Consulting Department If all the property of Coca-Cola suddenly turns to ashes today, as long as I still own the trademark "Coca-Cola", I can definitely announce to you that in half a year's time, a new Coca-Cola company will appear, with the same scale as it is now.
-Isaac Candler, founder of Coca-Cola Company.
The world's first bottle of Coca-Cola was born in the United States in 1886, with a history of 123 years. This magical drink has conquered hundreds of millions of consumers around the world with its irresistible charm, and has become the "king of drinks in the world", and even won the praise of "the never-shaped drink in the empire".
Holographic media marketing theory holds that any product has its life cycle, and it has to go through the leading-in period, growth period, maturity period and decline period. Each time period can represent the consumer's product concept. The length of product life cycle is mainly determined by the communication power, the stimulation of communication and the numbness of consumer response. When the product reaches a certain height in the growth period and maturity period, if the communication rhythm and communication concept are not controlled in time, the product will soon enter a recession period. The advanced management concept of Coca-Cola Company, besides its unique sweet, refreshing and exciting taste, is the key to its present situation. Whether it is the direction of advertising, marketing, channels, or the innovation of planning, strategy and products, it is an important factor that makes Coca-Cola still stand on the top of the tower. Analyzing these management concepts will have a great influence and far-reaching significance on the successful exploration and development of local beverage enterprises in China.
brand building
Advertising is a concept.
Coca-Cola, which is popular all over the world, has played a vital role in its hundred years of development, and its advertising strategy close to the market has contributed to the establishment of its most valuable brand position. As the core content of advertising, advertising language is a clear expression of brand positioning. It reaches consumers through various media, and all market-related activities should echo and complement each other.
We review the development of world brands from the change of Coca-Cola advertising language, especially the successful experience in China market, which has certain reference significance for domestic enterprises.
Please drink Coca-Cola.
From 1886, the first bottle of Coca-Cola came out to the establishment of the first factory in the United States, Coca-Cola was in the initial stage of development, and more people needed to taste Coca-Cola. "Please drink Coca-Cola" became the theme of its activities. After more than ten years, although new advertising slogans appeared from time to time, they were mainly promoted from the functional level of products, such as quenching thirst, delicious food and refreshing. Enjoy when you are thirsty.
An irresistible feeling
The first batch of Coca-Cola products entered the China market on 1978, and the first joint venture factory was established in 1980s. At that time, China was in the early stage of reform and opening-up, and many people in China were not used to this kind of drink with the taste of traditional Chinese medicine, and the price was higher. Coca-Cola focused its market on several big cities, took advantage of local beverage channels in China, consolidated all basic work and brought brand-new marketing concepts. At the same time of the massive invasion of foreign cultures, Coca-Cola has always been regarded as a "noble" by some people. "overwhelming feeling" was the most popular advertising language at that time, which also expressed a spiritual thing that Coca-Cola would bring to people, and actually represented people's curiosity and yearning for western culture.
Enjoy it, it will always be Coca-Cola.
1996 The Atlanta Olympic Games should be the most brilliant moment for Coca-Cola in the China market. There are 23 bottle decoration factories in China, and the Coca-Cola brand has become the most valuable brand. Products are often in short supply, and the China market keeps a high growth rate of more than 20% every year.
"Enjoy yourself, it will always be Coca-Cola" not only expresses a hearty feeling, but also reflects the confidence and atmosphere of Coca-Cola.
In fact, at this time, Coca-Cola really found the core content of the brand. There is both tradition and classicism, and there is no lack of passion and vitality.
All the time in Coke, Coca Cola.
Entering the 2 1 century, Coca-Cola began to feel unprecedented competitive pressure. First of all, the headquarters has high hopes for the China market and urges it to accelerate its development. However, with the gradual maturity of the domestic beverage industry, domestic beverages, such as Coca-Cola, Rising Sun, Jianlibao and so on. Seized many secondary and tertiary markets in advance and scraped the consumption targets of many young people; The diversity of consumer consumption forces Coca-Cola to change its marketing strategy.
Should we change with constancy, or should we change with contingency?
"Coke per minute" was put forward based on the market environment at that time.
"Engraving" is reflected in time, expressing that Coca-Cola keeps pace with the times, taking popular singers such as Nicholas Tse and Cecilia Cheung as endorsements and targeting the younger generation, so as to achieve the goal of countering Pepsi. Explain that regardless of the past, present and future, it will always be Coca-Cola.
"Tiredness" is reflected in space. On the one hand, the company turned from carbonated drinks to all-beverage companies, and comprehensively developed products such as tea, juice and water. On the other hand, the development of second-and third-tier cities, began to expand the rural market, the price is becoming more and more popular and civilian.
