The Five Secret Marketing Secrets Of The New Popularity Of The Brand

In the current Chinese market, running is the most popular and running is also the most lively. TheColor Run is undoubtedly one of the many runners. This commercial running competition launched by New Balance (hereinafter referred to as NB) and IMG has been held in Shenzhen, Chongqing, Beijing and other places this year. NB retro jogging shoes with the logo of the "big N" logo are also highly regarded as "the chief sponsor of Color Run Asia Pacific region" and swept across China with Color Run.

NB is the equipment of professional marathon athletes, the elite shoe of American politicians and businessmen. In recent years, it has become the new favorite of the city tide male tide woman. Why has NB touched so many people? What are the tipping points and secrets hidden behind the popularity? How long can the boom last? For this, the reporter interviewed Jiang Chang, director of marketing in NewBalance China.

　　 The secret behind fashion

NB was founded in the United States in 1906. It was favored by George W. Bush, Obama, Jobs, Bill Gates and other politicians and business elites, and was also known as "President jogging shoes / elite shoes". At the same time, you will find that many stars (Kim Su Hyon, Lee Hyolee, Shawn Yue, Yang Mi, etc.) have a special liking for NB, and will even show you in the movie and TV dramas from "stars", "Chun Jiao and Zhiming". There are more and more young friends around NB. For this phenomenon, some media used the three golden rules to explain the growth and popularity of NB. But New Balance, China's regional marketing director Jiang Chang, has some different interpretations. He believes that "the trend from the crowd's subjective preferences is changing, accidental, and can be created and continued." NB can survive for hundreds of years and rely on something that transcends the trend. Therefore, NB will stick to itself first, and at the same time, it will make full use of the trend and make full use of it, creating demand and creating a trend.

Tracing the development history of NB and its trajectory in China, it seems that we can understand the "antecedents" of NB. In the 90s of last century, NB entered China, and then quit because of the confusion of channels. In 2003, NB tried to return to China with the concept of running shoes, but did not detonate the market quickly. Until 2012, NB began to enter the high growth period. At this time, NB's global warming (especially in the United States, Japan, Korea, Hongkong, China and Taiwan) has more or less affected the choice of consumers in mainland China. The trend of dressing trend (wide leg trousers, straight trousers to underpants, small trousers and nine pants) has made NB this easy to match shoe type become more popular. According to the data from FashionMag.com, the fastest growth of NB is in recent years: New Balance has achieved rapid growth in the past three years (14.6% in 2011, 12.2% in 2012, 14.2% in 2013) and 2 billion 600 million in 2013. In 2012 ~2014, the number of NB shops in China expanded from 573 to more than 1000, an increase of 75% and reaching two or three line cities.

Jiang Chang admitted that NB was not unaware of the fire, but because in recent years, NB has made clear and focused strategic goals in the world. It has moved towards the goal of the world's third major sports brands, and has also made great efforts in strategic planning, resource input, product innovation, brand building, supply chain management and so on. Specific implementation in the Chinese market:

　　 Force point 1 - lessons learned, remediation channels

There have been many media reports about the story of NB in China in the last century. In the 90s of last century, the Chinese name of NB was New York, but the agents of NB Yangjiang, Guangdong, privately expanded their production, cut down their sales, and snatch the Chinese trademark of New York, causing a devastating blow to the brand image of NB, and NB had to withdraw from the Chinese market. In 2003, when NB returned to China, it abandoned its original Chinese name and began to operate directly from China in 2009. And build their own exclusive dealer system and adopt collation battalion mode. Create a unified store image, create an integrated brand consumption experience, and strengthen inventory management.

　　 Force 2: simplify brand information. Subtraction strategy

In order to clearly convey the brand information, NB implemented the product line subtraction strategy and put forward the product layout of "3+1": jogging shoes, antique casual shoes, British and American products and children's shoes as the main products; focusing on the pillar products, increasing publicity and communication efforts, strengthening image and positioning, communicating with consumers the respective selling points, playing the popularity and preference.

　　 Force point 3 - store consistency, retain Consumer

Over the past few years, NB has been making efforts to upgrade retail stores, training and operation. NB stores in China have upgraded the packaging of different product lines and the vividness of store publicity, and at the same time, the way of displaying products is more in line with consumer shopping habits. And integrate closely with online communication to form a complete brand experience. For example, around the "three primary colors" online micro film plot, do in the store and micro film theme and content consistent display. Create an interactive experience by conveying a more complete story to consumers.

　　 Force point 4 - grasp KOL, guide Trend

Although NB has no political background or strong publicity about presidential shoes, NB attaches great importance to guiding the trend of the trend: recommending the shoes to the opinion leaders with image and temperament, and launching a joint venture with many designers, trend leaders and many tide brands in the world, promoting the NB style through video, soft language, Atlas and so on. So that elite, stars and fashion people can become the best spokesmen of NB, and promote ordinary consumers. Even if they do not advertise, they can maintain a certain degree of exposure.

　　 Force point 5 - brand must sound, maintain Exposure degree

Few years ago, NB's brand information was rarely heard. But in the past two years, NB China has stepped up its investment in brand marketing, and has made breakthroughs in resources, creativity and communication channels. Jiang believes that these are also one of the internal factors that support the brand's popularity and healthy development: "NB global headquarters has quantitative research on brand indicators in various countries. Research shows that in the past two years, NB brand awareness, preferences and consumer purchase intentions in China have increased significantly."

"These efforts of NB have finally presented to consumers just the tip of the iceberg. Strategic adjustment, solid work, favorable market factors and consumer trends have contributed to the growth of NB." Jiang Chang said. However, some people have attributed the rapid development of NB to "expansion period, the growth of performance depends on more channels and more shops", and even think that "from elite, star shoes to public's shoes, NB will lose small dividends." In response, Jiang Chang responds that "opening a store will definitely contribute part of the sales volume, but NB is by no means a simple shop drive mode." Our same store has maintained a high growth rate for two consecutive years, and every store has strict plans. At the same time, it is far from the stage of "too big to be cool", and even if many people buy a brand, the brand may not necessarily be cool or lose its appeal. NB will remain vigilant and continue to work hard on brand value and consumer experience.