---
title: "Standard Action Breakdown for FMCG Operations in County, Township, and Village Markets"
description: "Before takeoff, flight attendants always instruct you to put on your own oxygen mask first before helping others; similarly, in FMCG operations, only after ensuring capital liquidity can other matters be valuable. The potential sales in county, township, and village markets are tantalizing, but they come with hidden traps, making it difficult to find the balance between investment and return."
author: "New Distribution"
publisher: "New Distribution"
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published: "2015-03-24"
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# Standard Action Breakdown for FMCG Operations in County, Township, and Village Markets

> Before takeoff, flight attendants always instruct you to put on your own oxygen mask first before helping others; similarly, in FMCG operations, only after ensuring capital liquidity can other matters be valuable. The potential sales in county, township, and village markets are tantalizing, but they come with hidden traps, making it difficult to find the balance between investment and return.

Before takeoff, flight attendants always tell you that in case of danger, you must put on your own oxygen mask first before helping others. The same applies to FMCG operations: only after managing capital liquidity well can other matters be valuable.

Tantalizing Sales and Traps

To be honest, promoting FMCG products in counties, townships, and villages is as elusive as a black hole. With 800 million rural residents, if you could earn one cent per person per month, it would be an astronomical figure. However, the rural reality of "different accents within three li, different customs within ten li," the muddy and bumpy logistics, and the low living standards... make it difficult to find the balance between investment and return.

With both tantalizing potential sales and silent traps, expanding and maintaining county, township, and village markets is like searching for treasure on an isolated island, full of risks and delights. Based on our years of observation and firsthand experiences, we summarize the following.

First, Decision-Making Scenario Analysis

"Why isn't our product in this store?" A blonde, blue-eyed president of a Fortune 500 company asked a salesperson at a township savings office, causing laughter from the crowd and confusion among the accompanying foreign managers. Two years later, after heavy investment, his product quietly withdrew from the county and township markets.

We are even more pleased to see that Zong Qinghou personally visited the front lines for local guidance, and research documents flew like snowflakes to headquarters. Today, in remote areas, only Wahaha bottled water is available at the Henan pancake stalls. This demonstrates the flattest, most efficient, and most direct model for formulating county, township, and village promotion strategies and tactics.

Second, Testing Scenario Analysis

During early market trial promotions, it is taboo to use all resources at once. Many companies, eager for rapid growth, pour all resources into the market. Although sales increase noticeably, later it becomes unclear which type of resource played the decisive role, leading to wasted funds. The proper approach should be:

1. Test product market penetration through customer trials and terminal display sales;
2. Test marketing push-pull effects through terminal displays, end caps, incentive policies, and temporary promotional staff;
3. Test brand influence through TV, newspapers, billboards, and other advertising.

By testing in these three tiers, you can obtain data to clarify the contribution of each resource, then integrate and advance together to maximize promotional value.

Third, Market Scenario Analysis

When the author first entered townships, he invited several township store owners to smoke a pack of 10-yuan cigarettes. They seemed to enjoy them, even taking a strong drag at the butt. Through conversation, he learned that in many Henan townships, township heads smoke 6-10 yuan cigarettes, village heads smoke 1-3 yuan, and ordinary farmers smoke 0.2-0.5 yuan. This consumption difference made the author realize the need to invest more effort in understanding county-level market demand. He then conducted tiered surveys. In county towns, major brands like Unilever's Lux and P&G's Safeguard were increasingly accepted by consumers. However, due to strategic neglect, high prices, and poor logistics, township markets were like a screen blocking them out. Meanwhile, many excellent small and medium enterprises, using convenient motorized tricycles, intimate knowledge of local customs, and suitable supply, thrived in the vast potential market, creating regional brands that meet people's needs.

From this, it is clear that the county-level market is divided into three tiers: county town, township, and village. It is essential to have a product series and differentiate quality, image, and price to position at these three levels. Only then can business opportunities be unlimited. If a fast-moving consumer goods project lacks strong product strength, a rich product line, and sustained initial funding, it is difficult to solidify the market foundation. It is better not to venture into this area.

Fourth, Operations Scenario Analysis

Due to economic environment and consumption capacity constraints, most townships and villages lack professional washing and care terminals, with food and grocery stores being the majority. Leveraging these channels is most conducive to reaching down. Crucially, using these multi-purpose stores to operate washing and care business, and using merchandising to highlight our product image and enhance capital liquidity, is a shortcut for cooperation. In county-level markets, constrained by transportation, manpower, and traffic, the lower the level, the weaker the consumption capacity, and the product and capital flow rates decrease while costs and profits increase.

