Text | Yang Wanli
From posting an article for reflection to accepting criticism from 360 founder Zhou Hongyi, to shouting to learn and imitate Lei Jun, Nezha Auto CEO Daniel Zhang's dynamics this year continue to attract attention from the outside world.
At present, a "red sea" has been formed between the new forces of car manufacturing, with "Wei Xiaoli" in front of it, and dark horse players - Wenjie Automobile and Xiaomi Automobile that came out this year, and the competition in the industry is intensifying, and car companies are becoming more and more eager for traffic.
In the context of weakening sales of Nezha automobiles, Daniel Zhang was "anxious". In addition to marketing on major Internet platforms, Daniel Zhang said that he can bow 90° for car owners to open the door. Whether you can get out of the circle in the industry is an art, and it is a test. Daniel Zhang lowered his "figure", ultimately in order to boost the company's product sales.
Learning to imitate Lei Jun, Daniel Zhang "bows" to reality
On the evening of April 17, some netizens asked Daniel Zhang in the live broadcast room, "Can you open the door for the user?", Daniel Zhang said that the next delivery ceremony will be held when the car is delivered, and he also said that he can bow 90 degrees to open the door for the owner.
Since the beginning of the year, Daniel Zhang has been active on the Internet.
At the end of March this year, Zhou Hongyi and Daniel Zhang appeared in the live broadcast room together. During the live broadcast, Zhou Hongyi publicly criticized Nezha Automobile, saying, "You are always 'self-satisfied' from marketing to product planning, which is not good." ”
Zhou Hongyi criticized Daniel Zhang for making Nezha Automobile once on the hot search. After that, Daniel Zhang posted on social platforms, "Accept Lao Zhou's criticism and learn from Lei Jun in marketing."
Until recently, Daniel Zhang said in the live broadcast room that he wanted to imitate Lei Jun. As the CEO of a well-known car company, why did Daniel Zhang lower his "figure"?
Recently, many "heads" and executives of car companies have appeared in the live broadcast room, from behind the scenes to the front of the stage. On the surface, car companies are promoting products and technologies, but in essence, they are grabbing users and market share. As Daniel Zhang said, the competition in the automotive industry is too fierce now, and if it cannot attract attention on the whole network, no matter how good the product is, it will not succeed.
We noted that Daniel Zhang said in an exclusive interview with the media last year, "The primary purpose pursued this year is not the sales target, the primary task is to complete the smooth replacement of products and polish the supply chain and quality system of new products." ”
Daniel Zhang also laughed at himself, saying that in 2022, he won the first place in the country in terms of new car-making forces (sales), and he did not get much (big) respect.
Things are different now. Starting from 2023, Nezha's sales will weaken, and the industry will be fiercely competitive, Daniel Zhang will "bow" to reality, and he will pay more and more attention to marketing.
It is understood that in the inventory of the social accounts of the boss of the automobile circle, Daniel Zhang made efforts on the two major platforms of Douyin and Weibo, and competed with Lei Jun, Li Xiang, Yu Chengdong, He Xiaopeng, Li Bin and other "big Internet celebrities in the automobile circle".
From the perspective of corporate marketing strength, Xiaomi Auto can be called a winner and has been leading the rhythm. From the technology conference to the official launch, Xiaomi Auto has continued to create hot topics and has rushed to the hot search many times.
Looking at Nezha Automobile, one of the main ways promoted by some salespeople is price advantage. Previously, some industry insiders summarized its marketing shortcomings, including the professional terms described so that users could not understand.
Now, Daniel Zhang has reflected and tried to change.
On January 2 this year, Daniel Zhang posted on social platforms, pointing out that Nezha Automobile has problems such as "old communication methods, good things cannot be said", "centralized power and weak management of marketing headquarters". Daniel Zhang also said that in 2024, he will also serve as the general manager of the marketing company, and will comprehensively improve marketing communication and user communication.
