58 innovative plans for marketing

Chapter 7 Market Competition Planning (3)
3. Choose a follower strategy, which is to keep up with the leader in some aspects, but to go its own way in other aspects.That is to say, it does not follow blindly, but follows the best. While following, it also exerts its own originality, but does not directly compete.Some of these followers may develop into challengers.

Scene reconstruction
1. Scenarios
Jinjiang Inn is the pioneer of economy hotels in China.At the beginning of its establishment in 1996, due to the immature overall market, it could only be limited to the Yangtze River Delta region for development in the initial period.At the same time, this is the first time for Jin Jiang Group to explore economy hotels, and there is no experience to learn from, and the situation abroad is quite different from that in China.All Jinjiang Inn's attempts are to cross the river by feeling the stones, which greatly reduces the speed of its development and expansion.In the early stage of development, Jinjiang Inn did not quickly make a reasonable layout across the country, which became a flaw in Jinjiang Inn.Jinjiang Inn is taking the road of economical hotels that incorporate the concept of commercial real estate, and mainly adopts the method of purchasing commercial real estate for direct operation. The financial pressure of this real estate operation method limits the rapid development of the enterprise.

Due to the open and fast nature of the IT industry, the founder of Home Inns, Ji Qi, completely cast aside the ideological shackles of the hotel industry from the very beginning, and went on a rampage according to his own understanding of the strategy.Home Inns spent two years completing the standardization of their own operating procedures, and then began to make great strides in the layout. Through chains, they quickly formed a scale advantage. Expanded.At the same time, with the introduction of strategic investors, with the strong support of funds, the chain development of Home Inns went smoothly, and went straight to Nasdaq along a straight path.From the point of view of the profit model, Home Inns mainly focuses on leasing, and the goal is to go public, through which the value return of investors can be maximized.

In this sense, Home Inns is a purely economic hotel chain.Comparing Jinjiang Inn and Home Inns, we can see that the profit models of the two are completely different.The trump card of budget hotels is to allow guests to spend the least amount of money to meet the core needs - accommodation and breakfast.In this way, guests will naturally come one after another, and the economy hotel market begins to expand rapidly.Home Inns just caught up with the mature time for the development of economical hotels, and has embarked on the fast track of development from the very beginning.In this way, Home Inns has changed from a follower of Jinjiang Inn to a leader.

Question: What is the key for Home Inns to realize the leap from follower to leader?
2. Role simulation
If your company is a new entrant in an industry and chooses to follow the strategy in order to avoid direct confrontation with industry leaders, how do you choose the best follow-up strategy to grow rapidly?

3. Thinking Enlightenment
Appropriate choice to follow the strategy, the enterprise will often achieve the effect of retreating.Why can achieve such an effect?
4. Physical training games
Props: some paper, some pens.

Number of participants: 9 people.

Method: 9 people were divided into 3 groups, namely A, B and C, with 3 people in each group.Set a specific scenario, Group A is the market leader company, and Group B and C are market follower companies.

Rules: Groups B and C analyze the competitive advantages and disadvantages of industry leaders respectively, and then discuss and form their own market strategy reports. Group A must formulate a plan to continue to maintain its leading position in the industry.The time is 30 minutes.After the game, everyone discussed which of the two groups B and C had the best market following strategy, and which group was the winner.

Purpose: Through the game, cultivate the game participants' ability to plan market following strategies.

5. Improve plan
Reference answer

1. Scenario: Find out the shortcomings of industry leaders.

2. Role simulation: keep an appropriate distance from the leader, learn while avoiding direct competition.

3. Thinking enlightenment and answer ideas: Because the strategy of market challenge and attack may cause fierce market competition and cause revenge from industry leaders.Industry leaders often use more resources directly, and they are more sustainable.Therefore, unless the challenger really has enough strength to challenge the industry leader with an innovative product strategy or a breakthrough in marketing channels, it will be able to preemptively strike.Otherwise, he is better off following the lead than attacking it.But we must pay attention to following the best, and give full play to our originality while following.

