How long can perfect diaries be red?
Editor’s note: This article from the micro-channel public number “ US industry new latitude ” (ID: meiyexinweidu) , The author ran balls.
Even if the offline barriers are broken, compared with traditional enterprises, the emerging brands are still in a state of short arms, and the layout offline will still be an environment surrounded by all kinds of songs.
The “Double Eleven” competition is the epitome of the Internet brand war in the past few years, from the rise of Tao brands represented by Yu Nifang and Afu Essential Oils, to being used by Baique Ling, Nature Hall, etcTraditional brands have been suppressed, and Internet beauty brands have passed the first decade.
Today, when the next decade is about to begin, the participants of this war have become a new force represented by Perfect Diary, Huaxizi, and HFP. It is brewing in the younger trend of Chinese beauty consumers. During the slant penetration of the new platform’s flow inlet, it quickly fermented.
This year’s “Double Eleven” battle situation is a turning signal. Although the smoke has not dispersed, the pattern has gradually become clear.
When the traffic bonus gradually fades, and the magical barbaric growth comes to an abrupt end, will these emerging beauty brands enter the footsteps of the Tao brand?
When the participants are about to enter a brand new battlefield, should they stop and think, the road ahead is flame or sea water?
01
Tao brand: the rise and fall of an era
13 years ago, Huang Xiaodong, who had vowed to only make a mask, hit a wall at the US Expo.
He took a film R & D family with more than ten wash masks after one year of research and development, and went to every stop of the Expo, but only recruited one agent in two years. Huang Xiaodong, who couldn’t go through the traditional channels, stumbled upon the purchase of cosmetics on Taobao, which can generate hundreds of thousands of lemon green tea a month.
In 2007, Huang Xiaodong simply registered a Taobao shop and set up a small team to specialize in the shop operations of Taobao merchants.
Also in 2007, Dai Yuefeng, the “outsider” of cosmetics, came across Hunan’s local brand Yu Nifang by chance and became one of the brand’s distributors.
After nearly 4 months of preparation, Dai Yuefeng ’s Yunifang Taobao online shop officially opened on March 8, 2007. At that time, there were only three products in the store, two facial cleansers and one cream. After a year of adjustments, Dai Yuefeng upgraded Taobao to a flagship store, and the seller ’s credit rose to Double Crown. In less than two years, Yunifang ’s online sales exceeded 40,000.
In September, two years later, Afu Essential Oil, which was founded by Diaoye, officially settled in Taobao, opened the brand ’s official flagship store, and defined the category with the brand “Afu, which is essential oil”. Directly hit the pain point of the market and stand out in a short time. In the heyday, it established the myth that for every three bottles of essential oil sold by Taobao, two bottles are Afu.
At this time, the Membrane Family also re-decorated the Taobao store and upgraded it to a “counter” model of the flagship store, which received strong support from Ali.
In 2012, Taobao Mall officially changed its name to Tmall, and the “Tao brand” rooted in Taobao, such as Yu Nifang, Membrane Family and Afu, was renamed “Tmall Original”, that is, on Tmall platform Born and grown young brand.
At that time, traditional beauty brands such as Baique Antelope, Nature Hall, Opal, etc. had not yet started online e-commerce business, and consumers had relatively few purchase options on Taobao. In addition, Ali also saw the good driving effect of the Tao brand on the platform, thus providing a series of help in terms of traffic tilt, brand promotion, low price discounts, etc., making the Tao brand priority to enter the fast track of development.
According to the data released at the time, in 2012, the total number of “Amoy brands” reached 121. Among them, there were more than 10 beauty brands. They are Yunifang, Mefa Family, and Ah Fu, Fangcaoji, Yuzishe, Botanical, PBA and so on are listed.
In 2013, Taobao ’s Double Eleven transaction volume exceeded 35 billion yuan, of which the Tmall platform cosmetics category had sales of more than 520 million that day, an increase of 67% year-on-year. With a total sales of 48.84 million yuan, Afu opened the road to re-election, and Yu Nifang continued to set a record with 40 million sales, ranking third on the list.
