---
title: "Brand + Advertising + Distribution + Promotion + Display = No Sales, What to Do?"
description: "In our consulting practice, clients often ask why a marketing model, strategy mix, or operational plan that succeeded in Market A fails in Market B, why past successes no longer work, and why sales remain stagnant despite increased investment. Based on our experience, such problems generally stem from three levels: strategic and positioning errors, core strategy and mix deficiencies, and execution failures."
author: "程绍珊"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2015-04-10"
language: "en"
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# Brand + Advertising + Distribution + Promotion + Display = No Sales, What to Do?

> In our consulting practice, clients often ask why a marketing model, strategy mix, or operational plan that succeeded in Market A fails in Market B, why past successes no longer work, and why sales remain stagnant despite increased investment. Based on our experience, such problems generally stem from three levels: strategic and positioning errors, core strategy and mix deficiencies, and execution failures.

In our consulting practice, we are often asked such questions by clients—why did a marketing model, strategy mix, and operational plan succeed in Market A but fail in Market B? Why are past successful experiences and practices no longer effective? Why is there no improvement in sales despite more investment than before? Consequently, at marketing review meetings, marketing managers at all levels often say, "We've done everything we should, but sales still won't go up," leaving the entire company confused and frustrated.

From our consulting experience, such problems generally arise from three levels of causes:

First, deviations in marketing strategy and market positioning.

Errors in marketing strategy and market positioning lead to not moving in a "productive" direction. Such deviations cannot be corrected by tactics or execution, nor by perfecting details. As the saying goes, "Without the skin, what can the hair adhere to?" The Red Army's successful strategy in the four "counter-encirclement" campaigns was the "mobile warfare" of avoiding the enemy's strength and striking at its weakness. However, in the fifth campaign, they shifted to a "positional warfare" of frontal assault. Given the vast disparity in strength, the fundamental error in strategic guidance doomed the Red Army to defeat, regardless of high morale or willingness to sacrifice. Generally, errors in marketing strategy and market positioning manifest in three aspects:

1. Mistakes in regional market selection.

The basic "fertility" of a regional market underpins the efficiency of marketing investment and output. Due to vast differences in culture, customs, and economic development, there are huge disparities in the "fertility" between southern and northern China, eastern and western regions, and urban and rural markets. Some products have a large market in the south but a small or even nonexistent market in the north. For example, a well-known health wine company withdrew from the northeast market within a year, losing nearly ten million yuan. The main reason for failure was the lack of accurate analysis of the northeast market's "fertility"—consumer habits. Northeasterners do drink health wine, but most brew their own based on personal preferences and recipes from friends and relatives, and they lack the habit of long-term consumption. For this market still in the "consumer education" stage, investing heavily in people, materials, and money naturally leads to losses.

2. Deviations in market segmentation positioning.

Even if a regional market is indeed "fertile" with large capacity, inaccurate customer positioning in segmentation can also lead to imbalance between input and output. For example, a company entered the Beijing market with two products priced at 180–240 yuan, targeting the mass gift market during the Spring Festival, but sales fell far short of expectations. Promoters reported: "Consumers look a lot, ask a lot, but buy little." Detailed market research revealed that the mainstream price range for the Spring Festival mass gift market in Beijing was 80–120 yuan. The pricing error placed the company outside the mainstream segment, so sales naturally suffered.

Both mistakes in regional market selection and segmentation positioning are problems with market "fertility," akin to "oranges grown south become trifoliate oranges in the north"—the vast difference in soil and water leads to vastly different "taste."

3. Lack of resource planning or insufficient allocation.

A basic philosophical principle is that "only quantitative accumulation can lead to qualitative change." The same applies to market development: promotional activities, dealer relationship maintenance, etc., must reach a certain level of "quantity" to trigger a market "qualitative change" and "ignite" the market. It's like boiling water: you need every bit of fire to reach 100 degrees; otherwise, it won't boil.

The maturity of consumer demand, brand and network market foundation, and competitive dynamics collectively determine the "quantity" needed for a regional market. If the required "quantity" for each regional market is not recognized and resources are allocated roughly, some markets may fail to "boil" due to insufficient accumulation.

Second, deviations in core marketing strategy positioning, and insufficient integration, rhythm, and precision in the strategy mix.

