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(1) To effectively counter terminal interception, you must identify key terminals. Should you counter-intercept at every terminal where competitors are intercepting? The answer is clearly no, because: (1) You may be constrained by marketing resources and expected sales profits. In many cases, this may determine that you lack the capability or the reality does not allow you to "bloom everywhere" to remove every landmine competitors have planted at terminals. (2) Even if you equip most outlets where competitors are intercepting with mine-clearing weapons and set up a long anti-interception electric grid, you may still fail to stabilize or increase sales figures on the report. Because many of these terminals may only be placeholders, actually generating little benefit. All these factors dictate that before launching counter-interception and allocating limited marketing resources, we must identify key terminals. In fact, if you have previously analyzed sales statistics and growth potential for each outlet, it is not difficult to find the 20% of terminals that contribute 80% of your performance among those where competitors are intercepting. Of course, the final decision on which 20% are key terminals for counter-interception depends on whether you are oriented by sales volume, profit contribution, or a combination of both. Similarly, terminal interception is not limited to hypermarkets; it also extends to key terminals at various levels, from KA to small grocery stores. This raises higher requirements for refining key terminals by different outlet levels. Moreover, in reality, although small and medium supermarkets may have lower single-store sales compared to hypermarkets, their single-store profit contribution may not be much less due to lower entry barriers, lower interception costs, and more flexible interception methods.
(2) Concentrate counter-interception resources on key terminals. As a giant in the tea beverage market, Master Kong once launched a "sweeping leaves" terminal counter-interception against Wahaha's iced tea. Taking the Guangzhou market as an example, it is said that Master Kong, to more effectively counter Wahaha's vivid terminal interception, "purchased" Wahaha iced tea at various retail stores, "exchanging" its own products for Wahaha's. Additionally, Master Kong promised greater benefits and signed "exclusive agreements" to counter further interception by Wahaha and other competitors. The intensity was considerable. But for weaker brands, dispersing limited terminal marketing resources to secondary terminals is clearly inappropriate. This dictates that we must adopt a strategy of using precision-guided "cluster bombs" to strike key targets in terminal counter-interception. That is, you should not engage in interception and counter-interception with competitors at outlets where sales and profit contribution are actually small and unlikely to achieve major breakthroughs, wasting limited marketing resources. Instead, you should identify key points, shorten the battle line, and concentrate firepower. Of course, if it is a newly opened outlet with no historical sales or profit contribution to evaluate, the outlet's business performance and foot traffic are what you need to consider. If you operate products like beverages that go into both supermarkets and hotels, which require channel segmentation, you need to choose places in segmented channels that are very important to you and where competitors' interception is relatively weak, to carry out terminal interception.
(3) Analyze competitors' interception methods and launch "high ground counterattack." To hit a snake, strike its head; terminal counter-interception should also target key points, using differentiated counter-interception methods that exploit competitors' weaknesses to allocate marketing resources. This dictates that terminal counter-interception strategies and actual measures must not only be based on consumer behavior research but also be competition-oriented. "The fighter in mobile phones" Bird, when tearing through foreign brands' terminal interception network, specifically targeted weaknesses such as long distribution channels and thin profits, using a "human wave tactic" to arrange salespeople for carpet-style street visits and build rapport with store staff, giving immediate commissions after selling phones, effectively enhancing its own volume capability in terminal interception. Of course, in practice, competitors' weaknesses in terminal interception and your differentiated counter-interception methods are not limited to this level. Details determine effectiveness and success; you should conduct more specific analysis, such as: (1) What is the form and tightness of the bundling between competitors and outlets? Is there an opportunity to directly dismantle competitors' interception from the terminal? (2) What is the content of competitors' terminal interception activities that affect consumer motivation? To what extent do they influence consumers' purchase decisions? Can you provide counter-interception activities that competitors cannot兼顾 and satisfy consumer needs? (3) What are competitors' information interception carriers, and what is their influence radius? How should your counter-interception information enter the minds of consumers visiting the outlet first and multiple times? (4) Are there areas in competitors' terminal interception activities where consumer contact is insufficient? Are their promotional staff dissatisfied with compensation and timeliness of payment? How skilled are these promotional staff at inducing customers to buy? Are there gaps that can be exploited? (5) What are competitors' consistent systems and behaviors regarding terminal maintenance such as outlet visits? How will these factors affect their terminal interception? Are there opportunities? (6) The volume of music and promotional language design at competitors' off-site promotions. ... There are many similar questions and analyses about what competitors are intercepting at terminals. It can be said that once you find answers to the above questions, you can almost be certain that your terminal counter-interception has found competitors' weaknesses and has more effective differentiation.
(4) Set up terminal interception barriers for competitors in counter-interception. Weaken competitors' terminal interception effectiveness as much as possible and increase their costs of continuing terminal interception. Regardless of brand or company strength, this should be a basic principle in our terminal counter-interception activities. In this regard, P&G's terminal counter-interception against the local brand that posed the greatest competitive threat—Slek—is worth learning from. To effectively counter Slek, known for terminal interception, P&G used advertising posters, continuous sun umbrellas, promotional price tags, fun mini-games, hot-selling areas (or gift areas) dozens of meters away from promotional stands, and stationed promotional staff to set up multiple visual barriers in the transition zones between promotional points and shelves, greatly weakening Slek's terminal interception effect and further forcing C-Bons Group to be exhausted by interception, keeping its terminal sales costs high.
Excerpted from "How Weak Brands Do Marketing" by Li Zhengquan
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