Recently, Dedao University held its 2019 spring opening ceremony, where six teachers (Wang Liming, Xiang Shuai, Li Yun, Kong Xiangdong, Mao Mingrui, He Fan) and seven students from the 0th cohort gave speeches covering various fields, all of which were wonderful. I was present throughout, and two speeches left a deep impression on me: one made me slap my thigh in excitement, and the other brought tears to my eyes... These two speeches, while using business cases as a starting point, mostly reflect humanistic sentiments, balancing rationality and emotion. I highly recommend them to you. Let's first look at the one that made me slap my thigh—How Coca-Cola doubled its sales by changing product display.

Speaker: Pan Lihua

Sales Operations Manager, Guangdong Swire Coca-Cola I am Pan Lihua, from Guangdong Swire Coca-Cola. One day, my boss suddenly said to me: Xiao Pan, let's adjust your KPI this year. For sales revenue, just quadruple it! If you were me, what would you think? Would you think he's crazy? At that moment, would you want to die or quit? —1 — Do Just One Thing, Double Sales I don't know how you would respond, but I know how someone like me would respond. I would do one big thing, just this one thing, and sales would quadruple. Can you see what the big thing is? The big thing is: take the large bottles off the shelf and casually place them on the floor. This action is called "ground dragon." According to our statistics, in a retail store, moving large-pack water from the shelf to the floor to become a ground dragon can quadruple sales. Why? There are three reasons: First, it increases display space, breaking free from the shelf space limit, allowing more facings in the front row within the same area.

Second, large bottles with handles placed directly on the floor are easy for consumers to grab and go without having to pull them from the shelf.

Third, the seemingly casual placement—note that the first key to a "ground dragon" is "seemingly casual"—gives the impression of abundant stock and good value, and hints at a discount or limited-time offer. So, this ground dragon is actually automatically calling out to consumers: Don't miss this while you're passing by! That's the method of doing just one thing to quadruple sales. —2 — The Secret of Coca-Cola's "Micro-Adjustments" We've all heard the story: Zhang San and Li Si were hiking in the forest when a bear suddenly appeared and chased them.

In a panic, Zhang San immediately crouched down to tighten his shoelaces.

Li Si shouted anxiously: What's the use of tying your shoelaces? You can't outrun the bear!

