Under the guidance of this market situation, most enterprises are struggling to cope in marketing. Although they spent a lot of money and used all the resources available to the enterprise, it is still difficult to obtain effective growth in sales performance and operating profit. Many enterprises are doing linear movement in advertising, channels, promotions, products, prices and other marketing elements. Increase or decrease advertising expenses and increase or decrease TV print media; Increase or decrease in promotional activities, increase or decrease in promotional gifts or gift specifications; Price reduction or price increase, increase the quantity without increasing the price, or buy one and get one free; The number of channel development increases, the channel incentive policy increases year by year, and the channel cost increases linearly. Under linear marketing, the marketing expenses of enterprises have greatly increased, but the marketing effect is not as good as before. This linear marketing under the traditional marketing mode has seriously hindered enterprises from coping with the market environment of 2 1 century.
Enterprise marketing urgently needs to break through linear marketing. Grid marketing is a new marketing strategy in 2 1 century. Grid marketing strategy, the elements of traditional marketing theory, such as advertising, channels, promotion, products, etc. Grafting with other enterprises to form a network of consumer groups, turning different subdivided consumer groups into grids in enterprise marketing, and realizing a marketing model with low cost, high efficiency and good effect. What is the grid marketing strategy and how to design it? How to implement grid marketing strategy?
The meaning and characteristics of grid marketing strategy
As we all know, the traditional 4P marketing theory is the basis of guiding enterprises to carry out marketing. Product, channel, price and promotion are the core of enterprise marketing. However, with the deepening of market segmentation, the saturation and dispersion of information and advertisements in the digital age, the phenomenon of personal media in the network society and the excessive competition brought about by the emergence of a large number of new products and brands, 4P marketing theory is facing more and more challenges.
Linear marketing is the characteristic of traditional 4P marketing theory. Just like China's folk proverb, enterprise marketing often follows a simple linear thinking mode. If the channel is poor, increase the intensity of channel development and increase the reward or support for channel participants such as dealers, agents and retailers; If the advertising effect is not good, increase the investment in advertising expenses, or change the media, or change the advertising language and content; If the product price is high, the price will be reduced continuously; If the promotion effect is not good, you can buy one get one free, buy one get one free, or try more or taste it for free, or set the prize bigger and bigger.
However, it is very obvious that all enterprises have shortcomings in marketing. The existence of barrel theory makes enterprises never perfect in advertising, products, promotion, channels, prices and other factors, and there will always be situations that are weaker than competitors. However, the limited resources of enterprises make it difficult for enterprises to meet all the competitive needs in limited resources forever. Rob Peter to pay Paul often appears in the marketing process of enterprises, which eventually leads to the loss of strategic planning, but in the cycle of expansion, trap and stagnation.
The deep segmentation of consumer groups and the trend of differentiation and individualization of market information make linear marketing face more and more difficulties. The marketing income created by linear marketing activities of enterprises decreases with the division of consumer groups into countless niche groups. The divergence of information makes the information of linear marketing divided, and the depth and breadth of information dissemination decline rapidly. Consumers' personalized, unique and self-centered consumption needs are increasingly met through experience rather than promotion.
In online marketing, enterprises can only concentrate on achieving a few target consumer groups, and the competitive behavior of competitors brings great obstacles to enterprises. Linear marketing movement of enterprises in advertising, products, channels, promotion, etc. It just makes the marketing of enterprises have a kind of power for some groups, and this power has also been weakened under the competition of competitors. If the power of a certain factor is weakened to a certain extent, the marketing system of the enterprise will collapse.
The biggest defect of linear marketing is that if one aspect fails, it will lead to the overall failure of enterprise marketing. Any abnormality in advertising, promotion, products and channels will lead to the sudden death of enterprises, and the operation of enterprises will face great risks at any time.
Grid marketing strategy is completely different from linear marketing. A grid is a point separated and intersected by lines in different directions. In marketing, the market is regarded as countless grids composed of different consumer groups, and countless grids eventually form a big net.
The meaning of grid marketing strategy is to use all kinds of effective marketing methods and tools to reorganize and distribute enterprise marketing resources into a grid state, so as to fully reach every extremely subdivided consumer group that may be touched, so as to make the limited marketing resources play a full role. Because the marketing resources and marketing mode of an enterprise exist in a grid state, it is called grid marketing. The existence of grid makes the enterprise lose several grids, which will not affect the overall survival of the enterprise and greatly reduce the marketing risk of the enterprise.
