In 2025, short videos are rapidly reshaping the traffic logic of business. More and more brands and retailers are using short videos to promote products, showcase stores, and even build personal IPs. However, distributors remain relatively silent:

"Shooting videos is something manufacturers should do; I won't make wedding clothes for others."

"I'll just stick to my offline business; making videos is too complicated, I don't want to bother."

"I'm not photogenic, and I can't express myself well; this isn't for me." When asked why they don't make short videos, the answers vary widely. The essence is that many distributors still rely on traditional sales paths and find it hard to connect making short videos with their own business. Indeed, compared to online conversion, offline selling gives a more direct sense of achievement. But the reality is that the intensifying market competition and the shift in traffic arenas are making it increasingly difficult for distributors who don't know how to sell themselves to achieve business growth. Traditional offline promotion Today, it's only a 'passing grade' One distributor summarized his frustration: "We run promotions, but customers remember the price; we provide services, but customers remember the salesperson; but if you ask them if they know our trading company and what categories we carry, many customers are vague." Often, terminal stores' impression of a trading company is limited to being "an agent for a certain brand" or some brief introduction from the salesperson. But for stores, it's hard to truly remember what products and services you offer and what unique value you bring through such fragmented communication. As a result, once there is personnel change or price fluctuation, the cooperative relationship easily breaks. This state of weak awareness, low stickiness, and unstable cooperation is a common problem many distributors face in their business promotion. Why is this? First, terminal stores face too many salespeople every day, and customer attention is highly dispersed. Facing scheduled, fixed-route visits, and even more salespeople than customers, store owners have long developed coping tactics to quickly "dismiss" them. Moreover, in an era of severe oversupply, there are too many substitutable products in every subcategory. Customers can't remember who you are, let alone your product advantages, so cooperation decisions fall back on price comparison. As for whether your product mix is scientific or your service is timely—these aspects that truly reflect capability—are hard to be recognized and appreciated in limited contact. Second, salespeople have limited time and energy, making it difficult to efficiently reach customers. From a time perspective, a salesperson visits 20-30 stores a day, once or twice a week. It seems busy, but communication efficiency and reach are limited. In terms of space, the spam-style promotion on WeChat Moments and groups can only reach familiar circles, failing to break through communication layers and easily getting drowned in the flood of information. Promotional actions are taken, but whether the information is received, remembered, and recognized is hard to guarantee. These phenomena have long become industry norms, but the problem is that when we get used to them, accept them, and even blame the tough business environment, we overlook that today's customer acquisition and reach have already evolved into more efficient forms. The external value of short videos: Higher promotion efficiency, resources come to you Since last year, New Distribution has observed that some distributors have made short videos one of their company's operational segments. After communicating with them, I've summarized several values of short videos for traditional trading businesses, mainly in the following aspects: First, high-frequency information transmission to regional terminal stores makes campaign reach and execution smoother. "Your salesperson can't visit 500 stores a day, but a video can get at least 500 views." A snack food distributor from Shandong told me that in the past, monthly promotions required salespeople to visit stores one by one. With 4,000 store customers, a round of notification took two to three days, delaying the campaign and only covering existing customers. But now, a single short video can centrally convey key information like campaign mechanics, discounts, and product highlights. With platform recommendations and employee shares, it can achieve broad reach to local and surrounding stores within hours. "In a recent campaign, short videos alone brought over 70 new customer inquiries," the distributor added. This improvement in promotion efficiency also shifted the team's focus during the campaign. He used online videos as the primary communication tool and offline visits as the core supplement for closing deals, shifting salespeople's role from "simple notification" to "deep service," allowing them to invest more time in customer follow-up and service optimization. Second, customers who come to you proactively have clearer needs and higher cooperation quality. Moreover, this "content finds people" customer acquisition logic can significantly improve cooperation quality. "Customers who proactively message us are mostly interested in us and want to cooperate. In the past, with traditional promotion, we often went to customers, but they