In two days, Lao Wang has to go to the provincial branch for his quarterly report. He decides to stay late at the office tonight to finish his presentation before heading home. As he smokes a cigarette and organizes his thoughts, the days of "fighting the epidemic" with his team flash before his eyes— Daily health check-ins, live-stream selling sessions, each difficult delivery, each batch of protective supplies, each warehouse inventory, each policy briefing... Indeed, this pandemic has changed Lao Wang and his team in many, many ways... If it weren't for this COVID-19 outbreak, I think it would still be premature for frontline city managers to talk about omnichannel distribution. After all, the emergence of new things is always accompanied by many uncertainties. Unless absolutely necessary, which frontline salesperson, with a long-term risk-averse mindset, would truly embrace it? However, this "once-in-a-lifetime" black swan event has shattered the peace. What was once "important but not urgent"—new retail—has quickly become the top priority that is "important and urgent"! Community group buying, E-RTM, and home-delivery e-commerce have seen a boom in both people and money in a short period—not only explosive growth but also a surge in customer traffic. This forces us to re-examine the urgency and importance of new retail and the new omnichannel. Almost all FMCG manufacturers quickly followed suit and accelerated their layouts. "Wherever business is, we go!" has become the strongest voice in the industry since the pandemic. In the early days of the outbreak, I attempted to propose that "omnichannel distribution" would replace "deep distribution" in the future, hoping that this new distribution mindset would help frontline city managers quickly understand, learn, and iterate, thereby building a cognitive and capability system suitable for the new market environment. To this end, I used my spare time on weekends to publish 7 articles on the "New Distribution" platform, covering strategy upgrade paths for channels, pricing, promotions, products, and brands under omnichannel distribution. Interested friends can click to read them in the extended reading section at the end of this article. This article is the strategy summary. I hope to give frontline city managers a blueprint. Facing omnichannel distribution, don't feel you're about to be eliminated, that the surging waves are about to crash over you, and your past experience is becoming outdated... My advice is: Don't fear new retail and omnichannel marketing! New retail is not about tearing down your existing capability system; it's about adding and expanding skills based on what you already have! We often hear the mantra in our daily work: "In the face of new retail and new environments, we must jump out of and escape our comfort zone, and iterate our capability system!" Why escape? We've spent years, suffered losses, stepped in pitfalls, made mistakes, and endured hardships to build an effective capability system. This "capability comfort zone" is the accumulation of time and experience. Why escape? New retail and the new omnichannel are not mysterious or high-tech; they simply require us to expand and enhance our existing capability system. We don't need to escape our comfort zone; we just need to expand it, building muscle on our existing capabilities! We don't need to learn new retail and the new omnichannel from scratch; we just need to add new retail and omnichannel skill extensions on top of core retail! We don't need to tear down our existing skill system; we just need to expand our capability system!

-01- Positioning: Refine the existing, expand the incremental When omnichannel distribution is implemented in practice, it simply means there are more and more sales channels, and the distance to consumers is getting shorter. Originally, you could just sell well in 4-5 fixed channels, but now there are 10 channels, and the total capacity is limited. Besides maintaining sales in original channels, we must also follow up on new channels in a timely manner. How to divide the 10 channels? I think the simplest division is "existing" and "incremental." Existing corresponds to original channels, old scenarios, and old retail. Incremental corresponds to new channels, new scenarios, and new retail. Around these two points, frontline city managers should refine the existing—continuously tap potential, not lose it, as it's still the main source of business contribution; and expand the incremental—regardless of volume, dive in, proactively engage, practice first, then summarize. For city managers, growth is the only hard truth. Without growth, you can't be considered a qualified sales manager. This is the basic principle and bottom line of sales. Expanding from existing and incremental, it extends to the specific 4Ps (channel, product, price, promotion) under new and old scenarios. This is also the basic model for city managers to do market work. By combining product strategy, distribution strategy, pricing strategy, and promotion strategy with the characteristics of the omnichannel distribution era, we can explore and summarize the basic business model for new and old scenarios in omnichannel distribution. Through in-depth discussion and analysis of the new 4Ps of omnichannel distribution, we find that when it comes to daily perfect execution, old and new scenarios are actually "I in you, you in me"—they can't be completely separated into two dimensions. For example, O2O home delivery is mostly an extension service of traditional retailers. Many related promotional mechanisms are just online versions of offline posters, serving the same people as offline stores. In other words, a retailer's O2O home delivery can be seen as a new play and operation of a big-box channel. The salespeople managing this new business are still the same ones who managed offline business. So whether it's a new or old scenario, guiding and driving from a channel dimension is the easiest for frontline sales teams to understand and execute! The following diagram integrates new and old scenarios from a channel dimension, ensuring the extended new 4P methodology of omnichannel distribution truly lands in the daily execution of every frontline salesperson. In fact, most FMCG manufacturers' frontline sales teams still operate by channel division, and many new scenarios are extensions and expansions of old scenarios in original channels. So as frontline city managers and the sales representatives below, you must not only maintain the "existing" in old scenarios but also strive for the "incremental" in new scenarios—grasp both, and be strong in both.