Making the county town a benchmark and focusing on townships, rewarding second-tier distributors with motorized tricycles and motorcycles for delivery, and radiating to village networks, can have a connecting effect. Conversely, doing village-level distribution and sales first, then working upward, can also achieve the effect of "encircling the cities from the countryside." We can decide based on the competitive situation.

Fifth, Competition Scenario Analysis

In FMCG, to increase the chance of success, you need to "ambush" first, then "draw the sword." That is, thoroughly understand the situation, plan meticulously, and then strike the market with lightning speed, never giving competitors any chance to follow up.

Many top players in FMCG regions have a "fierce" response speed, full of wolf-like tenacity. When a brand is about to make a big move, it needs to pay attention to upstream supplier support, potential competitor growth, current competitor competitiveness, and downstream distribution promotion capabilities, adjusting strategies in a timely manner (see Attachment 1).

Sixth, Channel Scenario Analysis

"Son, Uncle Niu's truck is here, get ready to unload," "Wife, Xiao Ma is almost here, tell him I'm not in." This is a true portrayal of rural promotion. The three-tier network of county, township, and village, with varying terminal quality, routes not on maps, and unfamiliar dialects and customs, determines that professional competence must be combined with an amateur perspective, achieving the goal that lasting longer is more important than doing bigger.

Most customers are accustomed to relationship marketing based on familiar people, vehicles, goods, prices, times, and routes. We need to use fixed routes, fixed vehicles, fixed times, fixed staff, fixed prices, fixed maintenance, and fixed merchandising to support this rural reality of "different accents within three li, different customs within ten li."

"Old Ma, five boxes of laundry detergent, 160 yuan, here's the money." The author has often seen veteran salespeople who have spent half their lives in townships casually throw a few boxes of goods onto the counter and settle accounts, with customers paying readily.

Upon reflection, doing one thing to the extreme is an advantage. Veteran salespeople, besides being recognized by their familiar faces, all understand that managing customers' inventory and sales is equivalent to managing their cash box; paying attention to competitors' inventory and sales is equivalent to paying attention to our voice in the industry. Every time they distribute goods, the seemingly casual placement is based on years of terminal experience and tacit understanding of customers' immediate needs, so goods arrive and money comes.

Seventh, Management Scenario Analysis

"Customers are the market, stores are the network." Based on the long-term pursuit of 100% distribution rate, targeted support should be given to terminals: protect large ones, support weak ones, and retain small ones. In practice, it is common for salespeople to overstock large customers, causing indigestion, and neglect small customers, leading to frequent stockouts.

Price difference lasts forever,
Inventory without omission,
Distribution must be lean,
Merchandising at its best,
Sales in multiple series,
Collection with clarity.

These five points are an operational formula summarized by the author after two years in the market and hundreds of foreign enterprise employees. Missing any detail is a mistake.

Eighth, Combat Readiness Scenario Analysis

Brand, sales, profit, and cash flow are the four pillars of FMCG operations. In the early stages of distribution, you often hear about whether goods sell well or not. When sales are good, terminal customers become profit-oriented. Grasping inventory, price difference, distribution, display, sales, collection, and merchandising, the faster the flow, the fewer customer complaints. The long-term efficiency of the sales support system is the key to victory. "The closer the head and feet," the more conducive to seamless operation.

Sales—the biggest fear is that the front line is under pressure while the rear lacks supplies. Salespeople's greatest pain is not only serving the market well but also "serving" internal resource allocation personnel. Regular cross-training where sales, sales support, and strategy personnel exchange positions for deep experience is necessary.

Ninth, Public Relations Scenario Analysis

In rural markets, those in cars cannot outdo those on bicycles, and those on bicycles cannot outdo those carrying goods on their shoulders. If you make store owners feel you are superior, you are heading for self-destruction. Salespeople who can eat from the same pot, live in the same leaky house, drink the same cup of wine, and smoke the same pack of cigarettes as the target group can create a healthy cooperation platform.

Tenth, Related Planning Scenario Analysis

Generally, items used by cadres' families first often play a demonstrative role in the surrounding area. It is common for some cadres' family members to run a grocery store or small business. Cooperating with them can sometimes lead to relatively large group purchases.

