1 minute to grab the customer's marketing coup

Chapter 8 Grabbing people's hearts is better than grabbing the market (1)
All work is a kind of work, and that is the work of dealing with people.

——"Oil King" John?Rockefeller
1.In the battle of marketing, attacking the heart first

I believe many of us have heard such a case: say, if one day the Coca-Cola factory is burned down, is Coca-Cola still in existence?

Same here.

why?
First, the factory that was burned was not its own, but a factory that did OEM for it.There are Coca-Cola branches and factories in many parts of the world.We also have many companies called Coca-Cola in China, but these companies are definitely not "Coca-Cola", they are the products of cooperation between our Chinese companies and "Coca-Cola".

All the factories of Nike sneakers are not its own. It only has logos and brands. This is called virtual operation.Excellent companies in the future are all like this: no factories, virtual operations—only product development and brand promotion.Because only if you stand in the upstream of the entire industrial chain, can you obtain the maximum profit. If you only purchase raw materials and produce products downstream, your profit margin will be very low.

Second, Coca-Cola's brand is not in the market, but in the hearts of customers, so it cannot be burned - any good brand is in the hearts of people.

So, where is the ultimate market in the marketing battle?
American marketing guru Jack?"The business war is in the minds of existing and prospective customers, and that's where you win and where you lose," Trout said.

But many people think they have the best quality products, and feel that they must be the ones who have the last laugh, so they drive to the "front line" with the products with full confidence.After fighting to the death again and again in the business war, he failed to kill a bloody path in the end, so he had to throw away his helmet and armor and leave the field sadly...

The essence of enterprise competition is the competition of customers' minds, not the market competition!In different historical stages of market development, with the ever-changing market competition environment, the focus of marketing is different:
In the factory era, the essence of enterprise competition was the level of production capacity and product competition. For example, in the period of commodity shortage in our country, as long as you can produce qualified products, you will not worry about not being able to sell them. At that time, the supply was in short supply;

With the development of market economy and science and technology, the production capacity of enterprises has gradually increased, so we have entered the market era. At this time, the focus of competition is to further grasp market resources and occupy markets and channels on the basis of solving product production (as long as you If you can "spread out" the goods, you generally don't have to worry about selling them).That's when supply and demand balance;

Finally, the rapid development of science and technology has brought us into the final stage of the marketing battle - the "mental age". At this time, enterprises can no longer guarantee to win customers by mastering production and market, and the competition has entered the direct competition for customers' mental resources. stage - because at this time, supply exceeds demand.

The corporate strategy in the mind age mainly revolves around two steps:

First, put the product on the market;

Second, put the product in the hearts of customers.

Whether it can enter the hearts of customers has become a major issue related to the survival of enterprises.However, because many entrepreneurs failed to grasp the pulse of this era, many companies have completely ignored this topic as a result.In the end, a large number of products with no problem in quality are continuously produced from the factory and enter the circulation link - the market.But customers are dazzled by the rows of shelves full of similar products.Those products that have never been able to enter the hearts of customers have finally withdrawn from the stage of history, and the companies that produced these products that no one cares about finally "closed their doors" due to the failure of marketing strategies.

We all know that shopping malls are like battlefields, and we all understand the principle of "attacking the mind is the top priority and attacking the city is the bottom" in war, so why not use this "one size fits all" when developing your own business and selling your products? What is the principle? !

The marketing decisions of enterprises usually involve the evaluation of tangible resources such as capital, technology, talents, channels, etc., but the evaluation of an extremely important asset is often overlooked, that is, the "mental resources" of customers.You must know that there is no objective reality in the marketing world, and there is no best product. There is only one thing—the cognition in the customer's mind. Cognition is reality, and everything else is illusion!

To run a company and a brand is to manage the mental resources of customers.Marketing is not about pondering about products, but about working on the ideas in the minds of prospective customers.

