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What exactly is refinement? Refinement conveys two levels of meaning: “refined” means precise and accurate; “detailed” means focusing on details and being meticulous.

Attacking a market often relies on a single-point breakthrough, concentrating resources on one point. At this stage, precision and accuracy are crucial; otherwise, the company may find itself in a dilemma. Even if some companies appear to launch a comprehensive, systematic offensive, they still need a precise breakthrough point to focus on, creating an offensive miracle. For example, the “pan-in-pan” model I observed relies on the hotel channel to drive market development; the consumer pan-in-pan model uses PR and group buying; the circulation pan-in-pan model breaks through via core tobacco/alcohol stores and key secondary distributors. Although these models may involve cross-pan integration in practice, depending on the competitive environment and situation, a core model is always chosen for heavy investment and breakthrough. Defending a market or consolidating after a single-point breakthrough requires more refined cultivation and flatter penetration—doing deep and thorough work to achieve full bloom and ensure market stability and sustainability. For instance, Seed Wine’s success is a typical result of meticulous market cultivation. Anhui liquor’s competition for the local market focuses on mid-range prices; the company’s products are mainly Xianghe Seed Wine and Rouhe Seed Wine. The reason for Seed Wine’s sustained high growth is its precise marketing strategy and deep cultivation of selected regional markets.

First, in regions without strong competitors, they promote products at price points with weaker competition—this is “refined.” (For example, in Lu’an, where Yingjia Gongjiu is based, they avoid the business and government market and focus on Xianghe Seed Wine, achieving sales revenue close to 70 million yuan in 2010.)

Second, when attacking a market, they first launch a single-point heavy attack, mainly using consumer pan-in-pan or terminal pan-in-pan to break through. Once the breakthrough is made, they launch a full-scale, systematic offensive—this is also “refined.”

Third, they push sales channels down to districts and towns, even to villages, aiming for every town to have an agent and every village to have a retail point. Distributors each handle their own areas, and towns achieve “five monopolies” (hotels, publicity, major supermarkets, major tobacco/alcohol stores, and good distribution resources). The goal is “no market gaps, first in every village, first in every store.” This is “detailed.”

Fourth, they have nearly 200 distributors under standardized management (vehicles, sales staff numbers, office locations, etc.), with 1-2 salespeople assigned to manage each, and over 6,000 terminal staff across the province—this is also “detailed.”

Fifth, they maintain a database of core consumers, detailed down to units and communities, with obvious advantages in personal connections—this is even more “detailed.”

Sixth, they stabilize prices: in 2009, ex-factory prices were raised 10-15%; in 2010, they remained unchanged, but rebates were reduced (mainly through returning wine, and also through reduced accounts receivable). This is a delicate task; the rapid decline of good brands often stems from insufficiently strict and detailed price maintenance.

Seventh, they implement a deposit system to prevent cross-region selling. This is also a detail-oriented measure.

Seed Wine’s sales revenue is 80% from within the province. The southern Anhui market has always performed well, and the northern Anhui market is also good. Among 17 regions, Fuyang, Suzhou, Anqing, Chaohu, Huangshan, and Ma’anshan hold the top market share; in other regions, they lead in specific price points or some counties. Currently, in Anhui’s 24 counties with a population of over one million, almost every major town has a direct agent. In 2012, 18 counties exceeded 100 million yuan in sales; in 2013, the target is 24 counties.

Today’s liquor marketing is highly homogenized; competition has escalated to capital and brand competition. However, for a regional weak brand with neither capital nor brand influence, can it continue to rely on natural, random marketing tactics for sustained, stable development? For regional weak brands breaking into new markets, they must know themselves, their competitors, and the environment, fully utilize existing resources, focus on their advantages, and rely on core marketing strategies—attacking with methods, steps, and goals to capture the market. Otherwise, all efforts are in vain; chaos leads to extinction—this is an eternal rule.

Let’s see how regional brands can achieve market leadership by building a refinement project.