1. Deviations in core marketing strategy positioning.

Simply put, the core competitive strategy is the point of differentiation advantage over competitors. It relates to the industry's development stage, consumer purchasing habits, and competitive conditions. For example, a feed company entering the Hunan market, lacking brand power and distribution network, relied on village and town terminals to conduct large-scale technical service activities to enhance brand and build terminal networks. The result was severe imbalance between input and output, forcing withdrawal. The feed industry's "credit sales" purchasing habit dictates that the core strategy must focus on "controlling" channel funds. Therefore, the company should first design channel profit incentives and consumer promotions with strong pull, build a channel and network capable of "credit sales," and then conduct targeted technical services around terminal consumer groups to enhance brand image and boost dealer confidence.

A deviation in core competitive strategy is like hitting "cotton" with a heavy punch—no matter how hard, it's hard to achieve the expected effect. In the past two years, the core competitive strategy in the mobile phone industry has shifted from "channels" to "products," but domestic mobile phone companies still focus on channels, neglecting product function innovation and quality improvement, and still tinkering with appearance and style. This deviation in core competitive strategy is the fundamental reason for the significant decline in domestic mobile phone market share in the last two years.

2. Insufficient integration, rhythm, and precision in the marketing strategy mix.

Marketing strategies are the "weapons" for attacking the market. It's not about having many or fancy ones, but about being "precise" and organically "combined." Specifically, effort should be put into the integration, rhythm, and precision of the strategy mix. Rely on a set of "combined punches" to attack the market in an organized manner, not just one "fist" or even one "finger."

Insufficient integration, rhythm, and precision manifest as "scattered," "chaotic," "abusive," and "shallow" use of marketing strategies.

(1) "Scattered"—lack of organic integration of channel, communication, product, and pricing strategies; strategies do not form a combined force.

Channel, communication, product, and pricing strategies should form a "combined punch," working synergistically to attack the market, steadily opening up and consolidating the market. For example, the aforementioned feed company should first build a distribution network with capital and ability to provide "bottom" sales, rather than blindly lowering the sales center; second, select 1–2 products with widely accepted color, smell, composition, and packaging to facilitate rapid market entry and quick volume; third, design an attractive channel pricing system to meet dealer and terminal profit needs and fully mobilize channel enthusiasm; finally, a rich mix of channel and consumer promotions. For example, design incentive policies for picking up goods, investment, etc., to keep channel profits dynamic, continuously pulling and stimulating the channel; design rich, differentiated consumer promotions; conduct targeted technical services around "typical" customers to deepen consumer communication, and stir the market step by step with rhythm to quickly digest "terminal inventory." The faster terminal inventory flows, the stronger dealer confidence becomes—channels are "rushed out." If channel, product, and pricing strategies are not coordinated and supported, using "technical services" as the breakthrough will only turn "salespeople" into "technicians," and the market will naturally not be done well.

(2) "Chaotic"—lack of rhythm control, insufficient market "momentum" utilization.

"Many hands make light work" is true, but if you add firewood "fishing for three days and drying nets for two," you won't get a "big fire." The key is to gradually add firewood according to the "fire situation." The same applies to market development: the key is to leverage the market's "momentum"—dealer enthusiasm, consumer word-of-mouth, etc.—rather than relying solely on "one's own strength."

Market "momentum" is created through the rhythm of marketing strategies. For example, the aforementioned feed company conducting terminal distribution: after outputting dealer and terminal purchase policies, promptly follow up with terminal visualization work like POP and banners, so dealers and terminals have enthusiasm and confidence to do the market well. Only then will terminals actively cooperate in technical service activities. Otherwise, relying solely on the manufacturer's own strength to organize will make it hard to find "typical" customer groups, wasting people, money, materials, and time, often with half the result.

Besides the order of strategy implementation, timing is also important. An old Chinese saying goes: "A wise man submits to circumstances." The same applies to market development. If timing is inappropriate, it's often hard to achieve expected results. For example, brand building: control the appropriate rhythm of "push-pull combination" and "air-ground combination" based on brand maturity. Blindly investing in advertising "bombardment" is like "depending on heaven for food," not focusing on "ground rooting." There are too many such failure cases. Ogilvy founder David Ogilvy said: "Only 50% of advertising works, but we don't know which 50%." However, if you control the rhythm of brand promotion well, the useful 50% can increase to 60%, 70%, or even higher.

(3) "Abusive"—lack of deep market analysis, blind borrowing and imitation.