Packaging cost investment should consider high practical value for the consumer group, making it easier to open people's wallets. For example, daily condiments packed in basins and sold at a bundled price to second-tier distributors can achieve good bundled sales. Retail stores are happy to sell spoonful by spoonful and then earn the basin money, greatly increasing market penetration.

In fact, in FMCG, if you are not a saint, you must be a madman. Many people quit due to the fast pace of mental, physical, and financial demands. Long-term persistence will make you like a skilled oil seller, thoroughly familiar with local conditions and with a growing number of relationship customers. The actual operation is "eight periods and one day": testing period, focusing period, distribution period, growth day, cultivation period, eruption period, nirvana period, value-added period, and continuation period. The full implementation process and typical cases are organized as follows.

Testing Period—To Jump High, First Crouch Down

To jump high, first crouch down. Through supermarkets, retail, and street stalls, understand the customer's entire purchase process. Through residential areas, units, and hotels, understand the customer's usage reactions. Only then can you avoid being like a blind man on a blind horse, approaching a deep pool at night.

First, start with double-blind testing. Decision-makers select consumers relatively evenly based on geographic area and consumption level. Remove the names, logos, and packaging of the most popular products on the market and our own laundry detergent and other products, number them, and offer them for free trial. During this process, the test executors are also unaware of the brands, to investigate consumer acceptance of our upcoming products' quality, fragrance, dosage, etc.

"What exists is reasonable." When the author conducted rural market tests in northern counties and townships, survey data showed that many households used one to two times more than county customers. Many subjectively judged that testers were trying to take advantage. But when visiting users on-site, it became clear that in many villages, laundry detergent is used to fry dough sticks to enhance puffiness, mix with pesticides to improve spraying precision and adhesion, and wash pots, dishes, faces, bodies, hair, and clothes. Its functions are seemingly incredibly amplified. "If your laundry detergent had more fragrance, it would sell better." A casual remark from a village head's wife indeed increased our product sales.

Pay attention to the details of customer purchases, and even more to the entire usage process. During subsequent product usage surveys, we inadvertently discovered:

1. Washing clothes, bathing, and haircuts in northern counties and townships are group activities and a form of entertainment, organized, tacit, and at relatively fixed times. It is normal for people to borrow and share washing and care products. Therefore, conducting market research, on-site sales, and brand promotion at riversides, bathhouses, and barbershops is equally feasible.
2. Most men use only half a bag of shampoo at a time. Adding an extra seal line in the middle of each bag, a humanized design, can trigger greater market demand. Most bagged shampoos are 5 ml. When divided into two connected bags, we can make them 3 ml * 2 bags, selling 1 ml more per use than other brands. A nine-story tower starts with a pile of earth; competing from the single-cell level increases the chance of victory.
3. Soap is a high-end consumer product in rural areas; laundry soap serves as a substitute. Adding fragrance can also boost sales.
4. Small sample products are generally favored by grassroots travelers. Placing similar products at stations and hotels can effectively increase market coverage.
5. Empty shampoo bottles can store needles, thread, mung beans, seasonings, etc. When broken, they can be cut into shoe soles, placed outside a pair of shoes during daily farming to extend shoe life. Therefore, shampoo bottles must be environmentally friendly and sturdy.
6. Due to price differences, bulk laundry detergent is more easily accepted than bagged, generating sales and deepening channel penetration, but it harms brand image.

Second, conduct atomic-level testing. With the same target group as double-blind testing, preferably entrusted to a third party, ask consumers to rate the product's concept, packaging, advertising, price, and usage effect on a scale from extremely dissatisfied, dissatisfied, satisfied, very satisfied, to extremely satisfied. Targeted planning adjustments help avoid weaknesses and leverage strengths.

"Country folks don't know goods; they just pick the big ones." The author personally experienced that concentrated laundry detergent accepted by urban consumers, despite various marketing efforts to distribute it in township markets, failed to open the wallets of the target group, leading to massive returns.

Decisions made without understanding the consumption trends at this level caused the project's market cultivation to be congenitally deficient, ending with terminal complaints, distributor grievances, and decision-maker failure. The successor adjusted to puffed laundry detergent, and the market stabilized only after six months of heavy investment.