Zhang San said: I can't outrun the bear, but I just need to outrun you. You see, most of us make Li Si's mistake, always thinking our mission is to fight the bear and win. That scenario does happen; maybe Steve Jobs faced it, and Elon Musk faced it too. But for most of us, we are more like Zhang San: the real problem and the best strategy are to be just a little better than others. The product I sell is Coca-Cola, which has a 133-year history. Since the internet age, our company has often been mocked as an old company. Whenever an internet hero wants to mock someone for not daring to innovate or take risks, they often quote Steve Jobs: Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life? The subtext is easy to translate: You're just a sugar-water seller, aren't you? Today, I want to say loudly: Yes, I am that sugar-water seller! Have you ever wondered: Coca-Cola has survived for 133 years, always selling so-called sugar water, with the same familiar taste and recipe... For over a hundred years, the product seems to have no innovation at all, yet it has survived for over a century and remains a world-renowned big company. Don't you think there's something suspicious? Could there be a secret unknown to the public? Today, I'm going to reveal a secret of Coca-Cola: how to change the world with micro-adjustments. The supreme guideline within Coca-Cola is "execution is king." Note that our "execution" has a specific meaning: it refers to doing terminal display well. What is display? Display is placing items in the most appropriate position within a limited space. It's that simple. But how can such a simple sentence become the supreme guideline? Let's look at a real example. —3 — "Place It to the Right of Red Bull" Coca-Cola launched a new functional drink called Monster. Our instruction to salespeople was: Place it to the right of Red Bull, maintain the same number of facings as Red Bull, and sell at the same price as Red Bull. This is our new product! We have the world's best-selling drink, Coca-Cola. So why not place it next to Coca-Cola? Why must it be next to Red Bull? And why on the right side, not the left? There's a lot of know-how here; let me explain: First, Monster is positioned as a functional drink. When you think of functional drinks, what comes to mind? Right, Red Bull. Consumers buying functional drinks subconsciously look for Red Bull; it's their reference point. People buying functional drinks won't take from the Coca-Cola cooler because they don't associate Coca-Cola with functional drinks. So, placing it next to Red Bull automatically tells consumers what this new product is for. Why the right side? Because over 99% of Chinese people are right-handed, and everyone is used to reaching for products on the shelf with their right hand. You might say, these are trivial tricks, not worth mentioning, right? Of course they're worth mentioning, but they're not trivial. Many consumers initially go for Red Bull but end up leaving with Monster. According to market research data, this mis-pick due to display order alone can increase Monster's sales by 13%. You see, just a micro-adjustment in position next to the leading brand can increase results by over ten percent, even tens of percent! Another example: Have you noticed in supermarkets that most well-known consumer brands display their products in a concentrated, vertical color-block manner? Why pursue vertical color concentration? Isn't horizontal concentration okay? Actually, no. This micro-adjustment technique comes from anthropological research. Studies have found that most frequent supermarket shoppers are women. Why? Because it's in women's genes. When primitive humans lived in forests, the division of labor was that men hunted, with clear targets—drawing bows, shooting arrows, and carrying prey home. Women gathered, humming tunes, picking one here and one there. You see, isn't the act of picking fruits very similar to shopping in a supermarket? Walking around, those with bright colors and large sizes are the most visible and likely to be picked. If they picked dull-colored or small fruits, the whole family might go hungry... So don't blame your wife for always wanting to go shopping; it's not her own behavior, it's an evolutionary requirement. Without this habit, her ancestors wouldn't have survived, and you wouldn't have a wife. Since picking fruits in the forest hundreds of thousands of years ago, women have been particularly attentive to product colors. A large block of color can effectively stimulate their attention. People's visual habits are to look up and down before left and right, so vertical concentrated display with the same color scheme is like artificially creating a huge, plump "fruit" for consumers. Again, data speaks: For the same brand, after micro-adjustment to vertical, same-color display, sales increased by 16% year-on-year. Such a high sales increase can be achieved without even requesting more space, just by rearranging according to color. With all these secrets, do we go and brainwash stores? No. Coca-Cola, as a 133-year-old company, is "cunning" and doesn't need campaign-style changes. Our requirement for salespeople is to adjust a little every day. Today, put one more bottle on the shelf to increase a facing; tomorrow, move the Coca-Cola cooler from inside to outside... Don't underestimate these small daily adjustments; accumulated, they bring astonishing benefits! Coca-Cola has relied on daily micro-adjustments, continuously accumulating, to defeat countless competitors over a hundred years and become the undisputed number one in the beverage world. Now, its annual net profit is over $5 billion, making it the company that Warren Buffett considers most in line with value investing principles. Chinese people often talk about "using four ounces to move a thousand pounds." In fact, Coca-Cola does "adding four ounces to a thousand pounds." —3 — Fast-Food Strategy: "Full, Top, Combo" Let me ask you: When you go to a fast-food restaurant for burgers and fries, what drink do you order? Cola, right? Have you ever wondered why you order cola? Is it because burgers and fries are too dry? But roujiamo is also dry, so why don't you think of ordering cola? Is it because carbonated drinks are refreshing? Then why don't you think of Sprite? I'll tell you: It's the result of Coca-Cola's "micro-adjustments." We adjusted the Coca-Cola on the drink menu in burger shops to be next to burgers and fries, making it a combo. This continuously reinforces the burger-plus-cola combination, eventually making you feel that burgers and cola are a perfect match. In fact, they were originally unrelated, but through micro-adjustments