It has been two hundred years since humanity entered industrial society. In the past two hundred years, science and technology and production capacity have advanced by leaps and bounds, and various products (including services, services are also a product) have become more and more abundant and surplus. From a marketing perspective, these two hundred years can be divided into three eras: the factory era, the market era and the mental age.
First, the factory era
In the early days of industrial civilization, there was an extreme shortage of products, the demand was extremely large, and the market was in short supply. During this period, the main thing is to increase the scale of production and the category of production, that is, to expand reproduction.
Which enterprise can produce more products, which enterprise can become bigger and stronger. Western capitalist societies, especially many capitalists in Western Europe, mostly succeeded in starting their own businesses during this period and have continued to this day.
Similarly, during this period, whichever country produces more products can become a world power. First Britain, Western Europe, and later the United States, all accumulated and developed during this period.
This is the factory era, and the core of it is to produce more products.
Britain is undoubtedly the most representative country of this era, opening up a new era with the science and technology, products and culture that led the world in the period of social transformation, and pushing mankind into modern civilization all the way.
As Western European countries, dominated by britain, continued to migrate to North America, the center of world development began to shift. In the middle and late period of this era, a master figure in stimulating production emerged in the United States: Frederick Taylor. He published the "Principles of Scientific Management" in 1911, marking the comprehensive combination and improvement of science and human nature in management, which is the starting point for the development of modern management science, and he is also known as the "father of scientific management".
Taylor put forward a series of management methods such as quota system, standardization, piece wage, etc., which greatly mobilized the production enthusiasm of workers, thoroughly standardized the degree of standardization of workers' work, and greatly improved product quality and production efficiency, making the United States catch up with Western European countries and quickly become a world production power.
In World War II, the United States supplied many products to many countries participating in the war, including China, especially a large number of weapons and ammunition and other military products, and probably the United States exported more materials than all other countries participating in the war combined. Once upon a time, the United States produced half of the world's total industrial goods and 1/6 of agricultural products.
In this sense, the fundamental historical figure who defeated fascism and won victory in World War II was not the so-called Big Three of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, but Taylor. The European revival and the rise of Japan after World War II, and even the later Asian "Four Little Tigers" and the sudden rise of today's China, actually relied on the Taylor method of work.
In this era, factories can produce at full capacity, because the demand for products is strong and orders are constant.
The theories of Marx and Engels are to analyze this era and predict the future. They believe that the development of the productive forces marked by the means of production is the fundamental driving force for the existence and development of society, but since profits are constantly used by the capitalists to expand reproduction, and the workers are constantly being squeezed of surplus value and become relatively poor, the proletariat and the bourgeoisie are bound to oppose each other, and finally the workers overthrow the capitalists, the proletariat overthrows the bourgeoisie, sends capitalist society to the grave, and establishes the socialist system.
This is the basic point of view of the two great men of Marne, which is discussed in depth and in detail in their core work, Capital.
However, with the progress of science, the innovation of technology, the improvement of the level of productivity, the increase in labor productivity is also very fast, the workers do not have so much labor intensity and so much labor time, the capitalists have begun to provide higher wages to the workers, so that the workers can not only support their families, but also improve the living standards of themselves and their families, the workers themselves and their children can get better education, medical care, vacations and other treatment, and gradually have housing, automobiles and other assets. The workers of capitalist society are not becoming more and more proletarian and poorer, but becoming more and more productive and rich.
The proletariat suddenly became a propertied class, and the number of the proletariat was getting smaller and smaller. This may not have been expected by Marx and Engels. Therefore, we must and can only look at the problem with the Marxist dialectical view and the concept of development, and we cannot be confined to the specific words of Man, otherwise it will not be explained at all. Of course, the basic idea that the productive forces of Marne are the determining force of social development still seems to be true, but the class situation in advanced capitalist societies is no longer as they predicted.
Having assets, being educated, being able to take vacations and travel is obviously not just a matter of the economy. When the workers become the middle class and the middle class becomes the majority of society, they inevitably begin to demand democracy, freedom and the rule of law, and the problem rises from the economic level to the political level.