1. Precision in Core Consumer PR

Core consumer PR is about dealing with people, making it hard to follow a fixed pattern. But without a pattern, relying solely on personal judgment leads to scattered efforts and wasted money. When marketing to core consumers, take “PR marketing” as the main line, maximize the integration of “SNS social networks,” establish a group-buying target database, set standard management methods, and follow up with services by defining circles, systems, people, interest chains, and responsibilities. Continuously improve the group-buying database, optimize the customer base, and enhance the quality of PR and group buying.

For example, when serving a regional liquor company, we established a database of over 400 core customers, covering almost the entire core consumer group in the market, including government leaders at or above the deputy county level and heads of enterprises and institutions. For these 400+ core customers, we formed a team of over 30 key account managers, responsible for maintaining relationships, PR group buying, and promoting the “trunk project.” We strive to make these 400+ core customers completely loyal to the brand, and through them, drive sales in the government and business liquor market.

  1. PR before group buying: Only after establishing good PR with unit leaders can group buying conditions and momentum be achieved. Without effective PR, the success rate of group buying drops significantly. Especially the PR of key figures in strong groups, thereby driving the wealthy and privileged to consume and cultivating long-term loyal customers.

  2. Build relationships, deepen vertically, expand horizontally: After successfully conducting group buying with an enterprise or institution, fully utilize the leader’s personal connections to carry out PR and group buying with other directly affiliated units, making the entire system deep and thorough. Use the leader’s friends or business relationships to penetrate other units or systems.

  3. PR advisory group: (Only PR, no group buying, receiving PR fees) Retired cadres from local government or important figures from enterprises and institutions, with wide social networks and great influence, are opinion leaders in many social circles. They can continuously assist the company in PR activities with various units, showing high loyalty to the company and brand. The company hires them as consultants. Through their social connections, the company can grasp detailed information about the local core consumer group, laying the foundation for market expansion and database building. Common practice: select PR consultants by administrative region, also known as “leading brothers.” Based on their performance, provide PR fees and gift wine. Usually, “leading brothers” are influential people locally or in their circles, quickly creating a huge impact in their social circles.

  • Internal line leaders and PR ladies: Hire internal line leaders to find cooperation opportunities, employ attractive PR ladies, and conduct regular or irregular visits, wine deliveries, and small tasting event invitations for emotional communication.
  • Gold card members: With the cooperation of local distributors, find people from reputable enterprises and institutions who have many social engagements, develop them into gold card members, first send wine for free tasting to build relationships, then send blessings, wine, and gifts on holidays and birthdays, providing preferential services and long-term emotional service.
  • One-table tasting sessions:
    • First, “invite in” tasting sessions: banquets hosted by distributors or brand consultants with a tasting theme. Conduct centralized brand promotion to target consumers; let our products meet target customers directly to deepen their awareness (experiential marketing); find and develop potential group-buying customers and attract investment.
    • Notes: Small tasting sessions should be conducted by system and in order; do not gather customers from many different units together, as it is not conducive to communication; try to invite one table at a time, at most two tables, to facilitate one-on-one communication; focus on one or two core leaders as the center of each session.
    • Second, “go out” tasting sessions: participate in small banquets with concentrated target customers by providing drinking wine. For example, “free distribution during major holidays,” “free wine for important people’s family weddings,” and other PR activities, making them the mainstream drinking group to guide and ignite other consumer groups, gradually forming a consumption trend.

Marketing guru Philip Kotler emphasized the importance of “opinion leaders” in promoting mid-to-high-end brands: first activate the 1-2% of the target group who are “opinion leaders,” through word-of-mouth and top-down influence, drive 15% of innovative consumers, and finally influence 40-50% of the following mass consumers, ultimately leading to full product popularity.

2. Deepening Catering Terminal Marketing

Competition in the liquor market has never left terminal competition; further, it is “using core products, through core terminals, to achieve effective breakthroughs with core consumers.” For core hotel marketing, only depth matters, not breadth; deeply explore the potential of entering hotels, and make the hotels you’ve entered solid and well-done.

Although the company has captured core terminals, that’s just the first step of a long journey; the good part is yet to come. Whether marketing is effective depends on how you unlock consumers’ mouths, let them taste your wine, like it, and then think of it—that’s the key.

