Click to read the original article for details. In the mobile internet era, 9 out of 10 people have shopped online. According to statistics from the e-commerce department, the market share of e-commerce channels in 2018 increased by 10.7 percentage points compared to 2014. Over five years, the compound annual growth rate of e-commerce channels reached 35.1%, far exceeding other channels, highlighting its competitive edge. Online channels have become a transformation path for many distributors. However, with rising customer acquisition costs, distributors are investing more and more in online channels. Yet, the boundless internet allows distributors to reach more consumers and gain massive traffic. In Chongqing, a young post-90s individual left his corporate job to become an online distributor. In just one and a half years, his sales exceeded 30 million yuan. He is Pu Bin, founder of Chongqing Partner Food Co., Ltd. On July 21, 2019, I met him in his office. If not for his age, it would be hard to tell that this mature, steady, and handsome man is a post-90s. In recent years, with intense competition in offline markets, many distributors have started to venture online, hoping that this massive traffic pool would bring faster distribution and higher profits. However, after several attempts, many distributors found that online business is not easy. The competition among platforms is no less fierce than offline price wars, and the promotion costs on online platforms are rising. In an era when online dividends are nearly exhausted, what changes did Pu Bin make? Provide Suitable Products for Platforms Among the products Pu Bin distributes, condiments account for 60%, mainly first- and second-tier brands like Luhua and Qiaotou. The remaining 40% are snack foods, including Chongqing specialties like small fried dough twists, hot and sour noodles, and Chongqing small noodles. Pu Bin does not place all products on all 13 online platforms simultaneously. Instead, he selects suitable products based on the nature of each platform and its consumer base. His online platforms can be categorized as follows: Platform-based: JD.com, Tmall Supermarket, Tmall Specialty Store, Taobao, mainly targeting consumers over 35 who have high brand loyalty. Traffic is obtained through active user searches, so these platforms are suitable for first-tier brand products. Content-based: Yunji, Beidian, Global Catcher, Meiri Yitao, Pinduoduo, mainly targeting younger consumers and women sensitive to cost-performance and price. These platforms attract traffic through content sharing, so they need creative and distinctive products to support, suitable for creating hit products. B2B platforms: JD New Channel, Alibaba Retail Link, Meicai, Meituan Kuaitui, mainly targeting small restaurant clients. With JD.com and Tmall as the main focus, leveraging platform visibility and traffic for large-scale product promotion, supplemented by new retail platforms to tap into precise consumer groups, and using B2B platforms to open up the catering channel. This is Pu Bin's self-created combined approach. In reality, many online distributors often choose platforms with high traffic and sales without considering their own product structure. Pu Bin said that the core competitiveness of e-commerce is product and traffic. Online platform competition has entered a white-hot stage, and customer acquisition costs are increasing. Distributors need to invest a lot of cost in gaining massive traffic, which is similar to offline distributors. In an era of saturated offline channels and product surplus, distributors need to develop new channels to reach more end customers. Additionally, they need to find products suitable for their channels and consumers. However, in the process, facing homogeneous products and price wars, offline distributors often need to invest more effort and cost. Therefore, how to improve efficiency and reduce costs is a common concern for both online and offline distributors. Currently, online platform distributors face the following difficulties: transparent product prices, high traffic acquisition costs, rising marketing expenses, and shrinking profit margins. To solve these problems, online distributors need to focus on product placement and internal management to achieve higher profits. Differentiated Product Placement Pu Bin said that online platforms mainly compete on price, so distributors need to ensure their products have cost advantages. Different platforms suit different types of products. Based on platform characteristics, distributors need to match different products. For example, for traditional e-commerce platforms like Tmall and Taobao, Pu Bin chooses first-tier brand condiments and snacks, relying on the concentration of well-known brands to increase store visibility. For platforms like Yunji, Beidian, and Meiri Yitao, Pu Bin chooses condiments with attractive packaging and distinctive features, mainly second- and third-tier brands. These products have non-transparent prices in the market