When Lei Jun's "super popularity" brought Xiaomi SU7 a sales figure of more than 7,000 in the first month, the competition between new energy car companies was almost crazy, and the marketing knife may be a backwater battle between Daniel Zhang and Nezha Automobile.
"Regarding the name change, I have different opinions with Daniel Zhang. I think we can launch another poll to get consumers and media people involved. "It can be seen that Daniel Zhang has made progress this time, and he is holding his mobile phone to record videos, and he is no longer like a leader." "I think it is not difficult for entrepreneurs to do IP, it is not easy for people who can do business, and the only requirement for doing IP is whether the skin is thick enough. Are you willing to put down your body, dare to blacken yourself and laugh at yourself. ”
On May 10, Zhou Hongyi updated the video on social media platforms and expressed his views on the name change of Nezha Automobile. And Nezha Automobile's turmoil about changing its name has been going on for a week.
A few days ago, Daniel Zhang, CEO of Nezha Automobile, posted a short video on social media in response to the voting results on the name change of Nezha Automobile. According to the results of the poll, about 29% of people support retaining the brand name "Nezha", 32% prefer to change the brand name to "Hezhong", 24% suggest that "Hezhong" and "Nezha" be used in parallel as the names of different product lines, and another 15% of users have proposed other name changes.
Faced with this result, Daniel Zhang said that he did not really want to change his name. "I took this name, and it has been six years since it was listed in 18 years, and I have accumulated a certain amount of brand equity and brand resources, and I don't want to waste it. The word Nezha is quite differentiated, has the tradition of Chinese culture, he still has the characteristics of a brand, and among all brands, it should be very recognizable and remembered," Daniel Zhang said.
Finally, Daniel Zhang said that the brand name issue will invite a brand advisory group to summarize the opinions and suggestions of all parties, and will carefully consider it.
Zhou Hongyi "can't sit still"
When the sales growth of car companies falls into a downward trend, the first to sit still are investors, and Zhou Hongyi is a typical representative.
At the 2024 Beijing International Auto Show, the photo of Zhou Hongyi sitting on the roof of the car in red was jokingly called "the only car model on the scene", and proposed that Nezha change its name during the auto show, suggesting that it could be changed to "Hezhong", and the main company of the Nezha brand is "Hezhong New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd."
In fact, in the past six months, under the advice of investor Zhou Hongyi, chairman of 360 Group, Daniel Zhang is actively setting off a marketing change within Nezha Auto. Specific measures include reorganizing the marketing team, personally serving as the president of the marketing company, and personally engaging in social media marketing.
From 2023 to the present, Nezha Automobile has entered a long period of sales decline.
In 2022, Nezha Automobile's cumulative sales will be 152,100 units, a year-on-year increase of 118%, ranking first in the sales list of new power car companies that year. In 2023, the brand's sales will take a sharp turn, with only 127,500 new cars delivered for the whole year, a year-on-year decrease of 16.17%, only half of the annual sales target, and the only new power car company among the top five in sales last year to experience a year-on-year decline.
Regarding the reason for the decline in sales in 2023, Daniel Zhang has publicly stated that "the main reason for the decline in sales of Nezha Automobile in 2023 is that it is not deeply involved in the price war." "In order to turn the gross profit margin positive, in the price war in 2023, Nezha Automobile did not fight very hard. This is also related to the resources of Nezha Automobile itself, and it is impossible for us to fight a price war with a non-listed company, which will lead to rapid blood loss. Daniel Zhang said.
Since the beginning of 2024, this decline has not improved. In the first quarter of this year, Nezha Automobile delivered 24,400 new cars, a year-on-year decrease of 6.9%. In addition to the acceptable performance in January, 6,085 vehicles were delivered in February, down 40% year-on-year and 39.34% month-on-month; Sales rebounded slightly in March, with 8,317 units delivered in the month, but down 17.55% year-on-year.
Sales continue to decline, and Nezha Automobile's cash flow is also in a hurry. In 2022, 360's net loss will exceed 200 million yuan, of which the investment income loss of Nezha Automobile will be as high as 894 million yuan, and in 2023, 360's net loss will be 492 million yuan, and the current investment loss of Nezha Automobile will be 687 million yuan.