Classic look back
Compared with Galanz, Midea and other companies, Joyoung's strength and popularity can be said to be not at the same level.However, in the soybean milk machine industry, Joyoung's "boss" position is firmly seated.Since the establishment of Joyoung Company in 1994 and began to produce soybean milk machines, Joyoung soybean milk machines have been thriving in the market, with a high market share.The reason why a new company can become a product leader is very simple: Few people know that Joyoung invented the soymilk maker itself.Just like Konosuke Matsushita invented the rice cooker, Joyoung deserves a spotlight not because it invented a new product, but because it turned this product into an industry.

In response to the background of many capital forces pouring into small home appliances one after another, in addition to the large-scale competition strategy, there is no doubt that it is a professional and personalized competition strategy.Soy milk and deep-fried dough sticks are the traditional breakfast mode of Chinese people.The food culture and functions of soymilk have allowed Joyoung Soymilk Machine to find a new market with general demand, and has made this market a scale of hundreds of millions of yuan per year.As a differentiated marginal product among small household appliances, Joyoung became popular with its Soymilk Maker.The two technological changes of the non-stick soymilk maker in 1999 and the boiled soymilk maker in 2001 brought the development of Joyoung to two steps.At this time, Joyoung has already become the first brand of household soybean milk machine products.

Joyoung has taken an unusual path in the field of small home appliances. Fortunately, it has created a new industry and succeeded.Wang Xuning, chairman of Joyoung Company, thinks that the success of soybean milk machine means that the personalization of small appliances is stronger than that of large appliances. Joyoung soybean milk machine is just a successful case of differentiated products in the market; Encountering strong competitors is also a key reason.

Having tasted the sweetness of the niche market, Joyoung's development idea is to continue to find new niche markets and make breakthroughs.Joyoung believes that although the soybean milk maker market is growing steadily and has good profits, it is a relatively small industry after all.Therefore, after some careful consideration, Joyoung established the goal of becoming the "No. 2001 brand of fresh small household appliances", and began to try induction cookers, blenders, purple sand pots and other small household appliances in [-].Discover consumers' potential demand for small kitchen appliances, use the existing huge small appliance marketing network, supplemented by targeted marketing strategies, so that Joyoung has repeatedly won victories.In the short three years since Joyoung entered the field of induction cooker, it has taken the second place in the market share of this product.

In the small home appliance market with many and miscellaneous brands, low concentration and insufficient market competition, Joyoung has built a base with unique advantages one after another with a growth strategy designed based on niche thinking.

Skillful touch
Market nichers, also known as market nichers, fill small segments of the market that are not of interest to large companies.This type of target market has the following characteristics: First, large companies are not interested, otherwise the entry of large companies will make market fill-ins impossible; second, this type of market is a subdivided market in the entire target market; third, small segments Sub-markets and subdivisions are multi-level, and the more subdivision levels, the smaller the market size.Market nichers target precisely such small market segments that are not of interest to large companies.

thinking innovation
The executive body of the fill-in-the-vacancy strategy is often the weak, or small and medium-sized enterprises.Although a large enterprise sometimes adopts a fill-in strategy, it is certainly not the dominant strategy of the enterprise.New firms entering the market should initially target niche opportunities rather than the entire market.New start-ups, latecomers entering a new market, should take filling the vacancy strategy as the first choice, or even the only strategy.

From the perspective of marketing, we will find that successful fill-in-the-vacancies in the market generally have three main directions of attack when they seize opportunities. The Virgin Group that provides them with diversified products and services; one is to persistently manufacture or sell unique products to create unique value of products, such as Swatch watches that represent fashion and trends; It is the successful choice of the path of differentiation in the market breakthrough. For example, the direct sales model has achieved the dominance of Dell, and Domino’s Pizza, which loves takeaways, has become an instant hit.

Practical points
How to find market vacancies and find exclusive customer groups is the key to the survival of market vacancies.There are three ideas that can be used for reference:

1. See the stitches. "The ability to discover and fill an underserved market" was one of the most important criteria when Wharton Business School selected the top 2004 contemporary business leaders in the United States in 25.It can be seen that the discovery of gaps is a test and opportunity for enterprises. The "gap" market has a relatively narrow range of products and services, and the market capacity is not large. Large enterprises are reluctant to enter this field because they cannot form large-scale production, so that small and medium-sized enterprises can not only expand their market share, but also increase their profitability.Small and medium-sized enterprises can form a unique competitive advantage as long as they see the opportunity, "squeeze" it immediately, and "get in".

