The off-season is an eternal pain for salespeople. In the market off-season, if marketing methods are wrong, even great efforts are futile. Thus, many companies, when the off-season arrives, either give employees time off, conduct marketing training, or launch new products for shelf display, and so on. In fact, by deeply analyzing the specific reasons affecting sales and adding appropriate innovation, we can truly eliminate the off-season and achieve strong sales even in the off-season. Here, combining my years of market experience and observations of some excellent companies, I summarize some practical methods to crack the off-season, for the benefit of our readers. I. Understanding the Formation of the Off-Season: From a marketer's perspective, only by identifying the reasons affecting sales can we prescribe the right remedy and effectively boost overall sales. However, in reality, most marketing or sales personnel either "don't know how to find, can't find, can't pinpoint, or can't accurately identify" the factors behind the so-called off-season, or even if they find and pinpoint them, they don't know where to start. Thus, the off-season remains the same year after year, day after day. Until one day, when they suddenly realize, they have been left far behind. 1. Not knowing how to find: mainly a mindset issue. The above diagram is a traditional off-season thinking map based on conventional thinking methods. The peak represents the so-called peak season, formed because the market was stimulated by certain sales-promoting factors. The trough is the off-season, formed because the market was affected by certain sales-inhibiting factors. Traditional theory holds that both off-season and peak season are caused by certain market factors. Influenced by this theory, the marketing community has coined the phrase "Do market work in the off-season, do sales in the peak season." When the off-season arrives, marketing personnel do not innovate sales methods but instead focus on basic management and market training. This thinking presupposes that the off-season market cannot see significant improvement, a notion rooted in past failures to activate the market during off-seasons and in the hype of a few so-called experts in the marketing field. Ultimately, marketers spend this precious time during sales troughs on strengthening basic management and training, euphemistically calling it 'building a foundation for peak-season volume.' At first glance, this seems reasonable and even sensible, perfectly illustrating the idea that 'thought determines action.' But in reality, as China's marketization accelerates, market mechanisms improve, and competition intensifies, failing to achieve sales breakthroughs in the off-season not only makes it harder to meet targets but also directly weakens a company's core market competitiveness! 2. Can't find, can't pinpoint, or find but don't know where to start: mainly issues of understanding and methodology. When I worked on the front lines, I often communicated with marketing and sales personnel from various manufacturers. Most had a shallow understanding of why sales were sluggish. For example, when asked why the off-season occurs, they would answer: it's the law of off-peak seasons; there's no specific reason; it's due to weather; it's due to consumer habits; it's because students are on vacation, and so on. They fail to identify or accurately pinpoint the essence of the problem. Or they might pinpoint the cause but have no way to solve it. For instance, in the beverage industry, when sales drop in winter, marketers recognize it's due to cold weather but have no solution, believing it's a natural weather or market law. Thus, these laws imprison their minds, leaving no room for innovative methods. II. Cracking the Off-Season Puzzle: Action is governed by thought; those who can control their thoughts can surpass themselves and create miracles. Therefore, to crack the marketing off-season, we must first address the root of thought: 1. View Sales Fluctuations from Another Angle In the chart above, I have placed the traditional off-season at the normal seasonal position, i.e., treating the traditional off-season as the normal season. I am not being pretentious or sensational, nor denying the existence of the off-season, but rather trying to get everyone to change their view of the off-season, change our thinking methods, and break free from the so-called traditional laws. As seen in the chart, the peak is the sales peak season, and the trough is the normal season. In the normal season, influenced by certain factors, a peak season forms. These factors may be weather or habits; once they disappear, it returns to the normal sales season. Therefore, to boost sales in the normal season, we must innovate and create these sales-promoting factors, whether in product, channel, temperature, or promotion. Only then can we stimulate consumption, drive market sales, and achieve a market boom. 2. Identify the Reasons for Strong Sales, Which Are Also the Factors Behind Declining Sales. Here, combining methods I have used, I offer two approaches to quickly and effectively identify the reasons affecting sales: Method 1: Divide products into several channels (or regions), then design a table (sample below). Require each salesperson or customer to fill it out monthly for a year. Specify which channel (or region) the product went to, and analyze the reasons for monthly sales increases or decreases in each channel (or region). At year-end, categorize and organize this data, remove exceptional reasons, and derive the specific reasons for sales rises or falls in each season. Method 2: A quicker method is to conduct market research. Survey subjects are typically frontline salespeople, terminal customers, or end consumers. Surveying those who frequently interact with consumers often yields conclusions closer to market reality. 