Landou. Meiji Landou knows that competition only takes place in consumers’ cognition, and its method of occupying cognitive gaps is to launch a saturation attack by “land, sea and air” in the empty mind.

Two Tigers and Meiji Landou have been launched by land, sea and air to capture the minds of consumers: relying on the elevator advertising bombardment of Focus Media and the brainwashing advertising songs of Two Tigers and Meiji Landou, Meiji Landou has captured the minds of consumers.

When we first launched Focus Media, we thought that the four words "Miaokelando" were difficult to remember. How could we make them remember? We made the decision to use songs to spread the word and make everyone remember Meiji Landou. We found the French nursery rhyme "Two Tigers" and adapted it into "Miaokeland, Miaokeland, cheese sticks, cheese sticks..." It is very familiar to everyone - Chai Xiu, Chairman of Miaokeland.

Among the top 10 popular slogans selected by "Inventory of Chinese Advertising Slogans in 2020", Meiji's "Choose Meiji for cheese" became one of the top three most recognized slogans of the year. The results of a nationwide consumer continuous survey from November 7 to December 4, 2020 showed that among urban households' cheese consumption, the sales volume of Yili Group accounted for about 33.8%.

While launching a large number of outdoor advertisements, Meiji Landou began to advertise on provincial satellite TV channels in January. The satellite TV channels currently covered include Anhui Satellite TV, Jilin Satellite TV and Shandong Satellite TV. Meiji Landou mainly promotes its cheese stick products.

In 2019, under the saturation attack of "land, sea and air" in the blank mind, Meiji Landou's brand awareness increased rapidly, and it won the double crown of sales on JD.com and Tmall in "618", with sales growth of more than 300%. After obtaining the letter of trust, Meiji Landou focused on the secondary advertising promotion of "Double Crown".

Among the numerous companies, brands and product information, identifying effective sales signals (sales signals: those that can influence consumers’ minds and become a strong reason for consumers to choose products) is the core value of advertising.

Meiji Landou will continue to expand its operational advantages and brand store matrix, increase the market share of its top products, attract and acquire new customers with new products, and increase its overall market share. In 2020, Sun Li officially signed a contract to become the brand spokesperson for Meiji Landou, breaking the circle through celebrity endorsements + targeted advertising + online. Meiji Landou has achieved the integration of brand, effect and sales. In 2020, online sales exceeded 220 million, with over 3 million fans, joining Tmall’s 100 million yuan club and successfully becoming the cheese sales champion in the e-commerce channel.

Category expansion, product line extension, channel deepening:

Category expansion: covering dozens of nutritious and delicious cheese products such as instant nutrition series, household cheese series and catering industry series. While maintaining the leading advantage of core products, its cheese slices, cream cheese, light cream, butter and other products are also gradually entering the market, further enriching the company's product matrix.

The product line extension is continuously promoting the quality upgrade of cheese sticks, launching new cheese sticks, gold-packaged cheese sticks with higher-end market positioning, and innovative baked cheese products, which are packaged in independent small bags for greater convenience.

Channel deepening: In 2020, Meiji Landou opened up new large end-users, such as Subway, Mr. Pizza, Hormel, etc. At the same time, we launched the "Winning at the Terminal, Leading Chinese Food" project, started product application development for Chinese food companies, built a market development team, quickly laid out the Chinese food market, and continuously filled in the blank market.

As of the end of 2020, Meiji Landou’s retail terminals have exceeded 290,000, covering more than 90% of prefecture-level cities and more than 70% of county-level cities across the country, basically completing its nationwide channel layout.

In 2020, the CR5 were France's Bel (25.0%), Biogra (19.8%), Le Chiu (5.2%), Anchor (5.2%), and Kraft (4.5%), and the CR5 further increased to 59.7%. Currently, according to the latest data from Kantar, Yili Group has jumped to the first place in the industry and become the leader of domestic cheese brands. It is expected to continue to occupy the leading position in the cheese industry in the future. The industry structure has been roughly formed.

The first echelon, composed of foreign-funded cheese brands and leading cheese brands, including Bel, Yili Group, Lezhiniu, Anchor, Kraft, etc., has firmly established itself in the national market.

The second echelon is mainly composed of giant dairy brands, such as Mengniu and Yili, which are ready to go through mergers and acquisitions or adopt new brand strategies.

The third echelon is composed of regional dairy brands, such as Bright Dairy (Shanghai), Sanyuan (Beijing), Huishan (Liaoning), Tara Eji (Inner Mongolia), etc., which operate in the region.

The fourth echelon is mainly OEM brands. As most cheese products are priced relatively high, these brands rely on low-price strategies to seize market share in the cheese market and compete with others at low prices.

postscript:

No matter how small the bowl is, water cannot leak out

No matter how high the water is, it can't flood the embankment

Author: New Consumer Brand Research Society

Source: New Consumer Brand Research Institute