Will Internet marketing hardware companies such as Xiaomi disappear within 3 to 5 years?

Internet marketing beats traditional channels, which may have been Xiaomi's trump card. However, after the advent of the real Internet era, this trick seems to be ineffective. Even Lei Jun is aware of the risks. In an interview with the media, he said: "I can handle it now, I can handle it next year, and I can handle it the year after next. If it is worthless the year after next, I will go bankrupt."

The value Lei Jun refers to is no longer hunger marketing or a business model without channels, but user experience, content and services. In the future, these valuable things must rely on a new ecological model, which is the LeEco ecological model that Xiaomi is emulating.

Why is Xiaomi’s Internet marketing model outdated?

In the initial stage of Internet marketing, Internet hardware companies represented by Xiaomi not only opened the curtain of Internet marketing through a low-cost, single-channel e-commerce model, but also dragged hunger marketing into the market through hype and vulgarity.

This may be the initial industrial advantage of the smartphone market, but as more and more brands and products join the competitive market, any business model that may harm user experience and interests may become a regression of the times.

Take a certain coarse grain mobile phone as an example. At the beginning of the rise of smart phones, high cost performance may be its first major advantage that quickly won the market. However, with the rise of more and more Internet cost-effective brands, this business model that relies solely on gimmicks and online hype cannot be a long-term solution for seeking corporate development.

More importantly, when this characteristic called "hunger marketing" has surpassed the product itself to become a company-specific label, then what the company wants to provide to users is a product, service, concept, or an illusion of corporate cognition.

Although the leaders of Coarse Grain have repeatedly publicly emphasized that the brand did not deliberately engage in hunger marketing, but simply because the production capacity of the product could not keep up with user demand. Of course, this argument was indeed persuasive when used for public relations at the beginning of the rise of the entire smartphone industry, but after the entire industry structure was established, especially after the brand's user growth and corporate voice increased, production capacity should no longer be a bottleneck problem.

This may also prove that for a company, in addition to the hardware product itself, the user's awareness and the true service value behind the product are what a company seeking long-term development should really pay attention to.

The ecosystem model is the future of hardware companies

As more and more traditional mobile phone manufacturers turn to Internet marketing, the drawbacks of Xiaomi's model have become apparent. After the popularity of this marketing that hurts user experience has passed, where the company's construction will ultimately go has become a major concern for the Internet industry.

The term "ecosystem" may seem familiar, but for Internet companies, it is an evolving process. When LeEco, an Internet company, first proposed the term, it was questioned by the industry. But now, many hardware technology companies, including Apple and Xiaomi, are trying to build their own unbreakable ecosystem "moat".

Although Apple is very satisfied with its ecosystem, its closed nature has caused users to suffer. Since the Steve Jobs era, Apple has begun to outline and build a unique ecosystem through nearly perfect hardware products and a completely closed software system. It is undeniable that for users, such product features enable them to obtain a very unique and perfect product experience value; but for the company itself, such a closed ecosystem has made the ecosystem itself precarious because the product is too dependent on the ecosystem construction.

LeEco's ecosystem is characterized by vertical integration of "platform + content + terminal + application". It is "open closed", that is, the construction of LeEco's ecosystem is not supported by a certain hardware product; and under the construction of the ecosystem system, only physical changes occur between products; instead, all terminal smart hardware can react chemically with other products through the LeEco ecosystem chain, thereby enriching the ecological industry chain itself. As LeEco CEO Jia Yueting said, there is no ecosystem without chemical reaction.

After completing the bold attempt of super TV in smart hardware, LeTV has rapidly launched smart hardware products such as Le Xiaobao, super car, and super phone in the past two years. In particular, the LeTV super phone, which is about to be released soon, not only directly hits the high-end configurations in the field of mobile phones such as full metal body, borderless design, HiFi sound quality, but also directly expands into the overseas international market through LeTV's vertically integrated ecosystem of "platform + content + terminal + application".

At this time, Xiaomi, which had just awakened and spent 1 billion US dollars to fill the content gap, was obviously far behind.

Therefore, we can conclude that hardware companies that simply want to rely on Internet marketing to seek sustainable development will face fatal challenges in the next five years. After both traditional manufacturing and Internet marketing have quietly transformed their industries into ecological ones, we look forward to the arrival of this ecological era.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.