The Tao brand at that time could be described as an absolute rider. As the earliest e-commerce entrepreneur, he seized the opportunity and bonus of the first-mover with the gesture of “struck and killed the master”. Start-ups set an example and confidence.
But with the gradual decline of the B2C traffic dividend of Internet e-commerce, on the one hand, traditional beauty brands have begun to touch the Internet, and Tmall ’s “globalization” strategy has also attracted overseas giants to enter the competition and intensify competition;
On the other hand, the rise of vertical e-commerce platforms such as Vipshop and Jumeiyoupin has hindered the development of Taobao brands that rely on Ali, a single source of traffic.
Beginning in 2014, the brutal growing Taobao brand slammed on the brakes. In 2015, it clearly showed a lack of stamina.
On this Tmall Double 11 beauty brand sales list from 2012 to 2019, Afu, who once topped the list, played directly and disappeared in 2015. She has since disappeared and has been replaced by old-fashioned domestic products. Hundred bird antelope.
In addition, with the influx of old local brands such as Nature Hall, Yiyeye, and Herborist, the once-famous Royal Café and Membrane Family were ruthlessly kicked out of the list in the following year.
In last year, several well-known Taobao brands involved in several mergers and acquisitions. Afu Essential Oil, which gave up the IPO, wanted to sell Yunifang for RMB 1 billion, but it suffered miscarriage and had to test the “Wei Qu”. Began “social new retail.”
This year, the family of the film law wanted to go back to the market through Zhonglu shares at a price of 5.6 billion days, and failed to expect more than 4 billion yuan in profit bets. It also caused a “stupidity” and made the listing plan a bubble.
These also reflect from the side that it ’s really hard to find a brand in these two years.
On the one hand, the online operation system built by traditional domestic products and overseas big names is becoming more and more mature and perfect, so that the Taoist brands that once wanted to kill the master with chaos are still beaten by the master.
On the other side, cutting-edge brands such as Perfect Diary, HFP, and Huaxizi have relied on new traffic windows to break into the “medium and low-end” market of domestic brands.
02
Emerging Brands: Replicators of “Amoy Brands”?
“There is no difference between the emerging brand and the Tao brand, they are still following our previous path, you wait and see.” Zhang Xin, a staff member of a Tao brand, said.
Today, the rapid fermentation of emerging brands has the same characteristics and uniqueness as the concentrated outbreak of Tao brand 10 years ago.
Facing the brand influence that traditional brands and big overseas brands have accumulated for many years, emerging brands focus on firepower and use marketing as a barrier to create explosive models through traffic advantages to cover more fans to enhance their incremental market. It’s exactly the same as it was ten years ago.
Only, the difference is that only Taobao was used at that time, and there was only Ali traffic. Now the traffic is more decentralized, the platform is more open, and the marketing methods are more. Diversified and richer ways to reach consumers, but at the same time as falling into the “marketing” paradigm, the traffic is more expensive and the marketing costs are higher.
“Working with KOL, it is very important to find the right time and the right person.” Liya Lin, general manager of the China region of Yike Medical Research’s ECOONER offline division, which has won fans with original liquid care products, told Meiye New Latitude.
According to Liya Lin, Yioke Medical Research ECOONER cooperated with Zhang Shaohan as soon as she recorded the “Singer”, compared with Lin Yun’s 800,000 little red book, Zhang Shaohan who just radiated “Second Spring” At that time, the quotation was not high, and the word of mouth was not bad. After pushing the nicotinamide product, it sold thousands of pieces in a day or two, but the subsequent promotion was not so smooth.
“Later, there were too many brands that Zhang Shaohan cooperated with. The good and the bad were mixed, and the effect of the brand’s grass planting was greatly reduced. We also tried to find Bao Gaojing and” The Great “in Gao Lu, although the attention was not as good as the head Stars, but this feeling of intellectuality is in line with our brand, and the conversion rate is very impressive, which is very unexpected. “
Apart from the Xiaohongshu platform, Douyin and live broadcast are also indispensable for beauty brand marketing.