and relatively high profits, and their consumer base is younger, with higher acceptance of such products. For instance, not long ago, Pu Bin created a hit product on Beidian for the time-honored Chinese brand Huang Shang Huang, with sales exceeding 1 million yuan. Similarly, on Meiri Yitao, a promotional price of 8.3 yuan for two bottles of Baijiaxian tomato sauce achieved monthly sales of over 10,000 orders. Why did these two products achieve good sales results? First, Beidian and Meiri Yitao are new social e-commerce platforms based on sharing and spreading, suitable for distinctive and cost-effective products. Huang Shang Huang is a time-honored Chinese brand and also a Tmall bestseller, with a large consumer base and reference value across platforms. Baijiaxian tomato sauce is a common condiment with high repurchase rate, and the two-person group-buying activity is extremely cost-effective for consumers. Apart from the products themselves, because Pu Bin controls product profits well and maintains reasonable profit margins, he can allocate funds for commissions and other incentives, boosting the enthusiasm of store owners. Additionally, Pu Bin makes good use of the Pinduoduo platform. Many people view Pinduoduo as a low-price platform, even though after its IPO, it has become a comprehensive e-commerce platform. However, first-tier brands on Pinduoduo attract little attention, and even if there are sales, there is no profit because prices are too transparent and the average order value is suppressed by Pinduoduo, leading to high operational and logistics costs for distributors. Therefore, Pu Bin uses Pinduoduo as a platform for creating hit products and clearing excess inventory. By leveraging price advantages, he creates viral products on Pinduoduo, quickly accumulating popularity and educating consumers. At the same time, he regularly clears excess inventory on Pinduoduo. Both methods have achieved very good results. For B2B platforms, since they target the catering channel, Pu Bin selects cost-effective products with price advantages. This meets the daily needs of small restaurants while increasing repurchase rates. Differentiated product placement not only builds the company's brand but also ensures profit generation. Large Population Base, Condiments Still Have Opportunities Online Regarding focusing on condiments online, some distributors are not optimistic. Pu Bin explains that in most people's impression, condiments are mainly purchased in supermarkets, small stores, and vegetable markets, and few buy them online. However, this understanding is not comprehensive. The condiment industry has a low entry barrier. As a slow-moving product in the FMCG industry, condiments have a low repurchase rate for most households. Although there are many condiment distributors, the market is far from saturated. It is precisely the low repurchase rate and offline purchasing that give online condiments an opportunity. Looking at the national market, China has a huge population base. In recent years, with the popularity of mobile internet, online shopping groups have expanded from first- and second-tier cities to third- and fourth-tier cities and even townships. The entire industry is in a period of flourishing. Pu Bin said that online condiments are mostly sold to the catering channel, mainly small stores in the catering channel. The emergence of B2B platforms allows these customers to purchase daily condiments through the internet. Compared to household consumption, the catering channel consumes a larger amount of condiments, with a repurchase rate 30%-40% higher than household consumption. By purchasing condiments online, small store owners do not need to send people out to purchase, saving time and costs. Pu Bin told New Distribution, "Many distributors on online platforms limit their vision to individual consumers. In fact, our ultimate goal is to sell products. If we can find an entity that covers more individuals, it's equivalent to selling goods to everyone at once." Be an Irreplaceable Distributor Management issues have always been a shortcoming for distributors, and online distributors face the same problem. How can they improve internal management to increase efficiency and reduce costs? Pu Bin said that the core value of online distributors is not selling ability but service. Whether your service is irreplaceable is the key to measuring the success of an online distributor. This is reflected in two aspects: first, on the enterprise side, when facing new products, can the distributor help the enterprise promote new products at the lowest cost and reduce trial-and-error costs? Second, on the platform side, how to achieve maximum output with the same traffic? This is the embodiment of online distributor capabilities. For example, if a new product meets 95% excellent cost-performance and 5% novelty, Pu Bin will create a hit product on social platforms to test whether it is recognized by consumers. At the same time, Pu Bin will also choose Pinduoduo to create