In recent years, Coca-Cola has kept pace with the times and lost no time in finding market opportunities. Carry out online marketing, sports marketing and other ways to attract consumers' attention. At the same time, advertisements based on some events are also commendable, such as:
Seize this feeling
Coca-Cola added joy to the festival.
Come on, watch the ball game and drink Coca-Cola.
Liu Xiang Spring Festival Home Edition. "There is Coca-Cola in every direction of going home" is also an extension of every moment.
Looking at the development of Coca-Cola, judging from the change of advertising language, it is always closely linked with the brand's market positioning, which has the following characteristics:
Simple advertising language is not only easy to remember, but also easy to associate with brands.
★ Advertising language is formulated according to the market position and competitive environment of the product at that time, serving for market expansion.
★ Advertising language is a kind of written expression of brand positioning. The form of written expression can be changed, and the core content and direction should not be changed easily. For example, very coke from "China people's own coke" to "young and ageless"; From "very cola, very choice" to "happy event, of course very cola", the product positioning is vague and cannot be deeply rooted in people's hearts.
★ The production process of a brand is a process of continuous accumulation and deepening. From inviting Coca-Cola to drinking Coca-Cola all the time, there is a connection and the connotation is gradually enriched.
Many enterprises are often confused on the issue of advertising language, and are in a dilemma on the issue of "change" and "unchanged". "unchanged" is easy to make the brand aging; "Change" can easily lead to unknown risks. In fact, the success of Coca-Cola comes from the long-term clear market positioning, especially the innovation of advertising content and form, which gives this century-old brand new life and vitality.
Marketing is a method.
Coca-Cola believes that marketing should not be an unfathomable theory, but an act that can be applied to specific work to help solve practical problems.
Coca-Cola believes that marketing is all the actions used by an organization to promote the sales of its products. It includes two parts: strategy and tactics.
Coca-Cola believes that the significance of marketing is mainly manifested in two aspects of enterprise behavior: one is to create consumer demand; The second is to strengthen consumers' awareness of the brand.
Coca-Cola doesn't think marketing is mysterious. To sum up, Coca-Cola's great success in China is mainly due to the perfect combination of its marketing strategy and tactics. We can use "three marketing tools" to summarize: sponsorship, promotional activities and cooperative store cards.
The first marketing weapon: sponsorship
Sponsorship is a form of public relations. By sponsoring sports, education, culture and other activities, Coca-Cola strengthens its brand image, improves its brand reputation and creates a drinking atmosphere, thus promoting product sales. Looking at Coca-Cola's sponsorship activities, it is mainly manifested in the following aspects:
(1) Sponsoring sports activities
1. Sponsor the Olympics. From 1928 Coca-Cola began to praise.
Coca-Cola participated in every Olympic Games from the 9th Amsterdam Olympic Games to the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000. As the only beverage supplier for the Olympic Games, Coca-Cola sponsored beverages, torch relay, established the IOC Museum, published Olympic songs and history books and broadcast them on TV, which showed the infinite enthusiasm of a beverage brand with the largest sales volume in the world for a global activity with the largest number of followers.
While Coca-Cola injects the Olympic spirit of "Faster, Higher and Stronger" into every cell of its own brand, people have begun to have emotional benefits for Coca-Cola: that is, they drink not only a drink, but also a spirit of "sports, boldness and upward", which coincides with the core values of Coca-Cola brand "optimism, boldness and courage to face difficulties". Therefore, by sponsoring the Olympic Games, Coca-Cola's brand and consumers are closely linked.
2. Sponsor world and China football. On a global scale, football has always been one of the most important sponsorship projects of Coca-Cola, and it is also the most valuable market asset of Coca-Cola. As a long-term partner of FIFA and the World Cup, Coca-Cola has been one of the main sponsors of every World Cup since 1974. Coca-Cola has an undisputed leading position in promoting football in the world. The spirit that runs through football is precisely the core values that the Coca-Cola brand has always advocated. In China, Coca-Cola's support for China's football career enabled Coca-Cola to properly localize the global relationship between its brand and football, and thus established a strong emotional communication model with China fans. Since 200 1, Coca-Cola has pushed China consumers' brand awareness of Coca-Cola to a new height through a series of public relations promotion activities around China football.