2. Create something out of nothing.Not all open markets are within the great circle of markets.Because for consumers, in today's era of severe excess material production, meeting their needs has become a breeze.However, satisfying consumers' latent desires, or deep desires, discovering or creating a brand new market, and relying on their own sufficient resource advantages, and then transforming them into market advantages, has become one of the important magic weapons for enterprises to win.A brand-new market generally has the following characteristics: the target market is brand-new and is large enough to be profitable; it has good potential for sustainable growth; and the enterprise has the resources and capabilities to develop and control the target market.

There is no doubt that the best way to capture a market is to create it.The ideal market strategist uses his product to position the market.

3. Replace it.Under the high-pressure competition situation of large enterprises, small and medium-sized enterprises are not completely without opportunities.In emerging markets, relying on endogenous comparative advantages, local enterprises can often gain their due market position and replace them in the contest with powerful foreign competitors.The key to the establishment of this comparative advantage is to find the weakness of the opponent, which is likely to be the niche of the local enterprise.However, this niche does not mean low cost and low price.There will be other more valuable niche spots.The so-called weakness refers to the difference between the means and methods adopted by competitors to meet the needs of consumers in this field and the highest satisfaction of consumers.The needs of consumers have not been well met, and this is the market opportunity to replace them.If the company has the ability to provide products or services that satisfy consumers more than competitors, then this market can be used as its target market.Taking advantage of competitors' weaknesses, looking for consumer groups ignored by the powerful, attacking rivals, and replacing them has become another strategy for niche companies to find niche markets.

Scene reconstruction
1. Scenarios
Southwest Airlines is positioned to operate short-haul flights with a flight distance of less than 750 miles, which enables Southwest Airlines to put more aircraft into operation every day and attract more passengers, which can greatly reduce operating costs and enable it to compete with Competitors compete on low prices.Southwest has a reputation for offering customers the cheapest fares, such as $56 one-way from Nashville to New Orleans, compared with $100 or more on other airlines.

Today's Southwest Airlines has grown into one of the largest civil aviation companies in the United States and the most sought after by investors, but the company has not abandoned the strategy of filling vacancies that has been pursued since its founding.

Question: How has Southwest Airlines remained a niche player?
2. Role simulation
If you are a company specializing in "old" books, how to highlight your business characteristics?
3. Thinking Enlightenment
How does an enterprise find the opponent's weakness when conducting a strategy to fill a gap in the market?

4. Physical training games
Props: some paper, some pens.

Number of participants: 12 people.

Method: 12 people were divided into 4 groups, 3 people in each group, namely A, B, C and D groups.Set up a specific scenario, Group A is the market leader, and Groups B, C, and D are market followers.

Rules: Group A formulates a plan to maintain its leading position in the industry, and Groups B, C, and D each plan a market filling strategy report.The time is 3 minutes.After the game, everyone discussed the written materials formed by each group, which group had the most perfect and practical market filling strategy, and which group won.Start the next round of the game, and the winning group plays the role of Group A.And so on, ensuring 30 rounds of the game.

Purpose: To find out the market that the leader is involved in and segment the unique market.

5. Improve plan
Reference answer

1. Scenario: Southwest Airlines maintains its niche status because of its strategy of choosing a unique market and avoiding direct competition with industry leaders.

2. Role simulation answer ideas: fully meet the needs of the target group.

3. Thinking enlightenment and answer ideas: You may wish to start from the following aspects: concentrate your own competitive strength in those geographical areas where competitors have weak market shares or few competitive forces; pay special attention to those that competitors ignore or cannot serve well Buyer groups; chasing customers of competitors who lag behind in product quality, features, or product performance; and launching special sales campaigns to customers of competitors with below-average customer service.

While paying close attention to competitors, those who fill in the gap should not ignore the attention to customers, and cannot simply emphasize competitor-centricity and damage the more important "customer-centric" strategic focus.In the modern market, the formulation of enterprise marketing strategy should not only pay attention to competitors, but also pay attention to customers, so as to achieve the balance between customer orientation and competitor orientation.In addition, in order to seek long-term development, enterprises not only need to formulate and implement competitive strategies and tactics, but also need to consider cooperation, and sometimes even consider cooperation with competitors.

(End of this chapter)