Introduction: Market conditions and environments may change, but the essence of capturing consumers remains constant.
On January 8, the "Rising Against the Trend: The Path to Breakthrough for Chinese Brands" summit was held in Shanghai. Representative Chinese brands such as Junlebao, Jinmailang, Dongpeng Beverages, Luckin Coffee, Yezhifeng, Tasly, Conba, Talanis, Kongke Pasta, and Daily Dark Chocolate, along with Xie Weishan from Junzhi Billion Strategy Consulting, which has long been committed to promoting the high-quality development of Chinese brands, delivered keynote speeches sharing their experiences and insights on breaking through in the new landscape. In the post-pandemic era, a new recovery cycle is brewing. The demographic dividend and traffic dividend have come to an end, but the dividends of mindshare and brand are unfolding. Those who take the lead will usher in China's "New Diamond Decade" of fresh opportunities. Below are key excerpts:
Wei Lihua, Chairman and President of Junlebao Dairy Group: Brand is the moat for a company's longevity.
Innovation is the sword for a company to break through competition, and brand is the moat for a company's longevity. Junlebao has accelerated its development by innovating the integrated whole-industry chain, two world-class models, and the creation of innovative category mega-products. To build a brand moat, Junlebao's infant formula focuses on CCTV, Focus Media, and major variety shows, making Youcui the leading brand in the domestic organic milk powder market. Jiancuo created the 0-added-sucrose yogurt category, focusing on Focus Media as the core medium to ignite the brand, continuously enhancing brand influence through cognitive breadth and precise reach. Jiancuo yogurt has now become the leader in the 0-added-sucrose category with a market share far ahead. Meanwhile, Yuexinxian, the "new generation of fresh milk" supported by INF0.09-second ultra-instant sterilization technology, maximizes the retention of natural active proteins in milk, is deeply recognized and loved by consumers, and its sales are rising rapidly.
Fan Xianguo, Chairman of Jinmailang Group: From innovation to creating mindshare is the only way to have a future.
True innovation is not simply a new product; it must occupy the customer's mind. Creating mindshare is the root of innovation. The law of survival of the fittest for enterprises is a competition of two occupations: occupying mindshare and occupying the market. Occupying mindshare relies on innovating categories and building brands, while occupying the market requires channel construction. "Rooted in culture, create categories, become the first"—Jinmailang has practiced this path, using life-scene media like Focus Media to form a deterministic connection with 400 million consumers' daily lives, continuously driving rapid product growth. From January to October 2022, Jinmailang's boiled water sales increased by 26%, and Lamian Fan grew by 180%.
Yang Fei, Co-founder and Chief Growth Officer of Luckin Coffee: Brand is a permanent traffic pool.
The key to rapid brand launch lies in positioning, symbols, and scenarios. Positioning determines mindshare occupation, symbols determine consumer recognition and memory, and scenarios determine the stimulation of consumer purchase. During the 2022 Winter Olympics, Focus Media used cloud platform technology to quickly switch Luckin's advertising materials, and the Luckin × Gu Ailing first-gold poster rapidly covered elevator scenarios. During the ad campaign, the winter drink recommended by Gu Ailing achieved surprising sales, becoming a classic case of event-driven scenarios. As consumption returns after the pandemic, companies should focus on refined marketing, acquiring internal and external traffic, retaining users, and combining effective user operation methods to gain huge subsequent conversion value.
Lin Muqin, Chairman of Dongpeng Beverages Group: Focus on one core and concentrate all investments.
In brand marketing, companies often face the challenge of choosing only one core message. At this time, they should integrate all media forms and persistently focus on investing in one sentence. As Dongpeng Beverages has done for over a decade, focusing on the slogan "Tired and sleepy? Drink Dongpeng Special Drink" has yielded significant results. The drastic changes in the media environment and the fragmentation of consumer attention are another challenge. Over the past two years, Dongpeng Beverages has continuously partnered with Focus Media's life-scene media, especially in key marketing moments such as the company's IPO, corporate philanthropy, and the World Cup, playing a crucial role in steady brand growth and accelerating national expansion.
Zhang Jun, Chairman of Yezhifeng Decoration Group: Mindshare share equals market share.
Only when a brand enters the hearts of consumers can it achieve long-term development. Mindshare share equals market share. Yezhifeng is the earliest home decoration company to invest in brand and mindshare. During the pandemic in 2020, Yezhifeng still announced a hundred-million-yuan investment in Focus Media. Through brand mindshare building, sales grew by 40% against the trend in 2021. Yezhifeng uses Focus Media to occupy the high ground of media communication, while also enabling flexible and intelligent delivery across dimensions such as city, audience, and time period. Focus Media is the preferred medium to ignite 400 million mainstream consumers and is an amplifier for other media traffic.
Wu Naifeng, Founder of Tasly: CCTV endorsement + WeChat, Weibo, Douyin, and Focus Media.