(2) Sponsoring social welfare activities
Since entering China, Coca-Cola has not only supported the development of sports in China, but also spared no effort to support social welfare undertakings in China. Since 1993, Coca-Cola has donated 52 Coca-Cola Hope Primary Schools and 100 Hope stacks in 26 provinces of China, bringing more than 60,000 children back to school. Since 200 1, we have provided professional computer training for more than a thousand principals and teachers of Coca-Cola Hope Primary School. Provide follow-up support funds for Hope Primary School, and start to build 30 online learning centers and 52 multimedia classrooms and TV teaching points throughout the country. In addition, Coca-Cola has jointly established the "Coca-Cola First Generation Scholarship for Rural College Students" with bottling plants around the country, and funded 678 young people from remote villages to complete their college studies. Up to now, Coca-Cola and its bottling plant have invested more than 30 million yuan in public welfare undertakings in China.
In 200 1 year, with the promotion of China Youth Development Foundation and donor Coca-Cola (China) Co., Ltd., the first well dedicated to forest land irrigation was drilled from Mo Tian Dune in Huailai County, Hebei Province. This is the second time that Coca-Cola Company donated/kloc-0.00 million saplings to the local area in 2000, and it also donated five wells around the sand dunes in Mo Tian, which completely solved the irrigation problem of/kloc-0.00 million saplings. As a marketing strategy, "take it from consumers, return it to society and join in public welfare" has won a good reputation for Coca-Cola's brand and laid a solid social foundation for its success in China.
The second marketing weapon: promotion activities
What is promotion? Different companies and scholars have different definitions of promotion. Coca-Cola thinks that promotion is a special activity, which provides customers and consumers with additional reasons to buy our products. Usually in the short term, it can improve sales and profit targets. The main functions of promotion are: increasing short-term sales and supporting new products or new packaging; Strengthen brand image and stimulate consumers' understanding and demand for products; Increase the passenger flow and sales volume at the point of sale, and bring great benefits to customers.
Coca-Cola Company attaches great importance to the use of promotional activities to improve the market share and industry penetration rate of its products. Promotion is different from advertising, which provides consumers with reasons to buy, but promotion provides motivation to buy. For Coca-Cola, promotion can be divided into three levels:
(1) dealer promotion
Promotion for distributors refers to the promotion activities organized by Coca-Cola Company to its distribution agencies, mainly including wholesalers and retailers. The purpose is generally to obtain or increase the sales of Coca-Cola products, or to encourage retailers to do some special sales activities in the store. For distributors, Coca-Cola mainly adopts price concessions and discounts to promote sales. In addition, short-term credit support, sales and lively competitions, free travel, quarterly lottery and other activities are provided to dealers to stimulate their enthusiasm for distribution.
(b) in order to promote sales
Promotion of sales staff is an incentive measure adopted by Coca-Cola Company to encourage sales staff to make extra sales efforts for its series of products. For sales staff, Coca-Cola usually takes the form of rewards directly linked to sales performance, and under the premise of the specified base, it overfulfils part of the rewards in cash or provides certain welfare rewards.
(3) Promotion to consumers
This kind of promotion is directly launched by manufacturers for consumers. The purpose is to induce consumers to buy the brand directly. Since the promotion to consumers is the "last step" to win the point of sale, here we will focus on the promotion methods of Coca-Cola to consumers in detail. Coca-Cola's promotion methods for consumers mainly include:
1. Free tasting.
Mainly used when new products are put on the market or enter new markets. Free goods Jian can provide consumers with the opportunity to try out products, with the aim of delivering products directly to consumers, especially to attract those consumers who don't drink Coca-Cola products at present.
Step 2 sell
A way to reduce prices in stages to promote sales in a specific period. Special sales are generally used in festivals and soft drink sales seasons, or when competition is fierce.
3. Incremental packaging
The product price remains unchanged, but the packaging capacity has increased.
4. Marketing Alliance
It refers to the behavior that Coca-Cola Company cooperates with other manufacturers or their distributors to advertise and promote products. For example, at 200 1, Coca-Cola cooperated with Founder Computer to launch a large-scale joint promotion activity of "Coca-Cola-Founder Computer Dynamically Interconnecting You, Me and Him". During the activity, consumers will have a chance to win Founder Computer as long as they buy Coca-Cola products.
The third marketing weapon: cooperative store brand
Walking in the street, we can easily see that some supermarkets, grocery stores, restaurants and restaurants have their own signs on both sides or one side, often with Coca-Cola's Chinese or English logo. These point-of-sale signs with Coca-Cola brand names are "cooperative store signs". The cooperative store card is made by Coca-Cola Company, distributed to customers free of charge, hung at the point of sale or as a decoration of the store itself. Co-brand is a marketing form created by Coca-Cola Company. Because of its successful application, other enterprises in the industry have followed suit. The emergence of cooperative store brands can be described as a combination of thousands of advantages.
Channel is a form.