What is even more unexpected is that most of these political demands have also been realized. Democracy, freedom and the rule of law in capitalist societies have come to the forefront of the world. The whole world is not only striving to learn and modernize capitalism, but also to learn from the capitalist management system.
However, as the capitalists expand reproduction indefinitely, there are more and more products, and the market has an economic crisis in which there is an oversupply and a large number of products are surplus. It seems to have become a curse that traditional capitalism cannot escape.
In order to get rid of the economic crisis, the capitalists even directly poured excess milk into the sea, the capitalist countries also began to seize the market and seize the land, Hitler clamored for living space, and Japan advocated the establishment of a greater East Asian co-prosperity sphere, so two world wars occurred in this era.
The First World War consumed a lot of products, blew up a lot of factories, destroyed a lot of infrastructure, the market faced huge demand, and then continued to produce, and then there was a large surplus, so it triggered the Second World War, and consumed a lot of products, blew up a lot of factories, destroyed a lot of infrastructure, and the market faced huge demand. It seems that a third world war is still needed, and so on.
From a marketing point of view, this era does not need to be particularly studied for what products are sold, just production can be. Product production is the sale of products, and as much as you produce can sell as much as you want.
This was more or less the case in the early days of China's reform and opening up, with a shortage of markets and short supply.
This is the factory era, the product is sold in the factory, not in the market.
Second, the market era
After all, the surplus of enterprise products or economic crisis cannot always be solved by eventually throwing excess products into the sea or waging war.
A large number of products can not be sold, and it is obviously not enough to produce a boring head, and it is necessary to start producing according to market demand. What the market lacks, what is produced, what the market sells well, what is produced.
The word sales has evolved into marketing, and producers need to do market research, analysis and judgment.
In fact, the era of comprehensive corporate management has arrived.
The needs of the times have spawned elites. At this time, another master figure was born, and he was Peter Drucker, who was also an American. We have to admit that the United States is very strong in this regard, and there are constantly emerging top figures in the natural and social sciences, which are beyond the reach of other countries.
Mr. Drucker created management science with emphasis on people and practice in his 1954 masterpiece "The Practice of Management", and it can be said that human beings have since begun to conduct systematic and in-depth research and practice of management as an independent discipline. Drucker also became the world's most recognized founder of management and the father of management, and his position in management was unparalleled.
Management is a science and an art, but it is more of a practice. Drucker's management has played a fundamental role in promoting and balancing the stable coexistence and efficient operation of our world, whether it is production or sales, whether it is political or economic, whether social or military.
More than seventy years have passed since the end of World War II, which people have been worried about, and it is not predicted that it will not happen in the next few decades. Whether it is political organizations such as the United Nations, economic organizations such as the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, and the Asian Development Bank, or military organizations such as the Warsaw Pact and NATO, as well as the governments of various countries, especially the major powers, they are all under the constraints of scientific management to varying degrees. It should also be justified to say that modern management constrains possible world military wars and mediates lurking world economic crises.
The development and application of management to today, even in countries with one-party systems or dictatorial governments, it is not simply a country that can be completely decided by one person, and it is subject to various constraints in the management of the party itself. Countries are also in a system of mutual restraint, and it is difficult to have another Hitler, Mussolini or Hideki Tojo.
The world is also turning more towards economic development. At this time, if an enterprise and a country want to become bigger and stronger, they must produce products that you have without me and you have excellent, and Japan, supported by the United States after World War II, seems to be a typical representative of this era. Drucker's management is more respected in Japan and is regarded as a guideline. In the face of people's continuous upgrading and changing needs, Japan's electronics, automobiles and other industrial products with their superior quality, fine appearance, low energy consumption, comfort and other comparative advantages in the world to occupy a large number of markets, including the United States market.