Third, targeted trial sales—select representative supermarkets, retail points, townships, and village terminals for sales to identify the best-selling prices, models, and packaging of our test products and competitors at each consumption level. Summarize these diamond-level information resources. The magic of the network lies in speed. For orders or custom requests to manufacturers, when the market is fully launched, it helps our products circulate quickly, allowing sales to build the corresponding brand.

Summary of this period: This stage accumulates a large amount of market introduction data and usage scenarios through research tools, helping us focus on the industry and position ourselves. Long-term use of relevant research tools can form a permanent "information dominance" mindset. This system greatly enhances our ability to lock onto target markets, giving us the first high ground in competition.

"Three years old determines eighty." Customers will view a product promotion like a child. The next step is to enrich the functions of experimental terminals to maximize their effect, lifting the market and driving overall development.

Focusing Period—Ignite at a Point, Spread Like Fire

"A single spark can start a prairie fire." The terminals and customer groups activated during the testing period are models to attract more partners. Before a large-scale market launch, these terminals must be managed by dedicated merchandisers and salespeople, seizing stack displays and end caps to significantly boost sales. Simultaneously, add seven functions to these terminals to exceed customer expectations for product needs, price matching, channel convenience, and service quality. The resulting strong radiation will make market expansion unstoppable.

Specific operations are as follows:

First, benchmark demonstration function—use hanging flags, POP, stack displays, end caps, music, in-store TV ads, and personnel promotion to create a sales scene where each product's influence is paramount, attracting impulse purchases and serving as a magnet for large-scale distribution.

Second, training function at all levels—the sales atmosphere can cultivate target consumers' brand awareness. We can also invite upstream and downstream partners to visit sales scenes to enhance cooperation confidence, train promotional staff's explanation skills, merchandising hands-on ability, and train salespeople's data collection, summarization, and analysis capabilities during distribution, preparing for tacit cooperation during large-scale operations.

Third, brand communication function—build stack displays like temples and promotional flyers like wedding photos. Such sales will be maximized, and brand communication will be most profound. Because temples are subconsciously desirable to many, and wedding photos are subconsciously pleasing, the absolute sales generated create an absolute brand.

Fourth, capital liquidity function—when our visual merchandising makes customers' visual, auditory, gustatory, and tactile senses subconsciously comfortable, transactions will come naturally. With promotional staff explanations, brisk sales are not difficult.

Fifth, laboratory function—insert a tall flying flag with the company logo on the stack display, and place a small box near the end cap where the color, fragrance, and texture of washing and care products are displayed. These all contribute to sales growth. Whether strategic planning or tactical actions, testing in representative terminals first before promotion is a steady and fast strategy.

Sixth, competition function—once fierce market competition begins, terminals with benchmark functions must play the role of pioneers. We provide key support and maintenance, which helps us benchmark against excellent peers, advance wisely, jointly suppress and eliminate weak brands, and consolidate market position.

Seventh, information collection function—purchase, sales, inventory, damage, defects, and losses; daily market changes and each promotion behavior leave valuable data at laboratory-function terminals for us to interpret and predict next steps.

Summary of this stage: This stage connects the previous and next, using the network points activated during the testing period as a fuse, focusing resources on these terminals, igniting at a point, quickly attracting high attention from various types of terminal owners, and preheating for large-scale distribution.

Distribution Period—The Purpose of Professionalism Is Comfort

"If you want to be professional, you must first look professional." FMCG veterans know this truth. After visiting the leading stores in each township and reaching consensus, implement a permanent visit plan with the "seven fixed" model to achieve good distribution coverage. This is a strategic layout of accumulating small victories into big ones.

First, fixed visit routes—a county-level market has 300-800 outlets. In the first month of distribution, we must formulate a visit route that does not miss a single terminal. In the second month, adjust for rationality. In the third month, it must be stabilized to avoid scattered distribution like a shotgun.

Second, fixed recognizable vehicles—long-term maintained customers will feel a sense of familiarity when they see our vehicle from afar, reducing communication costs.

Third, fixed delivery times—before loading goods the day before, call each customer to be visited in a pre-sale manner, record current inventory and next day's replenishment, and appear regularly and punctually every week. Credibility will be established subtly.

Fourth, fixed distribution staff—familiar faces make it easier to sell benefits. We can naturally place products in customers' hands or in front of them, use a calculator to help them summarize the investment and return of our products, and stimulate more cooperation desire. When leaving, attach a sticky business card in a visible place so customers can contact us immediately when needed, facilitating both them and our sales.