viral spread in a short time using price advantages. Use Project-Based System to Improve Work Efficiency In addition, Pu Bin has set a clear path for team building. Big data analysis and project-based system are the core components of his team. As an online distributor, data analysis is a necessary skill. Pu Bin has professional data analysts. Through data analysis, Pu Bin found that the main consumers of condiments on his platforms are women aged 25-39. Regional products are mainly purchased in Guangdong, while seasonal products are mainly distributed in the southwest. Through big data analysis, Pu Bin profiles consumer groups and product flows, providing data support for future product selection. At the same time, according to platform types, Pu Bin adopts a project-based system, dividing the company into operational projects: C-end store, B-end platform project, C-end platform project, and social e-commerce project. Each project has independent personnel responsible. Currently, the company's operations are divided into: B-end platform operations (Alibaba Retail Link, JD New Channel, Meicai, Kuaitui, etc.), C-end store operations (Tmall, Taobao, Pinduoduo, JD POP, etc.), and social e-commerce (Beidian, Meiri Yitao, Mia, Future Market, Shuaibao, etc.). Pu Bin said that adopting a project-based system can reflect the value of each employee, making them understand their significance and fully mobilizing their enthusiasm. In the future, content, short videos, and live streaming will become the main development directions of online platforms, so Pu Bin plans to establish relevant departments. Currently, the company is still in the startup stage, and he has his own ideas about talent recruitment. First, whether a startup can attract talent depends on the founder's philosophy and personality. And through stock options and dividends to motivate people, but startups have high requirements for talent, needing people who can get started immediately. Therefore, recruiting professional talent is what Pu Bin needs to do now. Selecting products based on platform characteristics and using a project-based system to optimize organizational structure are the keys to Pu Bin's rapid success. Since starting operations at the beginning of last year, he started with the B-end, increased C-end investment during development, and seized the social e-commerce dividend. Currently, B-end and C-end sales are basically equal, with monthly year-on-year growth maintained above 10%. According to Pu Bin's plan, he hopes to exceed 60 million yuan in sales this year. Pu Bin has positioned himself as a platform service provider, as only service providers can better empower enterprises and end customers. The future is an era of online-offline integration. Customer relationships remain a core element for distributors. Distributors need to understand what products platforms and buyers need, which requires extensive data analysis. At the same time, with the deep integration of online and offline, some distributors who are unwilling to change or are unprofessional will be eliminated. In the future, both manufacturers and platforms will need professional distributors. Especially for online distributors, they will take on more operational functions. For offline distributors, the emergence of online platforms is just an extension of channels. They still need offline sales personnel for terminal visits. In the Chinese market, personal relationships remain important. The entry of giants and the emergence of digital tools are not to eliminate distributors but to force them to improve. This is a good thing for distributors. New Distribution's Thoughts: In today's era when online dividends have disappeared, e-commerce distributors still have opportunities, provided they do a good job in product selection planning and establish a strong internal management system. Offline distributors are not suitable for going online because they lack online operational thinking and the technical skills to operate online platforms. However, they can choose a platform as a channel extension tool, such as Pinduoduo. Although offline distributors are not suitable for transitioning to online, they can refer to online distributors' product selection methods. Excellent cost-performance and novelty are one of the standards for offline distributors' product selection. Use multi-brand advantages to focus on core single products. Whether online or offline, improving efficiency and reducing costs are things distributors must do. In terms of management, whether focusing on online or offline, reasonable division of labor is needed. Use an organized management model to operate the company, rather than being boss-centered as before. Division of labor and delegation are changes distributors must make. Whether adopting a project-based or department-based system, the purpose is to fully leverage each employee's initiative. In addition, formulating reasonable compensation and appropriate equity incentives are methods to improve team cohesion.