New consumer brands born with social-media genes adopt both online and offline marketing tactics.
Photo from CFP
By MA Yue, Wu Rong
New fast-moving consumer goods brands born in the age of social media seem to have effortlessly mastered how to gain online traffic and popularity. They turn to celebrities for sales conversion and to improve their brand image. Online brands expand offline to reach different kinds of customers. Private traffic operations increase repeat business without the restrictions of third-party platforms. Stylish packaging and original crossover activities raise popularity.
This strategy hasn’t changed for years. Brands still prefer super idols. Even newcomers are not exempt. Top celebrity XIAO Zhan is chosen to do the endorsement for OCAK cereals, WANG Yibo for KELLYONE POPPER sparkling water. And Lelush, the Russian model who rose to fame last summer with his bored face and slacker attitude, shot a commercial for Luckin Coffee, with his iconic line "can I knock off now?"
Other emerging brands including Breo, MAKE ESSENSE, BANANAIN and USmile have also turned to Internet celebrities with a huge fan base to expand their influence and increase sales as quickly as possible.
However, new brands have some innovations to bring to the table. They focus on creating hashtags related to both endorsers and brands on social media to attract endorsers’ fans, communicate with them in comment sections and stimulate more likes and shares. The idea is to strengthen brand image, absorb endorsers’ fans and transform their interest into purchases.
High traffic is the most important marketing criterion for most start-ups. To gain visibility and attract customers in the shortest possible time, little attempt is made to match the endorser with the brand image. Endorsements of this kind simply use celebrities’ faces as their main selling point. But countless idols have fallen from grace and ruined their reputations through a variety of scandals, so new brands need to be wary.
While debuting brands turn to smiling idols, more established brands work on raising brand image, assets and value.
Domestic make-up raising star Perfect Diary worked with young idols around 2018 when the brand was new. One year later, Perfect Diary released a micro-movie starring young actress WEN Qi and directed by Iwai Shunji whose romance movie Love Letter is an all-time hit in China. Last year, ZHOU Xun became a global ambassador. The changes in marketing strategy have helped Perfect Diary dump stereotypes such as "Internet celebrity" and "cheap.”
The sugar-free beverage Genki Forest saw exponential growth in 2019 and 2020 by advertising on short video platforms and using popular endorsers. From last year, Genki Forest has released a series of videos on topics including China’s women’s volleyball team, ballet dancers, alpinists, and education in rural areas. The aim is to attract young people, build emotional connections with them, and spread its brand value.
Recently, Hey Tea’s promotional video Surprises Make Inspirations built on its slogan “inspiration of tea.” The ice cream brand Chicecream uses vlogs to tell childhood stories. Compared with conventional marketing methods, feature films astir up customers’ interests and emotional resonance, the brand’s friendly image is then strengthened.
As online traffic and endorsements become expensive, conversion rates can no longer meet expectations. New FMCG companies that pay more attention to brand value will go further. How to convey brands’ inner vitality - the key to success - to customers is a big challenge for all.
After gaining popularity, many brands including Saturnbird Coffee and BANANAIN have chosen to go offline and open brick-and-mortar stores to reinforce their image. A new customer experience attracts new customers. Location is crucial to offline business. Brands prefer spots like Huaihai Road M. in Shanghai as there is a large and steady stream of tourists. A store there is almost equivalent to a cost-effective ad.
Customers often judge a brand by the first impression of its offline store. New FMCG brands prefer sophisticated and original designs so that their stores no longer look like places that sell stuff. Their cyberpunk, industrial or galaxy styles are impressive and often go viral through social media. Customers can also get a better experience there.
The clothing brand Bosie Agender has set up many photogenic spots in its brick-and-mortar stores including cafes, photo booths, and pet shops. Saturnbird Coffee’s specially designed tables and chairs can be flexibly transformed to serve different activities. The highly interactive space can make customers stay longer so that they are more likely to purchase something. If clients return frequently, a long-term relationship and a deeper bond will be built between the brand and customers.
After becoming popular on social media, the next step is to make sure that customers come back frequently and purchase more things.
As operation on “public traffic” platforms like Taobao and JD.com becomes more difficult but less profitable, new FMCG brands now turn to private traffic, creating their own official accounts, mini programs, and VIP groups on WeChat. The idea is to improve the brand’s operational flexibility and increase per customer transactions. According to TideSight Research, new consumer brands’ private traffic penetration rate reached 80 percent in 2021.
Competition in the saturated beverage market is even fiercer. In 2018, Hey Tea launched its "HeyTea GO" mini program on WeChat. As of Q1 in 2021, the mini program had more than 35 million VIPs. Online orders accounted for 81 percent of the brand’s total orders. In October 2021, "HeyTea GO” membership was officially upgraded to "HeyTea Membership", further completing the system. Another beverage brand Nayuki began to build its membership system in 2019 and has 42 million VIPs as of November 2021.
Digital marketing decides whether a brand can grow healthily. Making decisions based on big data, conducting in-depth, step-by-step and refined user operations and increasing repeat business - these strategies do bring brands continuous sales growth.
New FMCG companies also care more about their brand image and positioning in co-branding campaigns. The crossover is no longer a simple promotional picture but extends to artworks, exhibitions, markets and pop-up shops.
Specialty coffee brands with chic lifestyle labels show great interest in artistic crossovers to strengthen their high-quality and chic traits. At the Seesaw Art Season 2021 held last October, Seesaw Coffee and the Finnish designer brand Marimekko jointly launched "Flower Market" drinks and co-branded merchandise. During the Becoming Andy Warhol exhibition, Manner worked with the organizer UCCA to launch drinks, gadgets and pop-up stores featuring the artist's recognizable banana symbol. The limited-edition panda latte, merchandise and stores co-branded by Manner and BEAST were also popular among young customers.
In fact, brick-and-mortar stores can also be art galleries. Makeup collection store brand Harmay held various exhibitions for artists like Zhang Ying and Zhao Zhao in its offline venues. Pop-up stores and markets, Inspiration Art Festival held by Yongpu Coffee and the POP MART x Woodstock of Eating Art Market, for example, are also ideal crossovers to strengthen a brand’s young and fashion traits.
Young people are loyal customers of these crossover products and activities as they care more about a brand’s originality and positioning, rather than the price performance ratio.
Packaging investment is 50 times more profitable than advertising investment. Packaging design is even more important to new consumer brands born in the social media age. It has been given priority and become a key part of R&D just like product ingredients and formula.
New brands’ success lies in exploring niche markets and differentiating themselves from existing products. Once their products become a hit, their packaging design will also become a hit.
To some extent, Genki Forest leads to a packaging convergence in sparkling water. The huge handwriting font and the fresh fruit pictures indicating flavors seem to have become a standard design. Saturnbird’s colorful capsule coffee package and transparent outer package are followed by many coffee brands. Wonderlab's typically short and fat bottles have also become a common packaging design among meal replacement shakes. Simple Love, a yogurt brand featuring “0 additives”, leads the minimalism trend and capital "0" is now largely used as a visual symbol on yogurt packaging.