in menu display in fast-food restaurants, they formed a fixed food pairing. Let me ask you another question: How do you successfully sell a 2,000-yuan bottle of wine in a store where all wines sell for 200 yuan? You might think of marketing hype, brand building, right? Actually, none of that is needed. Just place three bottles on the shelf: One at 200, one at 2,000, and one at 30,000. The 30,000-yuan bottle might never sell, but just because it exists, more people will buy the 2,000-yuan one. The psychological process is: The 200-yuan one can't even be considered wine? The 30,000-yuan one is unaffordable. The 2,000-yuan one is affordable and gives a sense of being middle-class. These are all micro-adjustments in position and order to create linkage in product usage scenarios and preset psychological drivers. You might say: You're indeed just selling sugar water, and what you're talking about are very traditional offline sales tactics. I'm different; I'm trendy. My business is on mobile internet. These methods are useless for me. Really? We don't just have display micro-adjustment techniques in physical stores; we also use them online. For example, when you open a food delivery app and click into a restaurant's page, our operational code is three words: "Full, Top, Combo." Change the original "Cola" on the page to "Coca-Cola 300ml"—that's "Full." In the beverage category, adjust our drink to the top position among similar items—that's "Top." There must be a combo that pairs with the food—that's "Combo." Through these micro-adjustments of "Full, Top, Combo," Coca-Cola's sales in that restaurant's delivery business typically increase by over 30%. These micro-adjustments are methods derived from large-scale data research and consumer psychology studies conducted by FMCG companies like Coca-Cola and retail enterprises worldwide. I can responsibly tell you: Coca-Cola is truly not just a sugar-water company! Today, Coca-Cola's consumer psychology research is already using VR technology and eye-tracking, which is very advanced. But no matter how high-end the research, to translate into concrete actions, it must be reduced to very small adjustments that every salesperson worldwide can execute. In every store, every person, every day, make very small adjustments. From this, we can see that you don't have to outrun the bear to win; you don't have to create revolutionary product innovations to build a great company. Moreover, product innovation will eventually hit a bottleneck. Look at how the differences between recent iPhone generations have become smaller and smaller. At that point, you can think of me, Lao Pan. Besides the macro path of revolutionary innovation, there is a micro path of development that leads to success, and that is "micro-adjustments change the world." With enough time and accumulation, doing a little better every day can also defeat your competitors and reap great benefits. —4 — From Chaos to Harmony OK, you might say: I don't run a store or sell goods. What does display micro-adjustment have to do with me? Then let me give you a down-to-earth life example. I believe many of you here are parents. What's the biggest trouble with a school-age child? Homework. As the saying goes, "Without homework, mother is kind and child is filial. With homework, chickens fly and dogs jump." Is it because the child doesn't want to do homework? No, they know that if they don't do it, they can't face the teacher at school tomorrow. Is it because they can't do it? No, they can do most of the homework. The main reason is that their attention span granularity is different from adults. A child around ten years old can concentrate for about 15-20 minutes, while adults typically last 45 minutes. The difference is the "chickens fly and dogs jump." You think they should continue writing diligently, but as a child, they're already thinking about playing with toys! What to do? Beating won't solve the problem, and soon you might not be able to beat them anyway... This century-old problem can still be solved with micro-adjustments. How? Place two of their favorite toys on the desk, at the very edge. Also put a desk lamp on the desk and keep it on, day or night. You might think: If you put toys there, will they still focus on homework? Isn't that like a mouse in a rice jar? On the contrary. Putting toys there allows them to relax after 20 minutes without having to go to the living room where all the toys are, otherwise, once they go, you don't know when they'll come back. Toys at the edge of the desk don't interfere with homework and give them a sense of security. Is the lamp for lighting? No! The lamp should be on whether doing homework during the day or at night. When on, it creates a circle of light about 50 cm in diameter on the desk. This is a cue for them to focus and concentrate. You see, you just need to put their toys away and turn on the lamp every day—such small adjustments—and you can continue to have "mother is kind and child is filial." —5 — The Super Returns of Micro-Adjustments Micro-adjustments seem like small, insignificant actions, but if done well and persisted in, they can bring unimaginable returns over time. Like the famous motivational formula: A change of 0.01, multiplied by time, makes a world of difference. For everyone living in the present, time is perhaps the fairest thing in the world: everyone has 365 days a year, 24 hours a day. Why do some people's days feel as colorful as four seasons, while others feel like they're repeating the same day for a lifetime? In my view, to manage time well, you don't need chicken soup or motivation; to change your "small world," The simplest, least painful method is also micro-adjustment, such as adjusting your wake-up time. I've found that waking up half an hour earlier each day and doing something meaningful—like reading, writing, or exercising—fills my day with energy and a sense of control. Just that half hour makes the whole day feel different. Let's calculate: 30 minutes a day, over a year, you gain an extra week compared to others. If you persist for ten years, that's two and a half months. What about 20 or 30 years? Once I calculated this, I started waking up 30 minutes earlier every day and have persisted for a long time. The longer I persist, the happier and more grateful I feel. Happy because this micro-adjustment gives me a real sense of control over my time. Grateful because when I see so many people still sleeping, praying for a once-in-500-years opportunity, I've already put on my best running shoes. This time, I might not only outrun those forest competitors, but maybe even the bear! Source: Tao Shuo PPT (ID: PPT_Tao) -END-