Dealers generally report that market competition has intensified and terminal costs keep rising. Most manufacturers transfer marketing work to dealers, some even just ship goods to dealers' warehouses and then ignore them. Manufacturers focus on product R&D, emphasizing products over marketing. A dealer said that dealers not only care about profits but also need manufacturers' marketing support. If manufacturers do these things well, dealers will cooperate with confidence.

First: Help dealers with market strategic planning. Most dealers, due to limited education and lack of professional sales training, and because of their survival mode (distributing others' products with a certain distribution period), rarely engage in strategic planning for the brands they represent. Thus, they often focus on short-term interests rather than long-term benefits. If the market is operated with this mindset, it is fatal for the brand. The local market is composed of various channels organically: strategic channels that play a decisive role but are unprofitable; main channels with high sales volume but thin margins; and profitable channels with low volume but high margins. To fully develop the market, full distribution and full coverage are necessary. Missing any channel makes it impossible to operate the entire market. When selecting channels, dealers will inevitably choose the ones that make money, which leads to market operation problems.

Therefore, when selecting dealers, both parties should conduct detailed market research based on local market capacity, market environment, local target consumers' habits, interests, competition, the manufacturer's marketing strategy, and the dealer's market position, strength, and resources. Only after reaching a consensus on the market development strategic plan should they start operating the market. The key is how to make dealers accept our strategy. Dealers are very wise; as long as we hit the nail on the head, clarify pros and cons, predict future market trends well, provide successful cases from other markets, and explain the losses if they don't follow, dealers will inevitably accept. Because dealers want to make money, if you show them a path to long-term profitability, they will take it. Only when dealers identify with the strategy will they become strategic partners who share weal and woe, ensuring the manufacturer's stable market position.

Second: Provide full-process sales assistance, ensuring peace of mind, and make dealers dependent on the manufacturer. After the market development strategy is formulated, even if dealers accept it, they still have doubts and may not fully implement it. At this point, the manufacturer needs to follow up, jointly develop a market expansion plan based on the strategy, and establish a brand operation team composed of sales personnel from both the manufacturer and the dealer. The manufacturer's personnel lead market development, while the dealer's personnel handle market maintenance. The dealer is required to provide logistics and financial support, and the manufacturer should also support part of the advertising and terminal costs needed for the initial market launch.

During the market launch period, operating under the manufacturer's name is more effective than under the dealer's name, and it has two advantages: first, it makes the dealer deeply feel the manufacturer's support; second, since market development is led by the manufacturer, it weakens the dealer's position in the eyes of terminal retailers, making them always believe they are cooperating directly with the manufacturer, thus reducing the dealer's control. This creates a strong dependence on the manufacturer.

Third: Achieve reasonable and orderly profit distribution. To control dealers well, there is a principle: dealers should not become too powerful, as that would threaten the manufacturer. Another principle is to make dealers exclusive distributors, not allowing them to handle competing brands; otherwise, they should be eliminated. In market competition, the strong set the rules. Because Gome is too powerful, domestic appliance manufacturers must listen to Gome. Therefore, designing profit margins for dealers at all levels and mapping out their development curve is a required course for manufacturers. All channel members should receive reasonable profit returns.

How to design this? Making dealers money is an unchanging rule, but they must not earn excessive profits. So, when designing, we consider the dealers' increasing desires year by year, design the annual profit growth rate, and create a "chicken rib" (something that is not attractive but hard to give up) so that dealers feel: if I don't do it, it's a pity to switch; if I do, there is a steady annual income.

Fourth: Provide targeted and strategic training for dealers. Nowadays, companies are strengthening training, believing it improves employee quality and work efficiency. I think training for dealers should not be like internal training; it must be handled carefully. Many companies organize dealer leaders to attend EMBA education. When they graduate, they say goodbye because they think they are too capable and that being a dealer for your brand is a waste of talent. They then start their own factories and brands. Whether they succeed is uncertain, but for us manufacturers, it is at least a failure.