Daniel Zhang personally went into battle to grasp marketing
Under the above challenges, this year is a particularly critical year for Daniel Zhang and Nezha Automobile.
To this end, Daniel Zhang, founder of Nezha Automobile, said at the Nezha Auto Global Value Chain (Marketing) Conference at the beginning of this year that the reason for Nezha's sluggish sales is mainly marketing. It is worth mentioning that before founding Nezha Automobile, Daniel Zhang worked in Chery New Energy and BAIC New Energy, in charge of marketing business.
Daniel Zhang said, "When switching between new and old products, there is no good connection, and the rhythm is chaotic; The price of new products on the market is too high, and although the adjustment was in place in the second half of last year, it has lost the opportunity; Loss-making product lines have significantly reduced production; The mode of transmission is old; The marketing headquarters is centralized and the management is weak. ”
To this end, Daniel Zhang "changed the blood" of the high-level personnel and marketing system. In December last year, 13 personnel appointments were issued, removing the executive vice president and executive vice president of Nezha Marketing. He also serves as the president of the marketing company to improve marketing communication in an all-round way. Since then, he has frequently appeared in front of the stage, but he has frequently fallen into controversy.
On the evening of April 22, at Nezha Automobile's 2024 spring press conference, Daniel Zhang mentioned: "Two or three years ago, we proposed the same price of oil and electricity, and we were the first to put forward this concept, we are the pioneers, you are all little brothers."
After this statement, which was considered a bit "arrogant", Daniel Zhang mentioned when introducing the stealth mode of the Nezha S model: "The function is outrageous, much stronger than the mobile phone holder." Towards the end of the press conference, Daniel Zhang also misreported the price of the Nezha L310 flash charging version as "146,009".
In the previous live broadcast on April 17, Daniel Zhang crossed Erlang's legs in the live broadcast room, and was questioned by some viewers for his high posture. After that, Daniel Zhang posted on Weibo, "I have a bad waist, in order to be comfortable, I bent Erlang's legs, on this point, I was compared by a bunch of licking dogs", and mentioned, "Let me act, I can't do it, the practice is far from enough", so it caused controversy again. At present, Daniel Zhang has deleted the relevant blog posts.
Nezha L shoulders a heavy responsibility
Compared with the short-term financial losses, behind the weak sales of Nezha automobiles, the lack of product strength and its own hematopoietic ability is the core reason that really worries investors.
Before 2022, Nezha has always adopted a low-price strategy, and Nezha Automobile mainly focuses on models below 100,000 yuan, and the representative models are Nezha NO1 and Nezha V. It was these two models that supported the sales of Nezha cars in the early days.
However, after 2022, Daniel Zhang led Nezha Auto on the road to brand improvement, hoping to gradually dilute the low-end brand image. The successively launched Nezha U, Nezha S, and Nezha GT are positioned in the price range of more than 100,000 yuan, more than 150,000 yuan, and 200,000 yuan respectively.
Industry analysts said frankly: "Under Nezha's early low-end strategy, because the competitive advantage is more focused on the price side, and some of Nezha's early orders are in the B-end market." In fact, the strength of its products has not been fully verified by the market. ”
In order to save the declining sales, Nezha Automobile accelerated its product update and released the Nezha L series model on April 22 this year. Nezha L is positioned as a family intelligent super range extender SUV. According to the official introduction, Nezha L is the world's only extended-range SUV with a pure electric range of more than 300 kilometers, and it is the first model equipped with a 40-degree CATL battery flash charging battery, with a comprehensive range of 1300km.
It should be noted that Nezha L is not aggressive in pricing, and its official guide price is 129,900-159,900 yuan, which is still aimed at the low-end market.
It is worth mentioning that since its listing on April 22, Nezha L has performed well in the market, and has received more than 15,000 orders by the end of April. It is reported that the car has arrived in stores and will be delivered in large quantities in May. In addition, the company predicts that driven by effective marketing strategies, Nezha L is expected to achieve monthly sales of 10,000 units in the future.
Compared with models in the same price range, Nezha L series models are equipped with fatigue driving reminders, active DMS fatigue detection, refrigerators, automatic parking, tracking and reversing and other configurations. Therefore, some people in the industry believe that the Nezha L series models released by Nezha Automobile this time are indeed competitive compared with friends in the domestic market of 100,000-150,000 yuan.