Click "Read Original" for details -01- Brand owners have long suffered under platforms! E-commerce de-intermediates, new manufacturing de-brands, pushing brand owners to a corner. So, can brand owners de-platform? Previously unimaginable, now it may be reality. Haven't the platform thinking and traffic thinking popular in recent years been criticized? Why can't de-platforming be possible? -02- Since 2013, brand owners have had a hard time. In 2013, most FMCG sales peaked, and only until 2017 did they restart growth through product upgrades. In 2013, China's consumer internet surpassed the US, and brand owners were forced onto the platform path. Although early e-commerce's vision was "making business easy," once platforms rose, e-commerce became "the hardest business for brand owners." In 2016, when Ma Yun proposed New Retail, he also proposed "New Manufacturing." On September 16, 2020, Alibaba's New Manufacturing system "Xunxi Zhizao" (Rhino Manufacturing) was launched. New Manufacturing is C2B, eliminating brand owners' added value, transferring it to platforms. If e-commerce is de-intermediation, then New Retail and New Manufacturing are de-branding. The value of brand owners is not producing products, but creating brand added value. For example, Nike does not manufacture, focusing on brand and marketing. Losing the ability to create added value, brand owners can only attach to New Manufacturing and become OEMs. -03- Business is a game. Besides competing for users, brand owners, channel players, and retailers have always been in a game. Later, platform players joined. In the game between brand owners and channel players (middlemen), through deep distribution, brand owners basically control the channels. Channel fragmentation is the result of this game. The game between brand owners and KA (Key Accounts) is evenly matched. Brand owners reach C-end through communication, having cognitive advantage; KA directly reaches C-end, having purchase convenience advantage. In developed countries, the game between KA and brand owners is balanced through private labels. Retailers' private labels are similar to "New Manufacturing" logic, also "holding consumers to command brands." Until the emergence of super platforms, the balance of the game completely tilted toward platforms. Platforms are too large, with huge traffic; any brand's scale is insignificant in platform players' eyes. In front of super platforms and New Retail, brand owners feel lost. Never so lost! -04- Business games require bargaining chips. The ultimate bargaining chip is the ability to influence C-end. Therefore, retailers and platforms have natural advantages in the game. Business discourse power shifts with different business institutions' ability to influence C-end. In traditional marketing, brands reach C-end in two ways: 1. Through media: brand → mass media → C-end users; 2. Through channels: brand → distributor → terminal → C-end users. Both are indirect reach. In the internet era, two more ways emerged: 3. Platform reach: brand → platform → C-end users; 4. New media reach: brand → new media → C-end users. Still indirect! No matter the mode, brand owners' C-end reach has a common feature: through intermediaries, indirect reach, i.e., brand → intermediary → C-end users. Only the intermediaries have changed from mass media and middlemen to new media and platforms. However, e-commerce platforms, O2O platforms, and New Retail platforms not only directly reach C-end users but also have users online long-term. User online presence has greater ability to influence C-end than mere indirect reach. Our conclusion: E-commerce platforms and New Retail platforms' advantage in the internet era is: first, direct C-end reach; second, real-time online presence. If brand owners indirectly reach through intermediaries and cannot achieve user online presence, they are destined to lose business discourse power and lack bargaining chips. -05- Compared to traffic exhaustion and rising traffic costs, the biggest problem for brand owners is the loss of value creation capability in the future. New Manufacturing is more frightening than e-commerce and New Retail. E-commerce and New Retail can be seen as new sales channels, but New Manufacturing means e-commerce platforms and New Retail, leveraging C-end, begin to "invade" the exclusive right of brand owners: creating brand value. Brand added value is the exclusive right of brand owners; otherwise, they wouldn't be brand owners. In front of New Manufacturing, brand added value may be lost. Brand added value is the cognitive ability brand owners form with C-end users. Retail is "department stores for all customers," while brand owners are "one product for all customers." New Manufacturing means, besides New Retail's "department stores for all customers," they also want to take "one product for all customers." E-commerce and New Retail call New Manufacturing C2B. The reason they can do C2B is that they have C-end. Reaching C-end, user online presence, and marketing digitalization will be the most important competition in the future. Business games focus on this. -06- How can brand owners directly reach C-end and have users online? Brand owners can build their own apps and micro-malls to directly reach C-end. But this cannot scale. Even Apple cannot fully do it. Xiaomi initially focused on apps, but now has moved to omni-channel operations. Of course, they cannot completely abandon indirect reach through intermediaries, such as cognitive reach via mass media and new media, and transactional reach via channel players and platforms. The most important online reach for brand owners must be through channel players, forming online reach. This model is F2B2C online mode, i.e., digitalization based on traditional channels. Although F2B2C user online mode goes through B-end, in China's channels, brand owners have strong control, deep distribution, and channel control to the terminal. So, although channel B-end is an intermediary, it is completely different from mass media, new media, platforms, and New Retail. The key to channel B-end is in brand owners' hands. For other intermediaries, brand owners have no control. In F2B2C user online mode, the path to C goes through B-end, but brands can directly influence C-end through virtual space. -07- De-platforming for brand owners does not mean not using platforms, but having bargaining chips against platforms. Because they have the ability not to depend on platforms, they gain more rights in business games. Once brand owners have a direct path to C-end, all intermediary obstacles (including platforms) are no longer obstacles. This ability is commercial deterrence. Marketing digitalization is one of the best modes for brand owners to reach C-end users. I call this mode BC integration. BC integration uses B as a bridge to reach C-end. With C as a bargaining chip, it operates across all channels and scenarios. BC integration is not just user online transactions, but cognition, transactions, and relationships all online. Of course, since traditional channels going online still takes time, a few users online still have a leverage effect. In fact, e-commerce has never exceeded a quarter of social retail share, but it has strong influence, which is the leverage effect. In BC integration's C-end online, transactions and relationships are strengths, but online cognition is insufficient. How to strengthen online cognition is the focus of BC integration. -08- Again, de-platforming does not mean not using platforms, but having bargaining chips against platforms. With various new retail scenarios emerging, most brands are entering omni-channel and omni-scenario modes; no retail channel or scenario is redundant. Retail changes are never revolution, but symbiosis. E-commerce rose, but the oldest grocery stores still exist. However, omni-channel and omni-scenario are not attachment, but symbiosis in the ecosystem. Now, besides control over traditional channels, brand owners are almost in a state of attachment in new internet channels and scenarios, lacking bargaining chips. Marketing digitalization and BC integration for traditional enterprises may help brand owners change this situation. Technically, platforms reached and influenced C-end earlier than other channels. The impact is that all business models are moving toward reaching C-end. Platforms and e-commerce front ends are not at the market frontline, but because they reach C-end, they are called front ends. Traditional enterprises' salespeople, even at the frontline, cannot influence users because they do not reach C-end. Reaching C-end will be the standard for business. Influence will arise from this. Reaching C-end and influencing C-end will become the mainstream of business competition. Reaching C-end, digitalization becomes a natural step.