Fifth, fixed product price difference—the price system in FMCG is extremely sacred. One terminal's price chaos can destabilize a township's channel. Fixed distribution prices combined with various incentives, such as buying one box of laundry detergent and getting a box of Zhonghua toothpaste, or rewarding non-company brand-name products in regional sales competitions, with practicality as the principle, can implicitly support price control and channel stability.

Sixth, fixed maintenance procedures—the best loading position on the truck, hanging flags in place, POP posted, the best warehouse outbound position, the best display position in the terminal, clear price tags, terminal staff explaining to customers, 1.5-3 times sales-to-inventory ratio, and permanent multi-faceted maintenance will have a dripping water effect. Whenever customers call long-distance complaining about poor sales, the author travels thousands of miles to the location, and most often the cause is incomplete basic steps.

Seventh, fixed merchandising methods—a single-shoulder bag is a salesperson's treasure bag, containing recent company policies, glue, business cards, calculators, staplers, and other items forming a mobile office. But always remember to carry a rag. At each terminal, besides arranging goods in good display positions and neatly, also wipe clean both our products and competitors' products. In the market, most salespeople ignore what happens after collecting payment. This behavior of helping customers manage their business with practical actions and being responsible after the sale will make most customers highly trust and cooperate with you. The purpose of professionalism is comfort. A rag can wipe out a strong market; this simple repetitive behavior can be called the "FMCG Bible," and it is not an exaggeration to describe it as core competitiveness.

Implement these seven fixed points, repeat simple things correctly, achieve the relationship marketing state of familiar people, vehicles, goods, prices, times, and routes, and the foundation is solid. Of course, to become an industry leader, you must give before you take. There are three distribution essentials to learn from.

First, distribute "benefits" not "good goods." The circulation speed and thin profits of FMCG determine that communication and transactions need to be fast. When the vehicle arrives at the store, first use hanging flags and POP for peripheral visual merchandising, making transactions easier. The author used this method to achieve over 90% first-time distribution rates. For the remaining 10% of customers, some say they have no money. No problem, barter trade: "I'll buy a box of your instant noodles. Now you have money, right? You can buy my goods." The store owner will often laugh and curse while putting your goods on the shelf. Some refuse no matter what. Fine, "Let me borrow your counter to display goods for a while. Let's do on-site sales promotion." Soon, a few bags are sold. Then it is easier to persuade the owner.

Second, distribute "value" not "price." "Do you have dirty clothes? Let me wash them for you." When entering a new area for distribution, we often use this method: explain while demonstrating. For the first few times, only let customers stock two or three bags of laundry detergent, help them with display, and use frequent small purchases to smooth the market. Persisting through all seasons, the salesperson's hardworking hands can wash out an upward-developing market.

Third, distribute "buying points" not "selling points." The author has laughed for years over an example: just after distributing whitening soap to a familiar township terminal, no one had seen such a product. A girl came to buy soap. The store owner picked up a piece of whitening soap and told the girl, "This thing whitens your face. Look how white this soap is." The girl paid without hesitation. Clearly, the store owner's sales proposition matched the customer's benefit point, and profits followed.

Laundry detergent has strong decontamination, shampoo has a cooling effect, and soap kills bacteria and promotes health. Cultivate terminal staff with unique product functions and correct customer benefit points, supplemented by spiritual and material incentives. When customers have more benefits, our goods will definitely be good goods.

We summarize the entire market operation with the jingle "Three Disciplines and Eight Points for County and Township Operations":

Salespeople must remember, three disciplines and eight points;
First, all actions obey the command; strict discipline leads to victory;
Second, take nothing from customers; integrity makes customers happy;
Third, collect payments promptly; save expenses and reduce consumption;
We must adhere to the three disciplines, and never forget the eight points.

First, speak sincerely and friendly; honesty and courtesy are the magic weapon of reputation;
Second, be diligent in hands, mouth, and feet; plan county and township sites well first;
Third, display posters and banners well; don't forget to highlight customer benefits;
Fourth, don't ask if people want it; use storefront marketing with a smile to introduce;
Fifth, arrange goods precisely; frontline training is the foundation;

Author: Liu Jianheng, Yang Hongwei, Zhang Laiqi

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