Independent brand to quality and marketing in transition become a bottleneck

Many facts indicate that China's self-owned brand of passenger vehicles may have grown from a previously unconventional ultra-high-speed growth to a more normal development track. According to the data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers and Passenger Car Association, in the first six months of 2010, nearly 60% of self-owned brands had sold less than half. After that, the market performance of self-owned brand passenger cars continued to decline.

There are two main reasons for this shift: First, the scale of China's auto market is already very large. We expect to continue to maintain the same high level as the first half of the year. In the end, the auto industry must eventually coordinate with other national economic sectors. In a balanced development, the first is that the self-owned brands are experiencing stronger and more brutal competition.

In the past, for a relatively long period of time, Chinese domestic branded passenger vehicles showed greater advantages in price compared with joint venture brands. However, with the rising cost of China's domestic labor market and the rising prices of raw materials, the advantages of self-owned brands have gradually weakened. This shows that it is increasingly difficult for self-owned brands to adopt low-cost, low-price competitive strategies, and that their effectiveness is also becoming less apparent. It is imperative to change the mode of development.

Contrary to this, in the future, price reductions or promotions in disguised price reductions are more likely to be a means for joint venture brands to deal with their own brands. The vast majority of joint venture brands have large annual sales and sales scales, and the economies of scale are prominent, and they have the conditions for price cuts. At the same time, the foreign parent companies of most joint-venture brands are brewing larger-scale product upgrades and upgrading products to meet the new standards that the developed countries and regions will implement more stringent fuel consumption and carbon emissions in the next few years. New regulations.

China's own-brand passenger cars have encountered unprecedented competition challenges for joint venture brands at this stage. It can be said that creating and nurturing independent brands is a long and arduous process. To truly get rid of the crisis, independent brands need to start with the most basic two aspects.

Return to the quality of life as the market competition, first of all in the product, the company's lifeline, the most important protection from product quality. Whether it is the development experience of China Auto itself for more than 50 years or the recent Toyota Motor recall incident that caused a sensation in the world, it clearly shows that "quality is the lifeline of an independent brand enterprise."

The distinct personality of China's own indigenous brands is not yet outstanding. Unlike the mention of Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volvo, etc., consumers are naturally reminded of their dignity, pride and safety. Establishing a prominent personality of the brand will surely go through a long process. To do this, we must start with the quality of the product.

In the automotive world, if it is said that quantity is visible, then what is invisible is quality; if we can see the market, sales, machinery, equipment, and products, what we cannot see is quality, credibility, and good faith. If a company is only staring at the visible, ignoring or even losing the invisible, then it will not be far away from decline.

In the Toyota recalled global recall, there are various doubts about the United States launching this investigation. However, it is undeniable that the series of vehicles produced by Toyota do have quality problems, and some models are still in accidents. Not a small casualty rate.

For Toyota Motor, it has been pursuing the scale effect during its presidency and neglected the company's foothold in products. Over time, it made the crisis further widen. Representative Toyoda Toyoda also clearly expressed this statement in an interview with the media.

After the crisis, some of Toyota Motor's models appeared to be unsalable. In the Chinese market, FAW Toyota's RAV4 model was hard to find from the original car, and now there have been many concessions. This has brought tremendous pressure on the promotion of FAW Toyota. Originally this was a very competitive product in China's market segments. Although FAW Toyota made a good sales of the car through various methods such as Rangli, its revenue was greatly reduced.

Although the climax of the financial crisis has gradually withdrawn, the industry’s reflection on this has only just begun. The storm of the financial crisis is not only a disaster, but also a mirror that can make people sober. For a long time, the basic competitive structure of the world auto industry is the United States, Japan, and Europe. Among them, Europe is mainly represented by Germany. In this sense, the three nations will actually play against the United States, Japan, and Germany. In the face of this crisis, the important conclusion drawn by the industry's reflection is that for a company that can stand in the market, the scale does not mean that it is strong and it should not be the most important goal. The quality of excellence is the foundation of the company. this.

GM, Ford and Toyota all suffered heavy losses in this crisis, and the mass enterprises that have been making a fuss about quality have not been affected much. The operating conditions have remained stable. Between maximum and strong, multinational car manufacturers have given enough choices to make Chinese cars a lesson.

Breakthroughs in marketing bottlenecks The vast majority of self-owned brands in China are in the initial phase, and marketing has become their most pressing bottleneck. To develop a new situation, independent brands should place marketing at the same level as product quality.

In the corporate world, no one knows that Toyota and Ohno established a Toyota production method (later summed up by American scholars as a lean production method), which has had an important and far-reaching impact on Toyota's development. In fact, there is also a man called Koshita Masaru, who has made a great contribution to the development of Toyota and is completely comparable to the former.

In the early stages of the development of Toyota Motor, sales had been a problem that restricted the development of the company. Of course, although its production capacity has gone up and its output has increased, the products have been slow-moving. By 1950, once there was a situation in which the products could not be sold and squeezed in large quantities, the company suffered serious losses, lack of funds, heavy debt burdens, and difficulties in exit. At this time, Toyota Kiichiro "kept the brothels" and invited "God of Sales in Japan," Shintaro, who used to be the General Manager of the United States in conjunction with the Japanese company's sales manager. After 15 years of training, Toyota Motor Company's unique sales theory and sales methods have been formed. The core of its sales theory is user first, sales second, and manufacturing third. It is this approach that has created a new situation for Toyota Motor Sales.

Prior to Toyota, Daimler-Benz had a dealer named Emile Jelinek, and with excellent results, it laid a solid foundation for the company's development. Based on the contribution of Jelinek and the prestige and influence in the industry, Daimler Benz decided to agree that it was named after his daughter, which is the history of the world-renowned Mercedes Benz brand. Later, Emil Jelinek also changed his name to Jelinek Mercedes from her name.

For an independent brand, sales should be considered as an extremely important event when building a marketing system. Research shows that in Japan, there are far more people engaged in car sales than those engaged in car manufacturers, and the ratio between the two is about 1.9:1. Although Chinese cars do not necessarily copy Japan's practices, marketing should be placed higher.

The newly-created brand is a latecomer to the market. The reason why it is possible to stay home is because there are market advantages. However, to make full use of the advantage of late-generation, the key lies in marketing innovation. Within the scope permitted by the national laws and policies, as long as it is conducive to the development of enterprises and branding, and is conducive to sales, it is necessary to get rid of the shackles of existing models and create models that should be owned by independent brands.