  • Directly station promoters: Station full-time promotional staff in core hotels, using word-of-mouth to directly promote and introduce products to target consumers.
  • Develop hidden promoters: hotel captains, bar staff, marketing managers, waiters, etc.
  • Organize internal consumption leaders: These insiders must be regulars or patrons of the hotel; they can be hired as company consultants to make the product concept actionable. For opinion consumption leaders, spend money, e.g., in A-class hotels, allocate 3,000 yuan for PR as follows: initial stage, give 1,000 yuan for wine name-ordering fees; as long as they come to this hotel, they order this wine; thereafter, give monthly gift wine to bring to the hotel for consumption.
  • PR for hotel regulars: Catering promoters collect information on brand regulars during daily work and report to the sales and PR departments. Collection methods: hotel reservation phone book, inquiries from key hotel staff, and inquiries from waiters. Collect regulars’ names, phone numbers, backgrounds, contact methods, preferred wine price points, brands, quantities, unit addresses, etc., to build a core consumer database. Based on the list, conduct regular visits, frequent gift-giving or wine-giving for relationship maintenance. For regulars with high status and strong influence, consider hiring them as tasting consultants.
  • Joint hotel promotions: For consuming 1 bottle of the product in the hotel, enjoy a 10% discount on the meal; 2 bottles, 20% off; 3 bottles or more, 30% off. If consuming 10 bottles within a month, the hotel issues a silver card for a long-term 20% discount; 20 bottles, a gold card for a long-term 30% discount. Also, joint promotions with nightclubs, bars, and KTVs, because customers often like to relax at these entertainment venues after dinner.
  • Prize placement: Place prize-winning products in designated hotels, with on-site prize redemption to stimulate consumer enthusiasm.
  • Differentiated services: Build deep friendships with hotel owners, managers, captains, and other key personnel through relationship-based PR, emotional maintenance, and circle-based interactions; provide practical help to hotel management, such as magazines and newspapers on restaurant management and sales, invite restaurant marketing experts for regular free training for key restaurant owners and staff; provide suggestions for specialty dishes and special services.

For core hotel marketing, it’s absolutely about depth, not breadth. If you can achieve sustained and effective communication with core hotels and their core consumer groups, and perfectly match investment and control effects with the company’s actual situation, you can truly create a demonstration effect that drives the whole area.

3. Refined Tobacco/Alcohol Store Marketing

Currently, with changes in consumer purchasing methods, especially the decline of the catering channel’s influence, the role of famous tobacco/alcohol stores is increasingly prominent. It can be said that famous tobacco/alcohol stores combine five functions: group buying, retail, distribution, display, and promotion, making them a must-fight channel for many liquor brands.

For tobacco/alcohol store marketing, we generally adopt five aspects for deep marketing.

  1. Broad distribution, full coverage, occupying the number of famous tobacco/alcohol stores matching the product. For famous tobacco/alcohol stores, carry out product portfolio distribution based on product price positioning, striving for 100% distribution rate, not missing any store that can sell the product, with full coverage. The purpose is to occupy channels and terminals to showcase the brand’s market value. Here, 100% distribution does not mean all stores, but those that match the product structure. Mismatched products and store types may not only fail to have a positive effect but could bring negative impacts or even aftereffects.

  2. Deep classification, heavy maintenance, occupying the quality of famous tobacco/alcohol stores. In a regional market, although there may be 400 famous tobacco/alcohol stores, only about 20% truly create high value, high returns, play a role in local group buying and retail, lead and drive other stores, and produce a “small pan” effect. We must deeply classify, focus on maintenance, and provide personalized services to create huge benefits. Therefore, classify stores using the “sales contribution rate” as the standard. Core hot-selling stores account for 15%, of which group-buying hot-selling stores are about 2%, with company group-buying professionals maintaining service; Retail hot-selling stores account for about 13%, with the company’s circulation department supervisor maintaining service, signing special distribution agreements, and serving these special distribution customers through differentiated profit distribution, diverse relationship maintenance methods, and distinctive management styles; For other stores, called moving-type and display-type stores, although they account for a large proportion, their sales contribution is currently low, and general sales staff maintain and serve them.