Common marketing strategies and tactics, such as differentiated pricing, buy-give, bundling, lottery, coupon, special display, tiered rewards, stack promotion, consumer experience, conference marketing, etc., have been used too "broadly" and "abusively," making dealers and consumers somewhat numb. This requires using consumer needs as the "benchmark" and competitor strategies as the "benchmark," improving strategy precision to "kill one enemy with one bullet," ensuring and improving resource investment efficiency.

(4) "Shallow"—weak purpose, insufficient targeting, form over content.

Before any marketing strategy is launched, one question must be clearly answered: Are consumers and dealers "interested" in this? Strategies that don't "move" consumers or dealers are a waste of resources. For example, buy-give promotions should not only focus on your own or cheap products; they should combine with regional and seasonal consumption hotspots, making consumers feel they "got a bargain" and that it's practically useful. Another example is conference marketing: it must aim to capture several potential and existing customers, not just stay at the level of consumer education, product introduction, and brand promotion.

Third, execution is not in place, lacking flexibility and innovation.

Even if market selection and positioning strategies are in place, and even if marketing strategies are integrated around core competitive links, if execution is not in place—especially organized execution—there will still be no results. Inadequate execution manifests on one hand as weak team execution, unable to land (mainly a problem of team willingness, not the focus of this article), and on the other hand, execution lacks initiative, lacking flexible and innovative responses based on regional competitive dynamics—a problem of team capability. Specifically, there are three phenomena:

1. Formalism—"similar in form but not in spirit."

Not understanding the purpose and operational points of marketing strategies or activities deeply and precisely, "drawing a gourd according to the dipper," results in "doing activities for the sake of activities." For example, a company organized a "community film festival + lottery and free drink" activity. The purposes were to "create market momentum and brand promotion" and to "lock in target consumers." According to requirements, during the film and free drink, community packaging should be done, such as hanging banners, setting up public service signs, building a list of potential customers, and conducting follow-up visits. But the actual execution: the film scene was indeed lively, but many free drinks were not consumed by the target customer group; after the audience dispersed, nothing was left in the community; the recorded consumer list was not followed up or tracked. Another example is terminal display management: the display position was indeed good, but the display lacked competitiveness, not close enough to competitors, failing to effectively suppress them. Without maintaining good customer relations and interpersonal relationships with sales staff, display positions were adjusted, quantities insufficient, defective products on shelves, or even out of stock.

2. Copycatism—"distorted and altered."

Regardless of circumstances, mechanically using things without innovation or flexible application. For example, regional market division is an effective means to prevent cross-regional selling and price chaos, but in execution, there is a lack of comprehensive assessment of dealers' financial strength, operational capability, commercial reputation, network status, and customer base. Instead, blindly dividing by administrative geography leads to discovering problems with dealer cooperation and capability, making coordination difficult and delaying the market. Another example: seeing another company's community marketing work well, they also do it, but the result is lively community momentum with no terminal sales. The problem is not seeing that successful companies' community marketing has "emotional" cultural marketing in front and "functional" product marketing behind. Regardless of whether their own "product marketing" selling points are distinct and characteristic, or whether their "cultural marketing" theme is clear and personalized, blindly imitating mechanically inevitably leads to poor results.

3. One-sidedness—insufficient combination of "point" and "surface."

The insufficient combination of "point" and "surface" mainly manifests in two aspects. First, emphasizing "points" while neglecting "surfaces." For example, overemphasizing the importance of display and exhibition while neglecting the customer-gathering effect of DM and POP outside the display area; overemphasizing core terminals as "market commanding heights" for shipment and radiation, forcefully attacking core stores, resulting in high input and low output, neglecting the "accumulation of small amounts" and counter-radiation of surrounding stores and terminals. Second, emphasizing "surface" while neglecting "substance." For example, overemphasizing terminal distribution speed and coverage rate, often resulting in "all sorts" of terminals entering, the market seems to have "taken positions," but many excellent terminals that were waiting and watching cannot enter.

Conclusion

The above analyzes the problem of "doing everything that should be done" from the three levels of strategy, tactics, and execution. There is a good saying: "There are always more solutions than problems." Once the problem is clearly defined, it is relatively easy to solve, because the problem itself is the opportunity for solution. As for how to solve the problem, the logic and key points of the above analysis are basically the logic and key points for solving it. In our marketing consulting practice, the most important and difficult work is diagnosing problems and focusing on core factors. As the saying goes, successful reasons are similar, but failure reasons are vastly different. However, if we cannot determine the main reason for "doing everything but no sales," then others' successful experiences are in vain. Marketing models cannot be cloned; they can only be borrowed!

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