In the 1990s, Japanese products were widely available in the United States, and they had the potential to surpass the United States. Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic and other electronic companies, Toyota, Honda and other automobile companies, many Japanese industrial enterprises jumped up, many companies have become the world's top 500 companies, and their management experience has been praised and imitated by the world. South Korea and Chinese, which harbor national resentment, have to secretly admire "Little Japan" in this regard.
In this situation, each country has focused its main energy on economic development, scientific and technological progress and scientific management. Especially in the Western capitalist world, represented by the top three global economic aggregates in the United States, Japan, and Germany, the countries and people are getting richer and richer, and the workers have not only become a complete propertied class, but some workers have become "capitalists", and the proletariat has basically disappeared completely. Even a very small number of proletarians who do not work are supported by welfare guarantees. Most people not only have ideal jobs, but also have a free life, leisure and entertainment have become the most basic normal life.
People are also educated at a higher level, more democracy and freedoms, more satisfied with the status quo of human rights and the environment of the rule of law. Everyone in Western society can innovate culturally, technologically, economically, politically, and socially, thus becoming a capitalist, a master, and a president.
After a commoner participates in the work, through more than ten years of hard work, he can become the president of the world's richest and most powerful country, which can be described as "the dynasty is Tian Shelang, and the Tianzi Hall is at dusk.". Isn't that what Bill Gates and Obama are, one is an undergraduate graduate, and the other is a black man who is still discriminated against in some people's minds. Gates was 40 years old when he became the richest man, and Obama was only 47 years old when he was president.
This is unimaginable in an era when three generations could not cultivate an aristocrat and a black person who was racially discriminated against.
The development of the economy has completely changed the class pattern, and not only is there no proletariat, but the bourgeoisie is less important. Capital has gradually become less intelligent and more important than technology, and in a sense, intellectual property representing intellectual capital has become the new global currency. In fact, Bill Gates and Obama did not have much traditional capital, only intellectual capital, but soon surpassed those capitalists who held a lot of traditional capital and rose to the top of the world with personal wisdom.
Since about 1960, the number of people living on knowledge in the United States has exceeded the number of people who make a living by physical strength, and today's manual workers are probably only about 10%. Taylor's era of relying on machines to enhance human physical strength has long been replaced by Drucker's era of relying on knowledge to enhance human brain power, people can find opportunities for success in all walks of life around the world, and the risk of direct conflict between the state, society, and human beings itself has been greatly reduced, which is the internal reason why there is no new world war. If it is said that Taylor gave birth to Drucker and Drucker made this knowledge society, there is also considerable truth.
From the perspective of marketing in this era, that is, we must do a good job of market research, find out the real needs of the market, and carry out comprehensive marketing under scientific management, marketing is mainly in the market and not in the factory, and the factory must produce according to market demand.
This is the market era, the core of marketing is in the market, not in the factory.
Third, the age of the mind
With the full development of the market era, what categories of products, what models of products, what quality products, and what price products on the market can be said to have everything. People walk into the store, and all kinds of goods are dazzling and dazzling.
It is estimated that there are 1 million standard stock keeping units (SKUs) in the US market, 40,000 standard SKU in a general supermarket, and 80% to 85% of the living needs of an ordinary family only come from 150 standard SKU, which means that 39850 SKU units in supermarkets are neglected.
Buying a car in the U.S. market in the 1950s was simply a choice of GM, Ford, and Chrysler. By the early 1970s, there were more than 140 models on the market, and today there are more than 300. Even if you change a tire, casually walk to the market to see, there are more than a dozen to dozens of kinds.
Consumer psychologists say that the sheer number of choices is driving humans crazy, which we call "the violence of choice."
In this case, how do we market our products? Is it okay to just do traditional market research? Because the result of market research may be that all products are saturated or even surplus.
It seems that the market has entered a new era.
The peculiarity of this era is that consumers have already decided where to go and what products to buy before going out shopping.
Although there are products of better quality, more thoughtful after-sales service or even cheaper prices than the one he is sure to buy, he will not choose.
