Text: Second brother head
Standing at the threshold of early 2022, it may be more real and valuable to evaluate the performance of enterprises in the past year from the perspective of an observer.
If you only look back at Dongfeng Honda's 2021 from the single dimension of sales, the ending may not be as perfect as we expect, in 2021, Dongfeng Honda sold 793,200 vehicles a year, did not stand on the step of millions, and even had a slight decline year-on-year.
But if we also shackle our eyes on the single dimension of sales, it is difficult to find the highlights of Dongfeng Honda in 2021 through this appearance, not to mention that the annual sales are close to 800,000, which is already among the best in the Chinese market.
First, a number of explosive products to help, Dongfeng Honda continues to improve
To be honest, the Chinese auto market in 2021 is actually not so peaceful, although it is far less violent than the epidemic in 2020, but it also has a tragic color against the background of lack of cores, repeated epidemics, and rising raw material prices.
According to the data of the Association, in 2021, the cumulative sales volume of China's automobile market reached 20.146 million units, an increase of only 4.4% year-on-year. If the factor that the base of the previous year was too low is taken into account, this year's performance cannot be called eye-catching.
Objective factors are placed here, if we still simply use sales to measure the totality of a company, it is a bit of a partial generalization. In addition to sales, perhaps we should pay more attention to the development of "quality" of major brands at this stage.
The way to measure this "quality" is actually very simple, just need to find a few of the brand's explosive models to get a glimpse of one or two.
Because first of all, China's auto market has long entered the stock competition, consumers have been educated by the market for decades, any car purchase decision to do is to think twice, dark horses, explosive models are no longer common, any model that can sell explosive in the market, there is no doubt that the strength of foreign products can withstand the verification of the market.
Secondly, these so-called explosive and star models are actually a manifestation of the brand's various advanced technologies and manufacturing capabilities, but those who can maintain their market position all year round must have their own superiority.
In 2021, Dongfeng Honda has a number of models that continue to detonate the market.
First and foremost is CR-V, which has once again led the segment by grabbing 222,300 sales in the Chinese market in the past year, and since it first entered China in 2004, CR-V has gained 2.2 million users in 17 years.
I privately think that there is a sentence on the Internet that evaluates cr-V very well: Dongfeng Honda wants to live a moisturizing life is actually very simple, as long as its two legs are alive, there is no problem, one leg is Civic, the other leg is CR-V.
As a star player of Dongfeng Honda, CR-V has been keeping up with market changes, from i-VTEC to Earth Dream Technology to VTEC TURBO; from the initial fuel, to i-mmd hybrid, to sharp hybrid e+, every step is closely related to the wind of the times, striving to be a model of the times.
It is also thanks to its high value that CR-V has won numerous awards since its birth, including many awards covering design, quality, performance, safety, retention rate and other aspects issued by authoritative and influential institutions such as J.D. Power IQS, KBB, CATARC and other authoritative and influential institutions.
Followed by Civic, as an important representative of Dongfeng Honda in the car market, Civic has gained the love of 166,100 consumers in 2021. Since entering China in 2006, 1.8 million users have become its loyal fans, continuing to lead the trend of sports cars.
In September last year, the 11th generation of Civic was launched, and the styling, power, and technology configurations were fully optimized and upgraded, once again bringing the ultimate and smooth driving experience to the new generation of charms that pursue driving quality.
Down there are including high-end MPV Elishen, flagship sedan Yingshipai, Wuhan Auto Show debut pure electric vehicle e: NS1, none of which have caused a warm response in the market.
Continuous improvement on the product side and high quality to impress the consumer market is undoubtedly more convincing than the simple sales growth. Putting quality first, Dongfeng Honda will eventually benefit for life in the gradually calming automotive market.
Second, word of mouth and value rose together, and Dongfeng Honda staged a good play
In the domestic auto market, Dongfeng Honda is a rare brand that can be praised by consumers.
In addition to the frequently appearing explosive models mentioned above, this phenomenon is also reflected in the popularity of Dongfeng Honda in the second-hand car market.
If you have a friend who knows the second-hand car market, you must know that the model with the logo is the hard currency in the market, and Dongfeng Honda's models, including CR-V, Civic and other models, are difficult to find.
Another dimension of high heat is its high retention rate, in general, the retention rate is related to the car ownership, brand, quality and other factors, the higher the retention rate, the more it can represent the wide acceptance of the vehicle.
