"After experiencing the peak of passenger car sales in 2017, sales have shown a downward trend for three consecutive years, with an average annual compound growth rate of about -6.5%, and the automobile industry has entered a period of deep adjustment of the market and industrial structure." On January 12, Roland Berger, the world's top management consulting company, released the "White Paper on Digital Marketing of Car Companies".
Since May 2021, the monthly sales of passenger cars have shown negative year-on-year growth, and in the environment of increasingly diversified consumer demand, emerging forces have entered the game, and the transformation of new energy vehicles has accelerated, OEMs are facing severe challenges in the sales market competition, and the sales model, channels and marketing methods need to be reformed.
In this regard, Roland Berger's "White Paper on Digital Marketing of Car Companies" disclosed the digital marketing solution (O-AIDL) for the first time, and cited the successful cases of Tmall and GM, Volkswagen, Chery and other car companies to explore digital solutions for new automotive retail.
The new change of increment to the stock market
The China Automobile Dealers Association expects to sell about 25.8 million vehicles in 2021, basically the same as in 2020, and passenger car sales of about 21 million units, an increase of less than 5% from 2020.
The automobile market has changed from an incremental market to a stock market, and at the same time, under the impact of the transformation of the "new four modernizations" and emerging technologies, the sales concept of car companies is shifting from products and channels as the center to "customer-centric".
For example, as of July 2021, Tesla's 181 direct-operated stores have covered 56 cities in China. The success of the "online sales + offline experience" direct sales model has posed a great challenge to the dealer-based sales model of the traditional automotive industry.
In China, the automotive consumer market is still huge. However, the base is large, the growth rate is slow, the Z generation consumer group is rising, the contact point is more diversified, and the impact of new sales models... In the face of new consumption changes, what should car companies do? How is the road to digitalization going?
In the stock era, car companies have long realized the importance of the digital process and laid out it as soon as possible. The result? The answers are mixed. Roland Berger's survey found that the core pain points of digital marketing of car companies include the inability to accurately identify potential customers and the low efficiency of delivery.
Three major spaces for digital transformation
In the face of competition in the stock market, car companies have increased their investment in digital marketing and user operations, how to break the situation now?
Roland Berger's "White Paper on Digital Marketing for Car Companies" believes that there are three major spaces for the digital transformation of car companies:
1. Improvement of efficiency: Improve the concentration of effective clues and accelerate the user decision-making link.
The nature of low frequency and high price of automobiles determines that the chain and cycle of their consumption decisions are longer than those of other consumer goods. According to data released by third-party media platforms, the average retention cycle of auto consumers in 2021 is 17.3 days, an increase of 2.1 days over 2020.
Longer consumer decision-making links and cycles, more test of the ability of auto brands to continue, refine operations and convert customers, any service negligence and breakpoint in the change of seasons, may lead to the loss of potential customer relationships.
2. Space for demand insight: Optimize the online car buying experience and capture the consumption trend of young people.
For example, the Wuling Hongguang Mini EV, a blockbuster model featuring "people's scooters", attracts young customers with daily commuting needs through small models and low cost characteristics, which shows that consumers in the new era are gradually getting rid of the traditional concept of "taking expensive as good".
Consumption upgrade is not equal to price upgrade, price war is not a long-term solution, insight into user needs, highlighting product value is the current car companies need to focus on the key grasp, for car companies to bring challenges at the same time, but also brought the opportunity of "corner overtaking".
3. Space for business upgrade: From the front-end policy to the underlying data, the system establishes the user's full life cycle operation capability.
At present, traditional car companies have room for improvement in four aspects, including customer portraits, demand satisfaction, data operations and system infrastructure.
For example, in terms of data operation, opening up the data link at all stages of the life cycle of car owners and mining the value of car owners is an important issue faced by the marketing end of most traditional OEMs.
For example, in terms of system infrastructure, the opening of data islands, the effective integration of data from all parties, and the effective transmission of various types of information to various departments are all problems that need to be solved urgently in system infrastructure.
Focus on the eight strategic groups
Before Double 11 in 2021, Roland Berger signed a memorandum of strategic cooperation with Tmall to launch in-depth cooperation in the digital operation of new automotive new retail, provide business methodologies for car companies to lay out e-commerce, and promote the digital upgrading of the automotive industry.
At present, based on Tmall's vehicle marketing practice, Roland Berger launched the digital marketing solution (O-AIDL) for car companies:
Focusing on "consumer-centric", with the user's whole life cycle operation as the key starting point, it breaks through marketing pain points in stages, constitutes a closed-loop link that can be traced and analyzed and feedback, and finally realizes the overall improvement of digital marketing capabilities and value creation efficiency.
Zheng Yun, global senior partner of Roland Berger, introduced that in 2017, Based on many years of online marketing practice, Tmall digitally defined the people at different stages of the user life cycle (O-potentials, A-know users, I-interest users, P-purchase users, L-loyal users) with the logic of O-AIPL. In order to adapt to the characteristics of high prices and low frequencies in the automotive industry and complex decision-making links, Roland Berger and Tmall proposed O-AIDL logic that is more suitable for the automotive industry, upgrading AIPL to aiddl: P representative purchase users, upgrading to D representative decision-making groups, and including test drives, deposits and other order users into decision-making users.
In addition, Tmall also systematically applied a large amount of data to the division of the automobile consumer population for the first time, and divided eight strategic groups: pioneer players, outdoor talents, mini transportation, luxury exclusive, middle-class advanced, exquisite entry, affordable home, and practical transportation. The division of strategic groups is convenient for car companies to re-examine the strategic layout of people, goods and fields, and use the digital marketing solution (O-AIDL) of car companies to optimize the consumer experience and improve the efficiency of consumer operations.
Among the eight strategic groups, the distribution of post-90s and post-95s is the most "Internet". For example, pioneer players are mainly post-90s and post-95s, and their acceptance of new brands is high. Post-90s and post-95 cutting-edge white-collar workers and women are the main force of the exquisite entry-level crowd, often pursuing mid-range price models in high-end luxury brands. Also after the 90s and 95s, some people pay attention to practicality and form a practical transportation crowd, and 100,000 to 150,000 models that take into account the cost performance are their first choice.
Tmall experience of car companies
"The digital process is accelerating, and car companies are eager to transform to digital marketing and sales. The Tmall and Roland Berger aims to create a new retail digital solution for automobiles and provide effective 'problem-solving ideas' for car companies and industries. He Chunlei, general manager of Alibaba Automobile Division, said that more than 60 mainstream car brands have opened stores on Tmall, and since 618 in 2021, the number of new car orders traded on the Tmall platform has also reached a new high.
Thanks to the digital marketing plan of car companies, GM, Volkswagen, Chery, etc., have all explored the successful experience of digital transformation on Tmall. For example, during the Double 11 period in 2021, the Volvo Tmall flagship store attracted targets and potential users to participate in the interaction, entering the store more than 1.2 million and guiding the sales of new cars to more than 10,000 units.
According to the relevant person in charge of Chery, with the help of Tmall's data technology capabilities, it has in-depth insight into user needs and uses a rich label system to tap into richer target potential customers. Establish a more direct and warm connection with customers, thereby further improving marketing efficiency and realizing the cultivation and conversion of users throughout the life cycle.
Industry insiders said that with the release of the "White Paper on Digital Marketing of Car Companies", the "Tmall Experience" of major car companies' digitalization will provide business methodologies for car companies to lay out e-commerce and promote the digital upgrading of the automotive industry.