According to Liya Lin, Yi Ke Medical Research ECOONER asked KOL Li Jiaqi and Wei Ya to become popular on the live track before they became popular, but because it was too early, the overall marketing effect was not satisfactory. Desirable.
Although Li Jiaqi was able to sell 100,000 boxes of facial masks in one minute, the promotion price of a single vibrato has risen to 1 million, which is prohibitive for many small businesses.
“Looking for online celebrities is like gambling. If you are lucky, you can explode, but you are unlucky. If you invest one or two hundred videos, it is common to have millions of hits.” < / strong> A staff member on behalf of the operating company told Meiye New Latitude.
At present, the niche domestic beauty brands operated by the staff mainly choose the online red in the waist to launch. One month is a launch cycle, and 30 KOLs are selected for cooperation. Only three to five cycles may produce 1 Into the explosive content of 2 articles, in addition, this type of generation operation or MCN agency does not guarantee the ROI of each stage.
Just as Yanui Jing, the founder of Uniqlo, described in the best-selling book “One Win and Nine Losses”, in terms of content marketing, brands face a win-win situation-for example, a video can run out Behind it is the sacrifice of 9 videos that cannot run out. Of course, 9 are still few.
Obviously, in this game between beauty and KOL, KOLs have the upper hand.
It is understood that for online celebrity bloggers whose vibrato score is around 1 million, the average quote for a video within 20 seconds is 25,000, and the average quote for a video within 60 seconds is about 40,000.
Many brands say that the input-output ratio of online celebrities is extremely low. Brands are doing loss-making business, and the value generated by most online celebrities simply does not meet their charging standards.
“The average marketing investment of the Tao brand at that time was about 35%. The current market will only be higher. The more investment in the early stage, the more revenue it will bring in the later stage. OK. “Zhang Xin told Meiye New Latitude.
For the first time participating in Tmall’s Double Eleven, Huaxizi, whose sales exceeded 100 million, has become a veritable dark horse this year, and is the second young domestic brand to break into the TOP10 beauty sales after the perfect diary.
As Li Jiaqi’s first hand milk, Xi Huazi, the binding relationship between the two has been deeply rooted in consumers’ minds, many people guess that Hua Xizi gave Li Jiaqi 100% rebate in the first 3 months, that is to say For the first three months of sales, don’t spend a penny of Xizi, all for Li Jiaqi.
“Usually, the rebate for overseas brands to KOL is about 20 points, and domestic brands can reach 50 points. It is not surprising that online celebrity brands can give 100 points in order to quickly open sales, and some can even give 120%. For one point, It is completely sold at a loss, the purpose is to accumulate potential energy, and then make money after the subsequent push. “The above staff told the American industry new latitudes, the brands are not living well, many wait Not until the day when the potential energy erupts.
“Taobao, the one I linked with before, ranked among the top anchors. The asking price is 10 million levels and then the link commission, so small brands basically lose money when they look for TOP-level big anchors for live broadcasting. Only the anchors make money. “
03
The layout of the new battlefield is not easy offline
The era of “crossing the river by feeling the stones” is long gone. If the company born in the Internet era wants to develop, it must follow the rules and rules of Internet companies, and deduced in accordance with the logic of the times.
For example, after the wind rises online, it becomes necessary to return to offline.
At the end of 2016, Jack Ma proposed the concept of new retail. Taobao brands chose to follow the rules of the game and tried to go offline. So far, the offline effect has not improved.
Last year, the film law family was exposed to different quality of online and offline products. The offline quality was much lower than online, and many consumers complained and returned. Although Yunifang deployed offline through a variety of methods such as direct management, franchising, and agency, and entered KA, CS and other channels to achieve rapid expansion, from the perspective of financial reports, more than 90% of its revenue still comes from online.
The Internet e-commerce circle circulates the phrase, “Internet brands, without doing offline in five years, there is no future.”