As the pioneer in the new-style functional tea beverage segment, Deepure targets the sub-healthy state of contemporary young people with excessive diet and irregular lifestyle, proposing the slogan "Want to eat but afraid of gaining weight? Drink Deepure," effectively hitting the urgent needs of young people. In 2022, Deepure invested over 100 million yuan, adopting the golden communication combination of "CCTV endorsement, WeChat, Weibo, Douyin, and Focus Media" to comprehensively reach mainstream urban consumers. Through communication and channels, Deepure not only achieved leapfrog development, firmly ranking first in the instant tea category, but also drove the entire category to rapid growth. The tea powder/tea paste/tea essence/tea liquid/tea honey categories emerged, with Tmall growth reaching 608.9%.
Xu Jianhong, Chairman of Inofa Pharmaceutical under Conba: Brand power is immunity.
After eight consecutive years of rapid development, Conba's Changyanning (a gastrointestinal medicine) hit a growth bottleneck. However, at this time, Changyanning firmly believed that brand power is immunity, chose to reposition itself, created the leading brand in the "intestinal Chinese patent medicine" category, stimulated, connected, and amplified consumer demand, and seized user mindshare. Facing content fragmentation and media dust, Changyanning chose to focus on Focus Media for three consecutive years, implementing saturation attacks, fully leveraging Focus Media's unique advantages of high frequency and low interference to ignite brand propositions. On this basis, Changyanning also carried out science popularization and interactive marketing, making efforts both online and offline. Sales exceeded 1 billion yuan, securing the first place in the intestinal medication market share and 10th place in the national retail market Chinese patent medicine ranking.
Ding Fei, Founder and Chairman of Talanis: Strategy is about trade-offs and adhering to long-termism.
In the 70-billion-yuan children's shoe market dominated by big brands, how to go from survival to leadership? Talanis anchored long-termism and chose to partner with Focus Media in 2022, marking its brand launch year. Instead of competing in changes, it's better to seek certainty. The market will change, the environment will change, but the essence of capturing consumers will not change. Talanis differentiated its positioning to seize the first choice for "fashion children's shoes," connecting with consumers' demand for children's shoes that are "not just comfortable, but also exquisite." With the support of Focus Media, Talanis's brand ads covered over 100 cities across the country, reaching target audiences with high frequency and saturation, efficiently occupying mainstream consumers' minds and achieving a leap in momentum. During the 2022 Double 11, Talanis achieved the first place in Tmall baby and children's shoe sales, with Tmall flagship store sales exceeding 100 million yuan for the first time, and ranked first in offline mall sales.
Wang Yichao, Co-founder and CEO of Kongke Pasta: In China's consumer goods market, don't underestimate any category.
Kongke Pasta focuses on the pasta category with a history of nearly 2,000 years, leveraging consumers' mature mindshare of classic categories and relying on strong supply chain capabilities. From 2019 to 2021, Kongke seized the traffic opportunities of performance advertising and achieved the first place in Tmall Double 11 pasta sales for three consecutive years through professional operations on Tmall and Douyin. In 2022, Kongke Pasta partnered with Focus Media and resolutely launched large-scale brand advertising, aiming to increase the mindshare AI scale of the category and brand, making more people aware of and interested in the category and brand. Looking at all media, Focus Media is the best medium we believe to increase mindshare AI scale at this stage. Online ads are often interest-based; if you don't want to watch, you can ignore them, but Focus Media creates an environment that effectively reaches consumers. Through Focus Media advertising, the Baidu search index for "Kongke Pasta" rose rapidly. During the full Double 11 period in 2022, Kongke's sales on Tmall in the pasta category exceeded the sum of the 2nd to 5th place combined, and it became the TOP1 in the convenient ready-to-eat category on Tmall, achieving a milestone leap.
Zhou Yu, Founder of Daily Dark Chocolate: Seize the blank mindshare in the category.
Although the traditional chocolate market is dominated by giants, the dark chocolate category is growing rapidly, and the category mindshare is still blank. Facing this situation, Daily Dark Chocolate seized the opportunity, created the world's first "oat milk dark chocolate," entered the market with innovative products, and by partnering with Focus Media to ignite the new product, successfully leveraged the perception of being the first in dark chocolate and channel penetration. With the help of Focus Media, Daily Dark Chocolate's Baidu search index increased by 926% year-on-year, all-channel sales increased by 300% month-on-month, free traffic rapidly increased, and the number of outlets expanded from 30,000 to 100,000, with core single-product daily sales maintaining category leadership.
Xie Weishan, Chairman of Junzhi Billion Strategy Consulting: The era of Chinese brands reaching billions is coming.
The era of Chinese brands reaching billions is coming. The Chinese market is vast and deep, with large volume, rapid development, and abundant nutrients. The huge market size can create more billion-yuan enterprises, and the steady growth of the national economy has also consolidated the development foundation for more billion-yuan enterprises. Enterprises should seek new opportunities in changes, seize new opportunities, and open new patterns. In the past year, most brands have been conservative in speaking out. In fact, at this time, companies willing to convey new ideas and spread more will gain better recognition when market noise is relatively low. Act when it's time to act; within the changes lie opportunities for brand growth.