  3. Emphasize image, build brand, and implement the “6 Ones Project” for famous tobacco/alcohol stores. For example, we formulated the 6 Ones Project for a liquor company:

    • One: Lightbox or storefront advertising: Treat storefronts, lightboxes, or shop signs as outdoor advertisements to create a strong visual impact. For example, make core stores or a street. In Hefei, compared to Gaolu Family Wine and Gujing Gongjiu, Wanjiu King has not done this well. Storefront ads are not about quantity but quality. This “quality” means, first, location selection is crucial, mainly on restaurant streets, government streets, or prominent landmarks; second, ad production needs to be “refined,” not simple images. This way, the storefront becomes a wine billboard.
    • Two: A standardized plaque: Place the company plaque in a prominent position in the store; a copper or wooden plaque reading “XX Wine Authorized Special Distributor” or “XX Wine Brand Demonstration Store,” giving the store legitimacy and consumers a reason to trust.
    • Three: A supermarket-style display shelf: Strategy 1: “Positioning strategy”: full-item display. In core stores, set up a “XX Wine Exclusive Shelf” for series product display to facilitate visual impulse selection; Strategy 2: Prize display. Like supermarket operations, buy end caps and set up shelves for product display, signing display agreements with display fee support. For example, set display standards, reward with physical goods (500 yuan cash) after three months of display; Strategy 3: Eye-catching price tags. Make price tags distinctive and bright during display, pulling products into consumers’ sight so they can spot the needed product at first glance.
    • Note: Product display: Start from “small details”: the relationship between display surface and retail performance: reducing from 4 bottles to 2 bottles reduces sales by 48%; from 3 bottles to 1 bottle reduces sales by 68%; increasing from 2 bottles to 4 bottles increases sales by 40%.
    • Four: A prominent stack display: At the entrance or prominent area of larger stores, do stack displays. Use the “brothers and sisters together” approach: combine series products for display, creating a strong visual impact to stimulate purchase; also highlight the vivid position of core leading products; prominent price tags on stacks; vertical concentration method for empty box displays. Because consumers’ sight moves up and down first, then left and right; this can also create vivid and effective display surfaces, making the display more layered and imposing.
    • Five: A POP/display stand: POP can be roll-up banners, posters, display stands, or human-shaped standing boards, jump cards, price tags. Display stands can be independently designed.
    • Six: Equip core stores with promoters: Rotate during peak sales hours before meals for terminal interception and on-site personnel promotion, while also managing, supervising, and maintaining relationships with the store.

  4. Assist tobacco/alcohol stores in group buying sales. Owners of famous tobacco/alcohol stores have some social connections. To maintain these relationships, they spend a considerable amount each year. If we assist the store in this work, not only can we reduce the owner’s relationship cost pressure, but through this maintenance, we can cleverly incorporate the store’s relationship with key unit figures into our unified control, making them potential core consumption leaders. For example: Jointly with famous tobacco/alcohol stores, regularly hold customer networking events. Hometown associations, alumni associations, and veteran comrades’ associations are important sources for discovering new customers and obtaining group-buying information; irregular relationship contacts; “customized greeting cards.” Send birthday greeting cards to group-buying customers; customized small gift marketing, various novel small gifts are techniques to bring tobacco/alcohol stores and group-buying customers closer to the product and brand impression. For example, exquisite pen holders. Never try to occupy the store’s network resources; instead, share and utilize them, and in the process, let the store truly enjoy profits and benefits. “Burning bridges” is what all store owners fear most. Only by resolving their concerns can they fully cooperate with the manufacturer’s market development. Of course, famous tobacco/alcohol stores are initially wary and won’t easily reveal the names of units and key figures they do business with. We can gradually eliminate their guard through continuous interaction and communication, winning their trust. Most importantly, we can clearly tell them that every visit can be made together with them, and gift wine is given in their name. As long as we persist in regular relationship maintenance for a few months, most store owners will voluntarily hand over this work to us, because all shipments still go through the store, and profits belong to the store; we only gain stable sales and maintenance of target consumers. This method, when used properly, is more effective than simple profit-promotion activities for these stores, because you’ve touched the most important part of their distribution channel, and they’ve become dependent on us.