3. Cracking the Marketing Off-Season (1) Product Innovation: Develop Counter-Seasonal Products. Research the market according to seasonal changes, then develop products that sell well in the off-season. An extreme example: in the apparel industry, summer sells summer clothes; when it cools, autumn clothes; when it drops further, winter clothes. If we sold summer clothes in winter, sales would be poor. That is, we must continuously develop new products that meet consumer needs and suit the market environment to create new sales booms. In fact, FMCG products are similar to apparel. If we develop products with the same mindset as apparel, we can easily create complementary product lines. Our sales will no longer fluctuate with traditional seasons. Success Case 1: Mooncakes have a very obvious seasonality, selling well for just over 10 days a year, with production equipment idle most of the time. Holiland, while making mooncakes, fully utilizes its existing human, material, and equipment resources to develop a variety of foods, forming a product line that complements two peak seasons in different seasons, and sells through its own Holiland stores, achieving annual sales of hundreds of millions of yuan. Success Case 2: The beverage industry also has obvious seasonality. Large food groups like Master Kong and Uni-President have developed large production lines for beverages and instant noodles, creating good complementarity between the two industries. (2) Innovate Product Quality, Blur Product Boundaries, and Segment Related Markets. Wahaha has done this excellently by combining beverages with liquid milk to develop Nutrition Express, which not only segmented the beverage market but also the dairy market, achieving great success. (3) Create Sales-Boosting Factors to Increase Product Sales. For example, in winter, some street vendors set up grills to heat sugarcane before selling, leading to astonishing sales growth. Some breweries develop high-alcohol beer in winter, and Lulu guides terminals to heat Lulu before selling. (4) Innovate Product Channels and Shift Sales Regions. If the factors driving strong sales disappear, normal sales channels shrink, but other channels become new opportunities. Therefore, we must follow consumers' shifts and transfer channels. For example, when schools are on vacation, the school channel loses its sales drivers, but the overall consumer base hasn't disappeared; students have moved to communities, large supermarkets, and other channels. We should follow consumers, strengthen development of large supermarkets, community stores, and mobile vendors, fully exploit sales opportunities, and ensure consumers can still buy our products. (5) New Products Have Less Obvious Seasonality. Since new products go through introduction, growth, maturity, and decline stages, launching new products in the normal season and promoting their growth through various marketing mixes can also increase overall sales. This conclusion has been confirmed by many companies' new product launch results. (6) Change Consumption Methods and Guide Consumer Habits. In northern cities, most hotpot restaurants close in summer. But in a few cities, a unique sight emerged of people eating hotpot bare-chested. Later, investigation revealed that after hotpot entered these cities, it developed rapidly, but summer business was poor. Later, some hotpot restaurants innovated in summer by installing air conditioning, developing night markets, and arranging support (inviting friends and relatives to patronize), which actually fostered a unique culture of eating hotpot in summer in some cities. In conclusion, I believe: To do marketing well, one must observe life carefully. A person who is meticulous about life and pays attention to details can become an excellent marketer. Of course, implementing marketing innovation requires a lot of work. For example, what is the sales ratio between peak and normal seasons? What is the approximate proportion of product characteristics to sales-influencing factors? What products or channels should be developed? How to ensure successful product and channel promotion? These are not discussed in this article. The purpose of this article is to shift everyone's thinking about off-season market operations, establish new marketing ideas, and then find balance in fluctuation, find breakthroughs in balance, and actively participate in market competition. -END- The best FMCG distributor learning platform in China Focuses on providing professional, practical, and actionable tutorials for enterprises and distributors Committed to helping Chinese FMCG distributors grow rapidly The most professional and practical knowledge base in the FMCG industry Reply with the red number below to get corresponding content Reply with number 1 to view the complete knowledge base | 001 Excellent Article Selection | 002 Distributor Market Operations | 003 Terminal Visit Management | 004 Sales Supervisor Skills | 005 Sales Improvement Techniques | 006 Channel Expansion | 007 Managing Distributors | 008 Distributor Development | 009 Distributor Internal Operations Management | 010 Team Management | 011 Efficient Distribution Techniques | 012 Sales Manager's 18 Skills | 013 KA Operation Methods and Strategies | 014 First Lesson for New Salespeople | 015 Internet, Brand | 016 Distributor B2B Transformation | [Long press QR code to follow]