The so-called good product often does not mean the product with the best quality, but the product most recognized by customers.In today's "post-consumption era" where similar products are flooding and homogeneity is becoming more and more serious, "the fragrance of wine is not afraid of deep alleys" has completely become a thing of the past.In this era, for any enterprise, selling is the last word (whether you sell tangible products such as bean juice focus rings, aircraft missiles, etc., or provide intangible services such as sauna massage, pedicure and haircut), otherwise, you only have It's time for a break!
Therefore, in the "post-consumption era", the customer is God, and you must serve this "God" well and win his "heart" - grabbing people's hearts is better than grabbing the market.

If any enterprise wants to develop, it must be a win-win process: only if you first understand the customer's mind and satisfy him, can you make money.Therefore, marketing is not in the heart of "I", and it is not the entrepreneur or the boss who has the final say; now is the era when customers are "in charge of their own affairs", and doing business cannot be done behind closed doors.

In fact, many entrepreneurs are busy "retreating and practicing" every day, thinking about how to sell their products without considering what customers think, which violates the taboo of businesses.

There was such a story:
Once upon a time there was a state-owned liquor factory, and there was a marketing director in the factory who was very good at marketing.Later, he saw that China's economic situation was good, and it was booming, so he wanted to rely on the "skills" he had honed for decades, create a brand by himself, be his own boss, and earn a lot of money!
The so-called "thinking is worse than doing it", with this good idea, he immediately rode the "forever" that came with his wife as a dowry to the factory.When I first entered the factory, I happened to meet the Secretary of the Youth League Committee who was full of fat and belly, walking out with a "pregnant" belly.Seeing the secretary's face, he became very angry and thought: Since we are going to leave, what is there to worry about - I have been worried for most of my life, and it is time to "become a grandson"!

After scolding his head and face, he got into the car, whistling and kicking his legs, and was bumped.Only the bewildered secretary stood in front of the iron gate of the factory. How could he have received such special treatment for decades, and he almost shed two lines of "tears behind bars"...

The marketing director returned home full of ambition, just in time to see a very popular TV series called "Water Margin".There is a song in it, "Song of a Hero" sung by Liu Huan. There is a line in it, which Liu Huan sang very powerfully - "Shout out when you see injustice on the road".

"The hero of Liangshan drank a bowl of wine, and then let out a roar..." Inspiration came, and this person registered a trademark with the three characters "Yin Hou", and made a "Yeng Hou" brand liquor.

Then he immediately looked for money, people, and factory buildings. A year later, he even opened the factory and brought out products, and the wine finally came out.The man was ecstatic, thinking he could finally collect money back.This kind of excitement and apprehension is like waiting for someone to call me "Daddy" after ten months of long time.

After the "Yi Yi Hou" brand liquor was produced, he waited and waited, hoped and hoped, but in the end, he didn't sell a single bottle.In the end, the factory was closed, the money was gone, and the wife who was no longer charming also ran away. This person saw that this situation was a bit like what happened to the secretary in his factory after he scolded him-the logic stopped.In his concept, such surreal things would never happen in the real world.

As a result, when he was excited, after a few seconds of depression, his nerves completely collapsed - he was stupid, yelling "shouting, roaring" on the street every day...

Why is this so?This person just figured out the product by himself and never did market research. After the wine came out a year later, the song would have been outdated and no one would remember it, let alone his "Yi Yi Hou" brand liquor!
So, we can sum up an experience through this real example: the market is not in your own heart, but in the customer's heart.Not only the person in the story suffers from depression, but many entrepreneurs around us suffer from depression. Why?Because they can't figure out the way to do business.

Just as the real estate industry pays attention to location, the key to corporate positioning is also location! !It's just that this position is in the heart of the customer.

2.Marketing "peeking mind": insight into the real needs of customers

Since it is so important to seize customers' minds and gain their approval, if we know the characteristics of customers' minds and their real inner needs, wouldn't we be able to act on the wind and prescribe the right medicine?

When it comes to demand, it seems that we all know that it is whether the customer is willing to buy it!
Demand, really that simple, is only determined by objective factors such as income and product cost performance?
To understand the needs of customers, is it really enough to do market research, read the questionnaires, summarize and sort them out?