Five days later (January 7), Daniel Zhang continued to post on the marketing matter, saying that he would improve the situation of not spreading products and allowing false information to be smeared, and at the same time would soon hire urban KOLs to help Nezha Auto do online content output.
From the user's point of view, understanding the user and establishing deep stickiness with the user is where Nezha Auto needs to work hard.
Daniel Zhang's two hurdles: Nezha's car sales are weakening and the road to market is long
The operating entity of Nezha Automobile is Hezhong New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Hezhong Automobile"). According to the data, Hezhong Automobile was founded in 2014 and launched its own car brand - "Nezha Automobile" in 2018.
According to public information, the models on sale of Nezha Automobile mainly include Nezha V, Nezha U, Nezha X and Nezha AYA, which are priced between 6-210,000 yuan, and Nezha S and Nezha GT are priced between 15-230,000 yuan. Nezha Automobile is positioned in the low-end market, and at the same time, it is also making efforts in the mid-end market.
The first hurdle facing Daniel Zhang is that as a new car-making force with top sales, Nezha Automobile has not achieved IPO listing for a long time.
In the current fierce competitive environment, the lack of support from the capital market is undoubtedly unfavorable to the long-term development of Nezha Automobile.
Nezha Automobile has released listing signals many times, but the process is long.
As early as July 2020, Nezha Automobile publicly announced that it planned to be listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board in 2021. However, the plan ultimately fell through. Since November 2021, there has been news that Nezha Automobile is considering an IPO in Hong Kong stocks, but there are no further developments later.
In October last year, Daniel Zhang publicly stated that he was in no hurry to go public, citing money on the books and a cold capital market.
According to Nezha Automobile's official Weibo release, on April 15 this year, Nezha Automobile's parent company, Hezhong Automobile, received an investment of no less than 5 billion yuan. The agreement also mentions the important message of "coordinating relevant resources to support Hezhong Auto to achieve its IPO as soon as possible". With the participation of new financiers, the subsequent listing process of Nezha Automobile is expected to accelerate.
Nezha Automobile is sprinting to IPO, and if it wants to obtain a higher valuation, it is extremely important to show the results and highlights to the market.
Judging from the change in sales, Nezha Automobile's sales have staged an "A" trend.
In 2022, Nezha Automobile will sell 152,100 vehicles, surpassing "Wei Xiaoli" and becoming the annual sales champion of the new car-making force that year. After entering 2023, Nezha Automobile "lacks stamina", achieving annual sales of 127,500 units, a year-on-year decrease of 16.16%, and did not complete the sales target for 2023 (300,000 units).
Nezha Automobile's ranking among the new car-making forces has changed, and it has slipped from the first place in 2022 to the fifth place in 2023.
According to media reports, Daniel Zhang said that the main reason for the decline in Nezha Automobile's sales in 2023 is that the company is not deeply involved in the price war. Daniel Zhang also said that Nezha Automobile's conservative attitude in price strategy failed to effectively attract those more price-sensitive consumer groups, which directly led to the company's loss of part of the market share in the fierce market competition.
Entering 2024, Nezha Automobile still has not reversed the decline in sales. From January to March this year, Nezha Automobile delivered 10,000, 6,085, and 8,317 vehicles respectively, and the total delivery volume of Nezha Automobile in the first quarter was less than 25,000 vehicles. Looking at the peers of new car-making forces, in the first quarter, the delivery volume of Wenjie, Ideal, Leap, Zeekr, and NIO all exceeded 30,000 units. Nezha Automobile's delivery data ranks low.
(Data source: The Paper)
It is worth noting that Nezha Automobile has set a sales target of 300,000 units globally in 2024, of which 200,000 units will be sold domestically and 100,000 units will be sold overseas. This means that in the next 9 months, Nezha Automobile's sales will exceed 270,000 units, that is, the average monthly sales will exceed 30,000 units.
In the context of weakening sales, we will continue to pay attention to how Daniel Zhang will lead the company out of the trough in the future.