Training dealers is necessary; otherwise, dealers won't understand the manufacturer's development ideas, and without consensus, the market cannot be operated. However, our training for dealers must be based on the company's development strategy, corporate culture, and values—training that is conducive to company control, not blindly enhancing dealers' development concepts. This is not beneficial for the balanced development of dealers and the company. Remember, the manufacturer's development speed must exceed the dealer's, and the manufacturer's market insight and development philosophy must lead the dealer's.

Fifth: Continuously instill ideas into dealers. We have always hated pyramid schemes—this illegal activity. But we secretly admire their successful "brainwashing" methods. We should regularly have our salespeople "brainwash" dealers. To do this, we need to create a beautiful vision for dealers, letting them know what benefits they will get when they do well with our brand. Practice has proven that the effect is very obvious. The loyalty of customers managed by salespeople with good eloquence and persuasion is significantly higher than those managed by salespeople with weaker skills.

Therefore, it is crucial for manufacturers to continuously instill ideas into dealers.

Sixth: Help dealers improve daily management capabilities. Dealers corresponding to small and medium-sized enterprises are mostly small in scale, with non-standard processes and management. Manufacturers should guide them to establish various rules and regulations, improve internal operational processes, enhance management levels, and help dealers cultivate talent. The manufacturer's middle and senior managers should periodically visit dealers' markets and provide on-site demonstration management. Only in this way can both parties cooperate more closely and unitedly.

Seventh: Formulate standardized market management systems and strictly enforce them. Dealers are partners, not subordinates. They only consider how to make money, so they not only fail to maintain the manufacturer's market management system but also constantly study the manufacturer's strategies to find loopholes. This is a test for manufacturers. To manage the market well, a strict and standardized market management system is essential.

Qingdao Double Star Group's Fuzhou agent performed well, with annual sales ranking among the top five agents. As sales increased, the dealer's ambition and desire expanded rapidly. Loan fraud, channel stuffing, policy manipulation, and violations occurred frequently. Because the dealer was powerful locally, Qingdao Double Star Group dared not deal with him. The dealer became even more brazen, and driven by huge profits, he overnight converted his Double Star specialty stores into his own brand stores.

This shows that having a system without strict enforcement is useless. Sometimes a customer's violation is a test of the company's attitude. If the company is principled and punishes immediately, the customer won't dare next time. If the company's control is lax, the customer will become more aggressive, and by then it will be too late to manage.

Eighth: Appropriately control the duration and region of brand distribution. Three types of dealers seriously restrict company development. One is dealers with too large a region; although they control a large market, they lack the ability to operate the entire market, leaving many areas blank, but the central city operates well, making it difficult for the manufacturer to cooperate. If you move them, the central city may be lost; if you don't, there are still large areas unoperated. Another is dealers with overly long contract periods; some need adjustment or elimination, but because the contract hasn't expired, making adjustments would cause significant losses for the dealer. The third is dealers who received initial inventory or monthly shipments with end-of-month payment during market development, or powerful local dealers who seriously violate regulations. Terminating contracts with such problematic dealers would cause significant economic losses to the company, but continuing cooperation would lead to poor market performance or increasing negative impact.

Ninth: Manufacturers must continuously enhance brand value. Ultimately, whether a dealer wants to cooperate with a manufacturer depends on whether distributing the brand can make money, whether the brand is recognized by consumers, what reasons consumers have to buy the product, whether the brand value is at the forefront of the industry, whether the brand has distinct personality, and what the company's future prospects are.

Why are Coca-Cola, P&G, and China Resources (Beer) so "arrogant" in their requirements for dealers? Because these well-known first-line brands can answer the above questions well. So, dealers are willing to listen to manufacturers, actually for the sake of money. Because you can help them make money, they listen to you. When you can't make money for dealers, they will immediately terminate cooperation. Therefore, as a manufacturer, you should focus on enhancing your brand value, awareness, reputation, and loyalty. Only then can you continuously increase dealers' desire to cooperate.

Overproduction, imbalance between supply and demand! Dealers do not lack products; many companies emphasize products over marketing. Many small companies fail to deliver what they promise to dealers in a timely manner. Dealers generally lack a sense of security! Some dealers lack confidence in new products! So whoever can provide dealers with distinctive products, more distinctive after-sales service, and win dealers' trust will occupy the market!

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