-02- Strategy: Use SKU as the smallest unit to plan the market In the era of omnichannel distribution, once frontline city managers have a clear market positioning, the next step is market layout. How to lay out? My suggestion is: Use SKU as the unit to plan your channels, products, prices, and promotions. Our monthly business targets are achieved by selling box by box, pack by pack, piece by piece. Any sales plan that doesn't break down to the SKU level is just talk on paper.

1. Channel: Break down first, then analyze, and finally execute As a frontline city manager, you first receive the sales target—the full-year sales target for 2020. Based on this target, considering changes before and after the pandemic, break it down to each channel under new and old scenarios. Here, city managers need to rethink the changes in channel sales share due to the pandemic. For example, with the rapid growth of home-delivery e-commerce, adjust channel business expectations based on personal insights and judgment of the local market. After determining the business share, start analyzing each scenario. For old scenarios, the first thing a city manager should do is rank the SKUs in each channel. Core strategy: Eliminate tail SKUs, streamline waist SKUs, and strengthen head SKUs. For new scenarios, although the contribution to sales is limited, there are many problems. Core strategy: SKU diagnostic analysis, business share analysis, focus on ROI output, especially price conflicts with offline or old scenarios—pay close attention. After the breakdown and analysis, the final step is distribution execution. Based on the analysis of existing SKUs, as well as the shopper profiles and demands behind them, combined with growth potential forecasts for the next 3-6 months, adjust each SKU.

2. Price: Stabilize prices to stabilize the market and growth If prices are chaotic, the market is chaotic. Price is always the lifeline. If you can't manage prices well, how can you talk about business growth? "Controlling prices and preventing channel conflicts to maintain market stability" is a key responsibility of frontline city managers. Although prices nationwide are uncontrollable, at the local market level, city managers must take proactive control. Set up price warning mechanisms based on the business share of different SKUs in different channels. Generally, big-box stores and BC stores are the core business for distributors and local sales teams. City managers already have experience managing prices in these channels and can control them. But wholesale channels are inherently price-driven, cash is king. Community group buying pursues hot products and traffic, and both channels have prices that are too low—these must be a key focus. For these two areas, city managers must drill down to each core SKU, calculate comprehensive gross margins, and design price ranges. What is the price bottom line? Once exceeded, city managers must step in and manage. Any bestseller is cultivated step by step, gradually becoming a profit source for manufacturers and distributors. Therefore, for price maintenance of bestsellers, the core is to do four things: Understand external price trends, control the local market, and focus on key channels, key SKUs, and key customers to extend and stabilize the market cycle of bestsellers.

3. Product: Divide hot products and new products, place them in new and old scenarios Regarding products, city managers need to think about how to plan and lay out channels on their own turf, combining new and old product lines, based on local market insights and judgment, to maximize current and future sales. The core revolves around two points: First, how to precisely match existing products to local channels; Second, how to lay out new product launches, cultivate them into new hot products, and solidify the market. The first thing a city manager should do is position each product line, such as mature core hot products, growing core hot products, long-tail single items, brand-new launches, and relaunched single items. Once clearly positioned, match them with corresponding channels.

Old scenario—Hypermarkets: All age groups; both a sales battlefield and a brand communication battlefield; full-line introduction.

Old scenario—Small and medium supermarkets: Limited shelf space, limited traffic, limited consumption; heavy placement of hot products to maximize sales.

Old scenario—Wholesale markets: Only sell hot products; introduce new and old hot products; try introducing relaunched mid-to-low-end new products.

New scenario—Online B2B: Hot product logic, transparent supply chain, precise data; suitable for cultivating growing core hot products.