The characteristics of grid marketing strategy are:
First, enterprise marketing resources (products, channels, advertisements, promotions) are gridded, not linear. Grid means that enterprise marketing resources can be dispersed to more market segments, which can adapt to the increasingly small market state. Traditional marketing resources can only move in one direction, while grid marketing strategy makes marketing resources move in multiple grids.
Secondly, grid marketing strategy is a non-central, non-planar and three-dimensional marketing model, which is a strategic model like human brain, nerve and blood vessel. Decentralization makes the waste and loss of marketing resources in one grid not affect the marketing of other grids, while three-dimensional makes the marketing resources produce the best results in any grid.
Third, the grid marketing strategy is a marketing strategy of winning without fighting. Its focus is not on competition with competitors, but on consumer communication and demand research, and grafting cooperation with enterprises of different industries and brands.
The Core and Composition of Grid Marketing Strategy
The core of grid marketing strategy can be explained by two dimensions, namely industry and brand. Industry dimension refers to the number and attributes of all industries that may graft cooperative marketing and enterprise marketing. Brand dimension refers to all brands that may graft cooperative marketing with enterprise marketing. The core of grid marketing strategy is that enterprises face different and extremely subdivided consumer groups. After carefully and fully analyzing the consumption characteristics and psychological trends of consumer groups, according to the principle of meeting consumers' psychological expectations and brand association, they will form graft cooperative marketing bodies with different industries and brands, and carry out marketing cooperation in promotion, advertising, brands and channels, so as to expand marketing income on the basis of providing greater value to consumers.
The theoretical basis of grid marketing strategy is consumer psychology. In consumer psychology, different consumer groups will form a certain impression of brand groups, and a consumer class will regard products of different industries and brands as a symbol of their status at the same time, so that a consumer group will obviously reflect the characteristics of buying the same products and brands.
Linear marketing is to make the marketing resources of enterprises reach the consumer groups in the shortest direction, thus producing good marketing effects. Grid marketing strategy lies in facing different extremely subdivided consumer groups, marketing through grafting cooperation with different industries and different brand enterprises, making full use of different industry attributes and different brand attributes, which can give consumer groups influence and appeal, thus arousing consumer groups' interest and desire for their own products and brands, and promoting sales promotion and brand building.
The strength of grid marketing strategy is reflected in the number and density of grids. There are different restrictions on the number and density of grids in different industries. Theoretically, the number and density of grids in any industry are limited. The success of grid marketing strategy, or the comparison of grid marketing strategies of different enterprises, lies in the comparison of the number of grid discovery and expansion. Grid density is determined by the segmentation of consumer groups. The more subdivided the consumer groups, the greater the density and the more grids.
The coverage of grafting cooperative marketing in different industries and brands is actually the number of grids, and the density increases with the increase of the number of consumer groups. At the same time, the competitive state in an industry also determines the number and density of grids, and the competitive state in the industry grafted and co-marketed with it also has an impact. For example, in monopoly industries, the number and density of grids are limited, while the number and density of over-fully competitive markets are high.
Implementation of Grid Marketing Strategy and Case Analysis
We can analyze the grid marketing strategy through a famous enterprise case.
Coca-Cola is the most typical firm implementer of grid marketing strategy. Coca-Cola, as a world-famous brand enterprise, tries marketing innovation on a global scale. In each development period, Coca-Cola will adjust its grid marketing strategy, endow it with fresh ideas and meet the needs of consumers' psychology and trends. Coca-Cola's grid marketing strategy is to think and take marketing actions with consumers as the core rather than enterprises as the core, which is one of the secrets of Coca-Cola's continuous success. It was with consumers as the core that Coca-Cola made the decision to deliver drinks to every place where American soldiers arrived during World War II.
Grid marketing strategy is Coca-Cola's long-term strategy, not short-term and speculative activities. Because of this, Coca-Cola and McDonald's, Disney and other companies will last for decades. In recent years, Coca-Cola has spared no effort in grid marketing, and its grid marketing skills are amazing.