Maybe he doesn't know there's such a product yet, but even if you tell him, he doesn't necessarily buy it because it's not a brand he approves of. At the same time, he won't believe that the product you say is better than the one he's already determined in his heart, and even though it's really better, he can't listen to it.
So how do you let customers know your products, recognize your products, and buy your products?
In his book "Positioning", the American marketing master Trout proposed a set of practical methods that can also be called theoretical innovation.
Alas, still American!
If you want to understand Mr. Trout's writings more Chinesely, Mr. Deng Delong, a positioning expert who is known as his Chinese partner and disciple, also wrote a book "Two Hours of Brand Literacy", which should be more habitual and easy for Chinese people to read.
Looking at the United States and Japan now, it can be said that Japan, which is comparable to and surpasses the United States in the market era, is far behind the United States today. Those Japanese companies that have been in the limelight for many years have also been overshadowed by a number of top American companies. In the past ten or twenty years, it is rare to hear that Japan has a newly emerging world-renowned enterprise, and there are not a few world-renowned enterprises that have emerged in the United States.
In the 2018 Fortune Global 500 list, American companies ranked first with 126 seats, and Japan ranked third with 52 seats. At the peak of the market era, Japan's economy reached 70% of the United States, in 2018, but only about 24% of the United States, even in the economic depression of the 90s, Japan still had nearly 150 companies among the world's top 500 companies. The U.S. economy has completely shaken off the siege of Japanese products and entered a new era, which Mr. Trout calls the age of the mind.
What kind of era is the age of mind?
This is an era of high competition based on knowledge for success. The fierceness, cruelty and civilization of its competition are much higher than in the market era, and the most direct manifestation is the information explosion, which generates billions of new pieces of information every day. The last 30 years have generated more information than the last 5,000 years combined, and in Sweden, where every consumer receives an average of 3,000 advertising messages per day, and scientists study that people forget 80% of what they think they have learned within 24 hours, how can you remember your fleeting promotional messages?
Not to mention buying your product, how can you first know that there is your product from such a huge amount of information? It's a very difficult thing.
Let's say that the communication records and WeChat in our own mobile phones are definitely much less than the entire amount of information in the outside world, and we can look at them many times at any time and anywhere, but how many can we remember them all year round?
So in this age of mind, you must first let people know you and remember you. Otherwise, how is it possible to deal with you and how is it possible to buy your products?
Therefore, your product must occupy the customer's mind, let the customer know your product, and think your product is the best. In fact, most of the products that customers think are the best are not really the best products.
So, what kind of superstructure form of society will be spawned by the economic development model with the mind as the core resource? Will capitalist values continue to dominate or dominate the world, or will a new form of social value emerge? Is it the beginning of the great progress of human society, or is it the prelude to the demise of human society? I'm afraid it's hard to answer now.
In fact, history is undergoing a fundamental transformation, but the human beings who are in it do not feel much. Let's think about whether mankind has relied on war to gain great power for thousands of years, but in recent decades China has risen peacefully. This paradigm, which would be radically changed without war, is underway, and is likely to bring an unexpected world to humanity, because the combination of information and biotechnology will tear the old model apart, but there is no new model to continue. This has already been demonstrated in the commercial sphere, where regional chains and Bitcoin are the hallmarks, and traditional centers may no longer exist.
If we look at the problem with an optimistic attitude, if all countries in the world voluntarily merge into a whole organization, or truly become a global village because of the need for human beings to protect the earth's homeland, we predict from a socio-political perspective, is it easier for Zuckerberg after the 80s to be elected as the "president of the world" or "global village chief"? Because the Facebook he created has about 2 billion active users alone, who has more support than the "partisan" of this social network?! No matter what, I can't choose you anyway, because few people know you at all, but ma Yun and Ma Huateng have a chance, and Chinese may also stand on the highest point of human society.
This is the age of the mind, the wisdom of the family will really surpass the capitalist, the core of marketing in the mind, not in the factory, not in the market (do not treat the customer mind as the market).
In short, the factory era product marketing is in the factory, the market era product marketing is in the market, and the mental era product marketing is in the mind.