New scenario—Online home delivery: Core consumer force, not price-sensitive; suitable for pushing new and high-end products; focus on new products.

New scenario—Community group buying: Hot product logic; appropriately differentiate from small and medium supermarkets, wholesale, and B2B channels; try new products.

4. Promotion: Not more is better, but more precise is better As frontline market commanders, city managers must clearly understand the carrier behind promotions and the business logic behind that carrier when facing multiple channels. Only by knowing the business models in different scenarios can city managers act with purpose, choose the appropriate promotion forms, and achieve corresponding goals. Old scenario business model: Traffic × Frequency × Average Order Value = Sales New scenario business model: Traffic × Conversion Rate × Average Order Value = GMV If you list promotion forms, they are limited and the plays are relatively few. But where to place promotions, at what time, and for which group—the same promotion form can have vastly different purposes. For the old scenario business model, offline, for example, when consumers enter a store, they likely have a purpose. When a consumer enters the daily chemical or beverage section, how to do in-store traffic diversion to turn them into effective traffic for us, rather than choosing competitors, is key. For the new scenario business model, online, consumers can be reached every day and can "enter the store" every day, but they may not buy your products; they can buy others. At this point, our core actions are conversion and average order value. "Brand is the foundation, distribution is key, and the terminal decides victory." In the era of omnichannel distribution, city managers must also have a bit of brand thinking in addition to doing well in channels, prices, promotions, and products. Although we are in sales and can't control the brand, we must have brand vision and pattern. Be a long-termist, pay appropriate attention to brand building in daily work, even a shelf talker—know that this can enhance our brand building. Building the market is a gradual accumulation process; grains of sand pile up to form a tower.

-03- Dive in, keep an empty cup mentality Facing omnichannel distribution, the attitude frontline city managers should have is: Cognitive system → Strategy system → Capability system To build a cognitive system, you must dive in. New scenarios and new retail are all new things. For example, in the ERTM channel, only after deep contact do you realize the information is complex, massive, and multi-dimensional, and the playbook is self-contained. If you don't get involved in detail and only stay at surface understanding, it will be difficult to formulate effective systems and strategies. Sales representatives, supervisors, and managers of each channel must go deep into the end of every channel, polish and think deeply from new scenarios to old scenarios, maintain an empty cup mentality, and fully learn the underlying logic and practical methods of new scenarios. If a city manager's cognitive system always stays in old scenarios, marking time and not advancing, it will be hard to survive in the new omnichannel distribution market environment. In the future, they will inevitably lose ground in fierce competition with rival brands until they exit the market. The above 4Ps (channel, product, price, promotion) actually form a complete strategy system. With the help of brand strategy upgrades, although different manufacturers and categories have different business statuses and shares in different channels, it is necessary to comprehensively analyze and think about the upgrade paths for product, distribution, price, promotion, and brand strategies. Ultimately, turn cognition and strategy into daily execution, so you do the right things and get things done! The core goal of this system is omnichannel growth, with sell-through as king! Because no matter how a city's market environment changes, how channels evolve, or how scenarios shift, if business doesn't grow continuously, the city manager in that area will eventually be laid off... In the era of omnichannel distribution, frontline city managers must lead by example, go to the front line and every terminal, and not like in the past when channels were fixed and single, and you could direct from the office. Now it's a brand-new market environment; you must personally get involved. If you don't understand it yourself, it's hard to guide your supervisors, your sales reps, and your distributors! Only with this correct attitude, actively leading the team to learn together, understanding customers, channels, and consumers, can we truly win in new retail and the new omnichannel! It's late at night, and light rain has started outside the office window. Lao Wang's report is on the last slide. He deletes the default "Thanks for watching" on the template and decides to end with a reflection from the pandemic: "Life is short, and careers are limited. Cherish our hard-earned capability comfort zone! In the new retail era, what we need to do is expand our capability comfort zone, not escape it! When our capability comfort zone expands enough to master new retail and the new omnichannel, our business in every city market will be healthier and have more growth momentum! Actively learn, embrace the new omnichannel distribution, strengthen and expand your capability comfort zone, and remember eight words— No need to escape, just expand!"

Bio: Xu Xiang, currently Sales Director for South China at Unilever, with 20 years of experience in FMCG daily chemicals, dairy, and condiments, deeply engaged in regional market management and customer marketing. Willing to exchange ideas with peers for mutual progress. The above article represents only personal views.

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