didn't necessarily have a need." These high-quality resources that proactively approach not only come from downstream stores. During my visits, I found that many distributors, through continuous video output, systematically present their product structure, warehousing capabilities, logistics efficiency, team image, and channel execution, gradually attracting more high-quality partners. These resources include brand owners wanting to enter the region initiating cooperation talks, drivers and sales staff recruited through recruitment videos, and even distributors connecting with peers and wholesalers in surrounding counties and cities to achieve cross-regional cooperation, expanding their originally local business to a broader scope. This is not accidental or "lucky." In traditional promotion models, the capabilities distributors can showcase are often limited by the efficiency of meetings and explanations. Short videos turn these advantages into visible, shareable content assets, making cooperation opportunities more certain and controllable, even breaking through original manpower radius and business boundaries. The internal value of short videos: Teams that can shoot videos can better run the market "In our company, from salespeople, sales managers to myself, each of us posts at least one video per day. From daily shipments, product introductions, display techniques to cooperation experiences, the forms are rich, but all are drawn from real work scenarios," said Distributor Hu. Initially, everyone wasn't used to it, but as customer feedback and actual conversion results emerged, the team became more motivated. From this perspective, short videos not only have external promotional and linking value but also internally stimulate employee initiative and organizational vitality. First, after customers watch short videos, they feel a sense of familiarity when salespeople visit. Hu gave an example: "Customers' perception and attitude towards us have changed significantly. Now some customers, when they see our salesperson enter the store, say, 'Hey, I saw you on the feed yesterday. I want to try selling that new batch of fruit tea you launched.' Through continuous video output, customers not only know us better but also deepen their trust in cooperation." Second, short videos bring a more timely problem feedback mechanism and improve customer experience. "Previously, when customers had problems, they would first report to the salesperson. If the salesperson didn't respond promptly, the problem got stuck," Hu said. "Now many customers leave comments directly in the comment section, and even proactively like and praise a salesperson's performance. When problems arise, supervisors don't have to wait for 'reports' but can understand and intervene in real time." The faster service response also forces the team to handle issues more standardized and transparently. Interaction with customers is no longer limited to pre-sales and after-sales but permeates daily videos, forming a virtuous cycle of continuous feedback and optimization. Third, for new employees, these videos also become a 'knowledge base' for internal training. In the past, a new salesperson needed to follow an experienced one for a month to get familiar with categories, scripts, and workflows. Now, by opening the account, from product information, campaign execution to customer needs, the experience that used to be passed down orally is now accumulated into reusable video materials, greatly improving learning efficiency. "It's okay if you're not good at expressing yourself; as long as you're willing to shoot, customers can see your efforts and thus remember and recognize you," Hu said. Now, short videos have become the team's business window, making the entire company more transparent, efficient, and vibrant. Final Thoughts Today, industries like catering and medical aesthetics are already "rolling out of the sky" on various short video platforms. Is it still too late for distributors to make short videos? Some netizens have expressed such concerns. But in fact, entering now is still the best time for distributors to occupy a position in the short video track. An industry insider mentioned that if you search for any FMCG category keyword on the platform, most videos come from brands or retail terminals. Videos led by distributors that systematically showcase relevant information are rare, and related creators and content are far from saturated. The industry gap not only means opportunities for layout but also the establishment of first-mover awareness. A video that clearly explains product advantages is highly likely to become one of the few reference points on the platform or in the region. Whether users actively stumble upon it when searching for related content or the platform precisely pushes it to potential customer groups, the first mover is always the first to be "seen." As Hu said: "The simplest way to beat competitors is to continuously appear in customers' sight, achieving integrated online and offline customer acquisition." In contrast, those who still rely on traditional offline single-point efforts are finding it increasingly difficult in market competition. After all, in this era of scarce attention and overwhelming choices, being 'seen' is itself a competitive advantage. If you choose the right direction, even if you're a bit slower, it's better than staying still.