Click 'Read Original' at the bottom or scan the QR code in the image to register -01- China had no marketing in the past, but it had buying and selling. As long as someone sells, there may be someone buying; as long as someone buys, there may be someone selling. Therefore, business is about buying and selling, and the problem is to solve the issues of selling and buying. In fact, as long as there are enough people buying, there will definitely be someone selling; but if someone sells, it does not necessarily mean someone will buy. In the past, China was driven by brands and channels. Brand-driven solved the 'someone buys' problem, which is a 2C issue; channel-driven solved the 'someone sells' problem, which is a 2B issue. Brand-driven and channel-driven can only solve the 2C and 2B problems separately. Some enterprises prioritize solving the 2C problem, such as betting on advertising effectiveness; others prioritize solving the 2B problem, such as channel dominance. Of course, it would be better to solve both brand and channel simultaneously, but that requires sufficient resources and capability. Even multinational companies with excellent brand resources have mostly failed to solve the channel problem in China. Understanding the complexity of China's mainland channels is to understand the characteristics of Chinese marketing. Channel digitalization and BC integration, to some extent, provide opportunities to solve both 2B and 2C problems simultaneously, but its logic is to use 2C as a lever to solve 2B problems. -02- What is the current problem with 2B? It is that the 'passage' has become an 'obstacle'. For example, distributors do not stock up, retail stores do not stock up, shelf placement is poor, SKU count is too low, or store owners or staff do not recommend products. This means the passage is not smooth; the passage is blocked. As long as consumers enter the store, they can only choose from the products displayed in the store. Only if someone sells will someone buy. The problem that deep distribution aims to solve is more SKUs, better displays, more recommendations, and smoother passages. What to do when the passage has problems? Still the 'more' tactic. Visit more frequently, improve customer relations, spend more money on more end caps, and increase promotional intensity. These are ways to clear the passage. You will find that not only are you working on the 'more' tactic, but your competitors are also doing the same. The result is: your 'more' is offset by your competitor's 'more', yet you have invested significant resources. Of course, brands that did not do the 'more' tactic were eliminated. In today's popular language, this is the involution of deep distribution. -03- The logic that 'if someone sells, someone will buy' is gradually failing. In the past, when new brands entered KA (Key Accounts), some said, 'Even if they don't sell, it's good for the image.' Now, when new products enter KA, I would say, 'Not selling is damaging to the image.' Deep distribution has reached its ceiling. Not doing it is certainly not an option, but even doing it to the extreme, it's just so-so. Using 2B methods to solve 2C problems has entered a bottleneck. You cannot go backward, but moving forward is also difficult. Recently, I have seen several cases where 2C logic solved 2B problems. For a brand that is not particularly well-known, I asked the boss why they would sell without paying entry fees or display fees, and the boss said, 'Because someone buys.' For a controversial brand, I asked the boss why they sell, and the boss said, 'Because big customers want it,' and 'Some customers turn away immediately if the product is out of stock.' A student asked me if I could get a certain brand of liquor from the boss, and added, 'I never thought people here would drink this liquor.' If the core logic of deep distribution is: as long as someone sells, someone will definitely buy. Then the current core logic is: as long as someone buys, someone will definitely sell. -04- In the past, from a marketing perspective, buying and selling were two separate issues. Now, cognition, transaction, and relationship are trinity, and BC can be operated in an integrated manner. Note: BC integrated operation is not BC integration. Sometimes for convenience, it is simplified to BC integration. The buying problem is a cognition problem. The selling problem is a transaction problem. Solving the cognition problem solves the transaction problem. In the past, whenever sales were poor, salespeople would say, 'The brand is not strong.' That is exactly what it means. Brand is a cognition problem; sales is a transaction problem. Because cognition (brand) is not solved, transaction (sales) cannot be achieved. In the past, there were only three means of cognition: 1. Word of mouth. The main means in agricultural society, with the advantage of high recognition and the disadvantage of slow dissemination. 2. Mass communication. For example, advertising. The advantage is speed, but the disadvantage is high cost and dependency. 3. One-on-one. For example, recommendations, with the core being relationships. Because relationships reduce the cost of cognition. Therefore, the core issue of marketing is cognition. 'Marketing makes selling superfluous' means that once cognition is completed, transaction is a natural result. -05- BC integrated operation has two core points: one is BC association; the other is dual private domain operation. What is BC association? For example, if someone buys a bottle of Coca-Cola, on e-commerce you can know who bought it, and on B2B you can know who sold it. But on the cloud store (cloud channel), you can know who bought a bottle of Coca-Cola at which store and when. The sale of a bottle of Coca-Cola associates the B-end (terminal) with the C-end (user). In the past, this association was impossible because there was no technical means. Of course, it is not necessary to know which store every user buys Coca-Cola from. The so-called leverage effect means that a minority can move the majority. For example, the 1990 principle on the internet: 1% of people drive 9% of people, and 9% drive 90%. For FMCG, full online transactions are unrealistic, but the 1990 principle can play a leveraging role. BC association is the key to 2C driving 2B. After digitalization, this can be seen in the data. Dual private domain operation. I have been talking about this concept offline for some time, and this article is the first time it is proposed in written form. Cloud store (cloud channel), the channel chain is F2B2b2C, connecting the manufacturer (F), distributor (B), store (b), and user (C). This has never happened in marketing history. Once the entire chain is connected, whose private domain are the users? First, users are certainly the private domain of the terminal (b). Offline strong relationships cannot be separated from the store. But note that the store's private domain is used to sell all products, not just one brand's products. By the way, some companies now divert users from offline to online, which is not sustainable and cannot scale. That is a sly trick. Second, users are also the private domain of the brand owner. User operation should not only aim at transactions and repurchase. Internet marketing technology is basically aimed at repurchase, which is very bad. User operation is a big issue, and this article will not elaborate. The purpose must be very clear: to turn users into the brand owner's private domain. With dual private domain operation, the brand owner has the ability to build user cognition and the ability to guide a limited number of users. If the store's private domain is the stock, then the brand owner's private domain may be the increment for the store. Using 2C problems to solve 2B problems is using the leverage of increment to move the stock. In an era of traffic exhaustion, which store would not welcome increment? Source: Teacher Liu's Digital New Marketing