Today, emerging brands are also receiving the baptism of this sentence, preparing to take the test of offline operations.
In September this year, Perfect Diary’s largest offline concept store opened in Chengdu Chunxi Road, officially launching the “new retail” strategy. It will open 40 stores in 2020 and will have 600 offline stores nationwide in the next three years. Specialty store.
Feng Qiyao, president of the new retail division of Yixian E-commerce, said that Perfect Diary has basically reached the peak of online fans, and now it is necessary to expand new customers through offline channels. Become an important channel for new brands to enhance interaction and experience.
But in fact, it is not easy to lay out a new offline battlefield.
According to the data provided by Perfect Diary, its offline stores have doubled the cost of store decoration compared to similar positioning brands. In addition, offline team building, online and offline integration, and SOP process Other aspects are the challenges that online brands need to face after entering offline.
“Most of the Internet beauty companies go offline through B-side channels such as KA and CS. There is little or no establishment of their own dealer system, which has limited their offline expansion to a certain extent. The perfect diary and Orange Duo directly choose the direct operation mode for TO C, which undoubtedly increases offline operating costs and difficulties. “ Bao Yuezhong, a new retail expert, told the American industry a new latitude.
Orange Blossom, established in 2016, is indeed more eager to enter the offline world.
Two years ago, Orange Duo began to cooperate with Mingchuang Youpin, which achieved an impressive performance of only 4% of the SKUs in the store but won 40% of the revenue. This year, Judo continued to choose to cooperate with offline channels, and has now settled in physical retail stores such as Watsons, Cool Music Chaowan, and Memorial Day Department Store.
But for the direct-to-consumer store or counter model that faces consumers directly, Orange’s attitude is particularly cautious.
In March of this year, Judo opened its first pop-up store in Shanghai Xintiandi Plaza; in August, it opened another half-month pop-up store in Changsha; one month later, a pop-up store in Hangzhou It was also officially opened, and it was surprising that this time, Orange Duo chose to continue to extend the store opening time for a period of half a year, making fast flashing a “slow flashing”.
“At present, the consistent approach of online brands is to use a pop-up store model to put trial and error in a small area, and after landing in several cities, you can make more accurate offline store planning. A beauty industry investmentPeople in Shenzhen told the American industry a new latitude.
Using the “slow flash” mode to improve and perfect offline stores in a short period of time, and to explore the operating laws of physical stores, it is enough to see that Orange is careful about offline layout.
Beauty makeup brands that have relied on the Internet have always been an asset-light mode of operation. The things they have done in recent years are mainly focused on brand building and resource integration. There is not much accumulation and advantages offline. The offline supply chain and marketing practices There is also a huge difference from online, and the barriers such as channels, markets, and technology that traditional brands have formed offline are difficult to surpass.
But the industry believes that The advantage of domestic brands lies in the new speed.
The R & D cycle and listing cycle of overseas brands are very long. The new frequency is at least half a year, and there will be a big change once a year, and usually only there are differences in packaging, and it is difficult to shorten the product development. Time changes.
And domestic brands, especially emerging brands, are closer to the Chinese market and closer to consumers.
On the one hand, the emerging brands will invite KOL to integrate into the product development process, and use KOL’s awareness of the market trend to control the research and development direction of popular products and potentially explosive models. On the other hand, the increase in the speed of product research and user feedback has also made new brands launch more frequently than overseas brands.
Usually, emerging brands can guarantee that new products are launched every quarter, and the perfect diary of the head brand is able to develop 3 to 5 new products every month. In contrast, the old-fashioned domestic product Baique Antelope will not have new products on the market for a year or even a year and a half.
At this time, the high frequency of new and increasing SKUs have also put forward higher requirements for emerging brands to launch large-scale offline stores on a large scale. Supply chain capabilities, inventory turnover, SKU management, etc. Become a new challenge.
“Even if these barriers are broken, traditional companies and overseas companies will still be in a state of short arms, and the offline environment will still be surrounded by all sides.” Bao Yuezhong said.