  5. Build a banquet bridge to intercept market terminals. Lock in banquet main products, formulate relatively fixed and sustainable promotion policies; and communicate promotional information to all target terminals; famous tobacco/alcohol stores are only responsible for recommending (earning intermediary fees), not for product sales; banquet price: slightly lower than terminal retail price. Intermediary fee: 10-15% of the banquet price, to stimulate stores to actively promote. Banquet policy: company guidance or combined with local consumption habits. Facts prove that as long as a company deeply investigates, deeply classifies, grasps the core, standardizes construction, and provides refined services to the famous tobacco/alcohol store channel, it will create very considerable value.

4. Deep Distribution in Township Markets

For county and township markets, do deep distribution. However, my deep distribution differs from the traditional sense because our deep distribution in county and township markets targets core consumers at the township level.

In township markets, we adopt the “1+1+1+1” operation model: 1 salesperson + 1 key account manager + 1 town mayor + 1 village party secretary. The specific process is: the account manager finds the town mayor (through the 403 core customer database established earlier), then through the mayor finds the village party secretary of the target village. Through PR with the mayor, village head, or party secretary, we make Laojiao Zhenniang the local internal reception wine. At the same time, we find a good retail store and core hotel in each village and town, and under the leadership of consumption opinion leaders, drive local mass consumption, ultimately achieving the network layout of “one town, one household; one village, one store.”

Taking Kongcheng Town in Tongcheng, Anhui as an example: there are 21 natural villages. We surveyed and assessed the economic level of these villages, selected 12 with better economic conditions, and conducted PR with village heads and party secretaries to make our product the local internal reception wine.

Of course, after selecting a village, we also need to conduct further PR with figures who have a certain say in the village, including village electricians, directors of wedding and funeral committees, teachers, and contractors. Only by firmly grasping these core consumers with influence in the village market can the product form a word-of-mouth effect in the rural market.

5. Focused Brand Promotion

Here, taking mid-to-high-end liquor as an example, let’s analyze how regional liquor brands can carry out core brand promotion.

  1. Product image display: Based on core consumer groups, display products or brands in places they frequent, such as high-end clubs, office buildings, car beauty centers, gas stations, etc., and distribute promotional brochures.

  2. Attack group customers: Strengthen PR with key figures in strong groups, thereby driving the wealthy and privileged to consume, cultivating long-term loyal consumer groups, especially strengthening publicity and sponsorship in the military, party and government organs (government, transportation, public security, electric power), etc.

  3. Participate in and sponsor large conferences or activities of government and public institutions to strengthen brand image promotion. Use tasting sessions and promotion meetings as opportunities to truly activate the relationship-based marketing model where the noble drive the rich, and the rich drive consumption. In the early stage, systematically and in stages, jointly organize cultural and entertainment activities and sponsorship events with major enterprise systems that have news value and influence, and use media for publicity and momentum.

  4. Cooperate with the wealthy class to establish VIP clubs. On the basis of building a relationship-based channel database, screen out some consumption leaders from within and hold irregular tasting activities and exchange meetings, provide free tasting and gifts, and offer VIP members special purchase discounts, continuously strengthening relationship-based marketing.

  5. Conduct event marketing: To further close the relationship with terminal group users, carry out a series of activities: such as tasting sessions, poetry and wine cultural activities, networking events, and select influential government and public welfare activities such as project opening ceremonies, completion ribbon cuttings, commendation conferences, annual government report meetings, cultural and sports activities, charity events, and figure selection activities for sponsorship and naming rights. Make a big deal out of weddings and birthday banquets of authoritative consumption leaders.

  6. Soft and hard media blockade: For local market hard ads: such as high cannons, bus bodies, outdoor advertising spaces, if the location value and influence are high, absolutely do not let them fall into competitors’ hands; for soft media: magazines, newspapers, television, etc., frequently publish and report on the company’s public welfare and event-based marketing activities, not just purely advertising or promotional images.

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