If a new product is developed completely according to the customer's opinion, will the customer definitely pay for it?
In order to fight against low-end competitors without affecting the corporate image, a food company decided to reduce the price of a popular product to the market without degrading its quality.Whether it is doing customer surveys or doing market tests, the results are very popular with customers.

Can customers not welcome the price reduction but not the quality reduction!
But it turns out that customers are really not welcome, and it turned out to be very serious.Why this unexpected result?The reason is that this food company does not understand the psychology of customers: as far as customers are concerned, as long as the product enters the market at a low price, they will take it for granted that the product is a low-end product, and it is impossible to draw the conclusion that "price reduction does not degrade quality"!

So why did they lie on the questionnaire again?
This is the problem of human psychological mechanism: when we simply think, we use rational thinking; when we really act, we will unconsciously add potential emotional needs.For example, the United States has always called "racial equality", but this lofty ideal may only be maintained in an "ideal state" during the tenure of the current black president-unattainable.

People are often giants of language and dwarfs of action.Customers are human too, so we can't treat them differently.It is already a common phenomenon that customers' words and deeds do not match.A statistic shows that if a company only conducts production and marketing based on various research conclusions, 90% of them fail, and the success rate is only 10%.

Customer research usually implies an important premise: customers can clearly express their needs.In fact, this premise cannot be established.The customer may be able to clearly express the external needs, but he cannot express the inner, potential needs at all.

Just like everyone has their own standards when they are in love, but this standard can never be stated, or cannot be fully stated, just like a poem said: "Can't say, can't say, once you say it, you are wrong." Until One day, a momentary encounter, let us reveal the secret: it is him (her)!
The customer can only express his needs in the language and concepts he can understand (or guided by the researcher).However, due to the extremely limited marketing language and concepts of customers, this is not enough for them to fully express their real needs.

For example, a customer who says they want to buy a cheap product actually wants to buy a cheap product.The former concept can be expressed by customers, and the latter concept cannot be expressed by customers.

However, the theoretical basis of customer research is precisely that "customers can clearly express their needs" - this is one of the core issues of unreliable customer survey questionnaires.

When customers express their needs, they often imply many prerequisites.For example, if a customer says they want to buy an economical car below 10 yuan, this is only a expressed demand, and there are still many unexpressed needs.For example, it must be "sedan car", "fashion car", "blue car"... only when these conditions are met at the same time, the customer will have a purchase behavior.

A study in the United States found that when many customers buy a car, they usually spend 10% to 30% more than they plan to spend.Anyway, 10,000+ is spent, are you afraid of spending an extra [-] to [-]?As long as friends or shopping guides keep pushing, customers can easily change their minds.

And this kind of behavior cannot be discovered through customer research, only the atmosphere of the marketing site can change customers.As long as you have an insight into the psychological journey of customers buying large-scale commodities, you can find that this is the consistent behavior of customers buying luxury goods.

Customers often "do their words differently", and what they say is often inconsistent with their consumption behavior.Man is such a complex animal that he cannot clearly explain his behavior, let alone express it in words.Therefore, when enterprises conduct customer surveys, they must consider the above-mentioned issues, and then adopt some targeted strategies, so that it is possible to ask customers what is in their hearts.

Next, before we go out to interview customers on the street, let's take a look at the characteristics of the customer's mind.Knowing what they think in their hearts, we can see through the layers of "language traps" to gain insight into their real needs, and then take corresponding countermeasures to overcome the enemy when selling.

First, the mind is limited, and marketing must be "up and down"

Psychologists have found through a large number of investigations and studies that the human mind is like a small cup, which can hold extremely limited information.It will simply remember a certain characteristic of a certain product, and then classify the required products.

Under normal circumstances, customers can only remember seven to eight types of products in a certain category, and the trend is to gradually reduce them to two opposing brands.If you think of Coke, you will think of Coca-Cola and Pepsi, and it is often difficult to think of other cola brands.

(End of this chapter)