We all say that marketing is to find and meet the needs of consumers, but the needs of consumers must always be met at the place of consumption, and the way from enterprises to the place of consumption constitutes a channel. Most of consumers' needs already exist, and marketers can grasp, dig and discover them through certain marketing tools or channels. Consumers may realize this demand in very different places, such as bringing the habit of drinking beer in restaurants to their homes, thus forming another consumption place and forming new channels. Therefore, the satisfaction of consumers' needs in different environments and locations will make the channel construction of enterprises more and more complicated.
The success of the century-old brand is mainly the success of the brand, but the century-old brand is still growing non-stop all over the world, which should be said to have a lot to do with the development of channel construction. Coca-Cola Company has well proved that the products advocated by the company are "ubiquitous", which is actually the result of constantly developing new channels in addition to digging deep channels.
Coca-Cola Company entered China in 1970s. For more than 30 years, I have been exploring my own localized development path in terms of channels: 1979 When I returned to China, I only entered the channels of high-end hotels, then put coca-cola bottle on the streets step by step, and then fully circulated in the wholesale market. Now all schools, restaurants, parks, government agencies, airports, stations, and even beauty salons and car repair shops .. Coca-Cola Company has deeply penetrated into the sales staff and channel system. Up to now, the distribution rate of Coca-Cola products in some cities in China has reached more than 100%. Some places don't sell their products. These places sell Coca-Cola products.
In short, to develop new channels, the problem is not how good our products are, how preferential our investment policies are, how novel our channel model is, how determined our enterprises are, and how abundant our funds are. More is to get close to consumers first, and then discover consumers' consumption demand, so as to discover unique channel resources that have not been discovered before, and enterprises should take this as their own responsibility and compete with channels * * * *, * * * to make it possible.
Coca-Cola has found a positive value in human nature for more than 100 years, and then through numerous successful marketing in different periods, it has accumulated a temporary success into a century-old brand.
Ideological orientation
Localization: it is a kind of flexibility.
Nowadays, Coca-Cola has become a global cultural symbol, but while it is popular all over the world, Coca-Cola still keeps a clear head. It does not blindly spread and promote American ideas, but adopts the strategy of divide and rule in different regions, cultural backgrounds, religious groups and races. For example, the advertising slogan of Coca-Cola Company is "I can't beat that feeling", which was changed to "I feel coke" in Japan, "unique feeling" in Italy and "feeling of life" in Chile. Advertising information always reflects the local culture, and there are different supporting objects, display methods and generation methods in different periods, and all of them adjust their position in the cultural form in time with the specific space-time situation. In China, Coca-Cola is the embodiment of this essence.
Promotion: Relying on local image, local people and local activities.
Although Coca-Cola is an international quality and brand, in the eyes of consumers, it will always be a neighbor's demeanor, and there is no feeling of being out of reach. When we see English signs such as "Dell", "Panasonic" and "Nestle", we often see Chinese characters such as "Coca-Cola", "Sprite" and "Fanta". At any sales terminal, Coca-Cola also requires that Chinese logos must be aimed at consumers, not English logos!
Only by relying on local image, writing and activities can promotion be localized. Although there were several top Olympic partners in the torch relay of Beijing Olympic Games in 2003, Coca-Cola Company may be the only one that really won the hearts of the people. In addition to the atmosphere, activities and China's small national flag, Coca-Cola also made many commemorative cans to commemorate the grand torch relay in China, and the general manager of Coca-Cola Beijing Company even served as the torch bearer.
The local VI display and image under international consciousness will not obliterate the international image of international brands, but complement each other. "The most local is the most international", and conversely "the most international can also be the most local".
Advertisement: Stars must be able to face to face with us and be close to each other.
Coca-Cola Company doesn't absolutely believe in superstars, just as Procter & Gamble rarely uses superstars for advertising. Advertising notice is not the only way for superstars since ancient times. In recent advertisements, Coca-Cola's localization efforts are getting stronger and stronger, and the effect is very prominent, attracting consumers to reproduce the effect. Whether Liu Xiang or Teng Haibin, in China, the last limelight should overshadow the advertising effect of Beckham, janet jackson and other big-name international sports and entertainment stars.
Of course, the series of sitcoms of Liu Xiang, S.H.E, Wilber Pan and Shawn Yue, which have been popular on TV recently, are all favorite plots of big boys, big girls and ordinary people next door. They are very infectious and close to the people. In fact, the localization of Coca-Cola has a deeper meaning, that is, both products and spokespersons are not far from consumers everywhere!