Recently, J.D.POWER and 58 Automobile released the "2021 China Automobile Retention Rate Research Report", in which Dongfeng Honda won the first place in the retention rate of automobile manufacturers with 63.4%, and its models including Civic, XR-V, CR-V, And Alexand were awarded the first place in the retention rate of models of the same level, which is enough to witness its leading strength.
In addition to the good market reputation widely disseminated, Dongfeng Honda has also insisted on giving users a sense of high value.
At present, the channels for users to obtain a sense of value from the brand are nothing more than two aspects, one is the product value, and the other is the brand value.
On the product side, Dongfeng Honda has always been consistent and faces the consumer market with high value; on the brand side, Dongfeng Honda is also striving to be upward and strive to be the best.
Nowadays, major car brands are riveting user operations, which is also well understood, because linking users with brands through marketing campaigns is the simplest and most efficient way to increase user viscosity.
But many brands have fallen into a kind of marketing for the sake of marketing, and the starting point of the entire marketing campaign is not how to increase the stickiness of users and bring more value to users.
Dongfeng Honda is different, it is started by the user, and then to develop a series of marketing activities, really get the user's psychology.
For example, Civic CIVIC's "C-Guest Program" aims to help young people enhance their C-bit awareness, enjoy the freshness of life at all times, and strive to stand at the forefront of fashion trends with them.
"Love C Guest" will undertake the social mission of transmitting positive energy; "Environmental Protection C Guest" is committed to making tomorrow a blue sky; and "Sports C Guest" allows car owners to feel the passion of Civic CIVIC and enjoy the joy of sports.
For example, in other marketing activities, including working with Happy Twist to create a micro-movie "Shen Lang's Siwei" for the new CR-V; titled "Longing for Life", interpreting the happy lifestyle of freedom with a new UR-V; in-depth cooperation with Station B, the name of "Rifle Sauce" was collected for the new LIFE in the way of user participation and co-creation...
Above, from the perspective of customers, Dongfeng Honda customized a variety of marketing activities, while bringing warmth and joy to the majority of Dongfeng Honda customers, it also passed positive energy to the whole society, so that users can deeply feel the improvement of the sense of value.
Third, annual sales of one million is not the only goal
It is true that Dongfeng Honda's sales have not crossed the million mark in 2021, which is also a pity.
But once anything is attached to the result, it will most likely get lost in this process, and thus ignore the process of pursuing this goal.
Therefore, for the million target, Dongfeng Honda looks very open, and remembers that Zheng Chun, executive deputy general manager of Dongfeng Honda, said the year before: "The goal of million sales should be hard to forge ahead, but not deliberately." "Doing things in a down-to-earth manner, crossing naturally, and maintaining a healthy system is many times more important than the number of "millions"."
In fact, adhering to long-term value first and maintaining a healthy system is dongfeng Honda's consistent goal.
Of course, the opening up of the million goal does not mean that Dongfeng Honda does not have an enterprising spirit, and Dongfeng Honda has been working hard for it.
For example, in terms of electrification, according to Honda's planning, by 2030, Honda China's new models in China will be electrified models, and the launch of new fuel vehicles will be stopped. Globally, Honda plans to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, and the sales ratio of pure electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles is planned to reach 40% in 2030, 80% in 2035, and 100% in 2040.
In terms of factories, Dongfeng Honda signed an investment agreement with Wuhan Economic Development Zone for the new electric vehicle plant project, and will build a new factory specializing in the production of electric vehicles. The new plant, located in the Wuhan Economic and Technological Development Zone, covers an area of 630,000 square meters and is scheduled to start production in 2024, with an initial base annual production capacity of 120,000 units.
The new factory plans to build an efficient, intelligent and sustainable development of a new generation of electric vehicle factories, with stamping, welding, painting, assembly, vehicle testing and other complete processes of electric vehicle production, and will introduce new automation technologies in welding, assembly and other processes, with industry-leading automation level.
There is reason to believe that Dongfeng Honda's regret that it failed to complete millions of sales in the era of fuel vehicles will not be repeated in the era of new energy.
Write at the end:
In 2021, Dongfeng Honda has highlights and regrets, in the face of the challenges of the market environment, Dongfeng Honda adheres to the principle of customer first, quality first, through high-quality products, innovative marketing, to achieve high-quality comprehensive development.
For Dongfeng Honda, this is a kind of persistence of keeping the clouds open and seeing the moon, and it is also in the era of deep shock adjustment of the automobile industry, Dongfeng Honda has gone through an extraordinary road in tenacity and innovation.