Hello friends, I am Weng Zhangxian from Uni-President's Digital Center. Today, my topic is digitalization driving enterprise growth. Growth is the goal; digitalization is just a means. How should we understand the concept of digitalization? I believe there are two levels: first, digital tools; second, digital operations. These two are inseparable. Tools are like the historical trends: from the agricultural era to the industrial era, the agricultural era had hoes and fences, the industrial era had machinery, and now we are in the digital era. It is just a tool for development, not the goal. The ultimate progress and development are the goals. Progress is in thinking and operations—how to use this tool well is what we ultimately want to achieve. Of course, in the digital era, every enterprise has its own model, methods, and thinking. Uni-President has also done some digital practices over the years, and today I want to share and exchange ideas with you. Reacquainting with Uni-President First, let me reintroduce Uni-President. Uni-President was founded in 1967 in Tainan, Taiwan, China, starting from flour processing. After about 55 years, the group's overall revenue is around 100 billion, and it is diversifying and globalizing. In most people's minds, Uni-President mainly makes instant noodles and beverages, but it is not just that; we also have food manufacturing, distribution and supermarkets, trading and logistics, and commercial investment. Uni-President entered the mainland market in 1992 and was listed on the Hong Kong main board in 2007. So far, it has nearly 35 production bases nationwide. The company is continuously innovating and developing, with more than 30 brands of various sizes. The company places great importance on product innovation and iteration, and its R&D capabilities are at the forefront of the industry. Uni-President hopes to continuously provide consumers with valuable and warm products. Challenges Faced In this society with abundant material wealth, the new generation of consumers is constantly putting forward new demands, and we are also facing multiple challenges, which can be summarized in three aspects: 1. Market defocusing, 2. Marketing aphasia, 3. Growth slowdown How to understand these? Consumers have migrated to the digital continent, scattered and fragmented across various corners and channels. How do we connect with them and communicate our brand value proposition? In the past, we could reach consumers well through CCTV or satellite TV to promote the brand, but now it is difficult. What does the migration of consumers and digitalization bring? How to find our target audience more quickly and accurately—what kind of people, where are they, what do they want to hear? How to connect and resonate with them is the problem that brands need to solve to shorten the distance with consumers. These are the external challenges brought by consumption upgrades and changes in the market environment. On the internal side, it is not just the increase in labor costs, difficulty in recruiting, and long training cycles. At the same time, offline deep distribution relies on people; now we may need to expand on the same capabilities to extend coverage boundaries. When it comes to expense allocation, in the past, the consumer profile was simple; we could know where they were, what channels to use, and as long as we had experience, we could do well. Now it is different; consumers have been "digitalized." How to find them? We need to use data to more accurately locate consumers and improve overall connection efficiency. In terms of communication, new media is rising, including Douyin, Kuaishou, Bilibili, Tencent Video, etc. Many of our consumers are there, with many touchpoints. How can we communicate more effectively and ensure the communication is effective? That is what we need to think about. Finally, after communication, how to convert it into order conversion? After communication, we need to achieve final transactions. How to seamlessly link from communication and promotion to orders and transactions? These are the specific problems we face now. How to solve them? The answer is still digitalization. Digital Transformation Only by adapting to the current environment can we survive, as the fittest survive. Consumers have been digitalized, which requires our enterprises to follow suit. Where consumers are, enterprises and brands must be there. Of course, consumers' digitalization pace is much faster than that of enterprises; many enterprises may not keep up. What to do? Focus. Where to start digitalization is a choice for each enterprise. Different enterprises have different choices; some may want to do supply chain digitalization first, some channels, some consumers, etc. These are based on the enterprise's development history to set the pace of digitalization. But one premise is that digitalization cannot be achieved overnight. At the same time, it requires a certain digital IT foundation to better facilitate digitalization. There are many ways to do digitalization, including introducing a complete set of digital solutions, or building gradually with the enterprise's own IT, which is also a path. How to do it specifically requires a set of thinking and methods. Uni-President is also continuously learning internally. Mr. Liu Chunxiong, an advocate of new marketing, has also summarized a set of industry marketing digitalization logic. We focus on two parts: first, channel digitalization, relying on the existing channel structure, using digital technology to establish an online trading platform (F2B2b) to improve channel circulation efficiency. Second, we need to extend the entire marketing chain to the C-end. In the past, the distance between brands and consumers was too far, making it difficult to know what consumers think, what they want, and what their real needs are. So now we need to build a platform to extend forward, allowing the entire link to reach C-end consumers, listen to their voices, and understand their true needs. Then, in turn, empower terminals to truly achieve BC integration. Through C-end pull, we can stimulate the vitality of the channel and enhance the incremental system of the entire channel. In the past, we used a push model; in the future, we hope to pull the overall channel traffic from the C-end to the terminal. This is what we are continuously striving to do. Through this design thinking, we gradually build a marketing digitalization tool system, from brand to channel partners, to terminals, and finally to consumers. Through various digital tools, we achieve omnichannel and multi-touchpoint connections between brands and consumers, creating a new marketing ecosystem with full-link and full-scenario reach. On the C-end consumer side, we hope to better approach users and listen to their voices through a consumer operation platform. In new product development, we hope to co-create with consumers and explore their real needs. In the past, when we did consumer research, it might have been in a certain city or region. How authentic is the data we got back? I think everyone knows in their hearts. Only when we truly hear first-hand voices and get consumer data can we truly provide consumers with more appropriate and warmer products. We have built a tool system for people, goods, and scenes. For these tools, we have used multiple forces, including our own IT. Our own IT has about 200 people. In addition, for certain sub-modules, we co-create with leading IT service providers and solution providers. There are many technologies now, and we need more technology to lay the digital foundation, but it is difficult for a single enterprise's IT to do it alone; we need to complement each other's strengths. We complement with leading IT companies to truly achieve digitalization implementation. For example, our SFA tool empowers sales representatives, hoping to make it clear at a glance, see the terminal situation they serve, collect store information in real-time, and make performance analysis intelligent and efficient. There is also the B2B platform, Uni-President e-Mall. We have connected more than 2.8 million terminals and nearly 10,000 distribution systems; UP vending machines, in addition to extending our sales time, provide 24-hour service to users, and through this system, we can better manage members and provide more precise product placement. Uni-President Club hopes to empower brand operation colleagues; they can better connect and interact with consumers through this platform, achieving precise placement and marketing. The Cloud Code platform uses cloud codes to better connect with consumers and B-end, achieving BC integration. Having said so much, these are all our tools. These tools are the manifestation of the evolution of the entire business model. What we consider is not just technological advancement; technology is just the foundation, of course important, without which digital operations are difficult. But more importantly, it is a mental leap. How do we think and how do we use these digital tools well? First, I believe it is about benefiting the public. An enterprise is not just an enterprise in society; it belongs to an industry chain, not only upward but also downward, both sides. We must not only achieve success for our consumers but also for our upstream and downstream partners and stakeholders. Only when more stakeholders achieve success can we coexist, co-create, and develop harmoniously. Furthermore, the products we make need to find resonance, find a place of resonance and empathy with consumers. Only then can products create better life scenarios and achieve the beautiful life that the public aspires to. Finally, in conclusion: enterprise digitalization starts with technology and ends with organization. The so-called three parts technology, seven parts management; without good management and operations, no matter how good the technology, it cannot exert its due value. Note: This article is from the keynote speech by Mr. Weng Zhangxian, Technical Director of Uni-President China Digital Center, at the 2021 (4th) China FMCG Conference, organized and authorized for publication after his review. Click Read Original to see more about the 2021 (4th) China FMCG Conference... Are you "watching" me?