Of course, it must be mentioned here that the Coca-Cola Company also uses the image of Ah Fu, which is loved by everyone and reflects the folk customs of China, before and after the Spring Festival every year. On the day of the festival, stick it on your doorstep and hold it in your hand. Who can stop the strong feeling of local culture?
Diversification: it is a kind of consolidation.
Far eastern economic review once commented that Coca-Cola is a company with a long history and one of the most successful companies in the world, but it is reshaping itself. Despite holding the most valuable brand, this soda producer is marching into all areas of drinkable products, trying to transform itself into a localized "all-round beverage company". In Asia, Coca-Cola's diversification strategy is more obvious. Because carbonated drinks have never been as popular in Asia as in the United States and Europe. Even in the most developed markets, such as China, Hongkong and Korea. Asian consumers consume less than/kloc-0.00 cans of carbonated drinks every year, while Americans binge on 395 cans every year. Therefore, the general managers of Coca-Cola Asian countries have been keen to adopt the strategy of "localized thinking and localized action". Last year alone, Coca-Cola launched 15 new beverages in 45 Asian countries.
In China, Coca-Cola is also developing into a multi-brand and comprehensive beverage company, and the multi-brand strategy has achieved initial results. According to a recent survey conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics and China National Business Information Center on large retail enterprises in 30 provinces and cities 1 100, the annual sales of Coca-Cola ranks first in the carbonated beverage industry, while Sprite, Bright Eye and Fanta rank second, fourth and fifth respectively. Coca-Cola series products have become the most popular soft drinks in China market, accounting for 35%.
China Marketing for 20 Years: Why Not Have Your own Coca-Cola?
This problem is really worth pondering and thinking about. After 20 years of marketing in China, we have been sticking to 4P and 4C, constantly tapping new demands and developing new products. What was the result? Our products are rich, not only in quantity but also in variety. But we are lost in this constant subdivision. If you want to ask, what is the highest level of marketing that you admire most?
Marketing like Coca-Cola.
This is not to say that you want to be a brand like Coca-Cola. If you talk about brands, public relations, media placement, advertisements, activities, etc. These are skills, or more accurately, organized skills. What is even more admirable is the simplification of Coca-Cola's product line. In the voice of segmentation, in the wave of paying attention to consumer demand everywhere, Coca-Cola has always been presented to us with one thing-Coke. This is the real business strategy! Why didn't Coca-Cola respond when the market saw Wahaha's extraordinary coffee cola jumping up and down in the market?
Look at Coca Cola and Procter & Gamble. One does not produce new products, and the other keeps producing new products. Which one performs better in China market? The answer is self-evident. Two years ago, P&G was "defeated" by C-Bag in some markets and was forced to cut prices. As for Coca-Cola and Pepsi, the prices of these two companies are completely under their control, so their profitability is much better.
China's manufacturing industry, having studied marketing and brand for so long, seems to have taken others' "fur" home.
Therefore, we can see that in China's fast-moving consumer goods industry and China's industrial stage, we have experienced various struggles, but there are no real giant products and enterprises in essence.
Who has the chance to be the Coca-Cola of China?
China is different from foreign countries, and no product can break through cultural isolation.
For example, the current liquor can't reach the scale of 5 billion yuan or even 654.38+0 billion yuan. The main reason is that everyone takes the origin or regional characteristics as the core of the brand, and while forming the so-called distinct positioning personality, they set up scale obstacles for themselves. So we talked about "regional marketing", adapting to local conditions and so on. But at this time, many people forget that this kind of isolation, to a great extent, is the shackles we put on ourselves.
Brand is a symbol of product value identification and recognition. How many regions and groups can be covered by brand promotion determines what scale the product can reach. Therefore, the brand of Coca-Cola must be vulgar, not something artificially fabricated like history, year and elegance. It must be mental and psychological, so in this sense, the "people's brand" in the existing market brands may have a better chance of reaching 5 billion yuan, even surpassing the "famous brand".
Brands have cognitive attributes, and the connotation of vulgar brands is the most widely recognized. Only popular and simple brands can fight up and down.
At the same time, an important obstacle to prevent China brand from becoming Coca-Cola is that the channels used by most brands cannot carry billions or even billions of sales. For some enterprises, even this is the main reason. "You can buy it everywhere and the price is basically the same" is the basic requirement for channels, just like coke. Coca-Cola in China can only be achieved by implementing the channel mode of "strict control in large areas, regional circulation and supplementary sales at key terminals". Because "scale profit" is the highest pursuit of enterprises. On this "scale" road, capital integration, brand integration and channel integration will be the general trend.
China's own Coca-Cola hasn't appeared yet, but we believe it will appear in the future 10 to 20 years.