This was no ordinary news, after all, every day a brand announces its new spokesperson.
But when it comes to Wahaha, it is extraordinary. Because the last official spokesperson of Doll Ha Pure Water was still 22 years ago.
Wahaha X Wang Leehom, 20 years of endorsement
Wang Leehom emerges
In 1998, when Wang Leehom first made his debut, he did not have much popularity in the mainland. Zong Qinghou defied all odds and signed Wang Leehom as a brand spokesperson. This was also Wang Leehom’s first endorsement in the mainland.
Wang Leehom is still just a newcomer, having just made his mark with his album "Circle and Rotate".
At that time, Wahaha was more popular than Wang Leehom, and many people also knew him through Wahaha advertisements on TV…
With the Wahaha mineral water with his own avatar printed on it, the channels are spread all over the shelves of major cities and even countless villages and towns in China, thus Wang Leehom quickly gained popularity.
And because of Wang Leehom’s subsequent popularity, he became a household name in the domestic music scene, and Wahaha became even more popular because of its spokesperson linkage.
"In the past, the days were very slow, the car and mail were slow, and life was only enough to love one person."
Just like a poem written by Mu Xin, Wahaha at that time had the single-mindedness and dedication of an old-fashioned person.Wahaha and Wang Leehom spent their peak years together.
Wahaha x Leehom Wang, advertising story
From Wahaha’s perspective, the vision of choosing to sign Wang Leehom back then was forward-looking. Because at that time, Wang Leehom was not yet popular on both sides of the strait. Later, Wang Leehom, as an evergreen in the music world, and the image of a high-quality idol, also provided the Wahaha brand with years of inspirationPositive brand endorsement…
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Wait until you understand
The cooperation between Wahaha and Wang Leehom has always been a story in the history of advertising. They achieved each other in the early days of entering the market, and their cooperation has been more than 20 years. For more than 20 years, Wang Leehom has become a representative of Wahaha to some extent. Together with Wahaha’s brandImage is deeply rooted…
Therefore, when Wahaha officially announced Xu Guanghan as the new spokesperson, many fans and consumers couldn’t accept it for a while. Their advertisements on Douyin and blockbuster comments were all:When will I change back to Leehom Wang and when will I drink it?
Wahaha’s brand crisis
Breaking the endorsement myth
In 2019, an interview with Zong Fuli, the successor of Wahaha, broke the "endorsement myth" between Wang Leehom and Wahaha.
She bluntly said that she did not like Wang Leehom, nor did she like Wahaha pure water packaging, because "Wang Leehom is too old" and has some aesthetic fatigue.
In fact, it is not only the spokesperson Wang Leehom who is no longer "young", but also grows old with the spokespersonWahaha brand itself…
existYear 2013, Wahaha reached the peak of revenue. That year, the group company completed beverage production throughout the year12.70 million tonsRealize operating income78.30 billion yuan, an increase of 23% year-on-year, achieving profits and taxes of 13.90 billion yuan.
exist2014, Wahaha sales72 billion yuanOperating Income of Wahaha in 201567.70 billion yuan;2016, Wahaha sales52.90 billion yuan…
The declining sales year after year also means that Wahaha’s "midlife crisis"Officially arrived.
Many people attribute Wahaha’s crisis to its products, because from the perspective of products, Wahaha has not been able to achieve the same results in recent yearsNo impressive explosives appearedThe revenue is still supported by the classic products represented by Nutrition Express, so the product aging situation is prominent.
Wahaha X Xu Guanghan, probing the edge of traffic
While replacing the spokesperson, Wahaha Pure Water also launched a new advertising slogan: "Water is water, let water return to purity".
Back in the day,In order to break the monopoly of WahahaOther "water" brands began to play different slogans, positioning mineral water, rich in minerals. Or spring water, sweet and pure natural.
Wahaha’s official website explained why they chose Xu Guanghan: "Xu Guanghan made his debut in 2003. During the 17 years of ups and downs, despite the difficulties and challenges, he has always maintained the purest original intention and love for the performing arts, which is highly compatible with the simple and pure characteristics of Wahaha Pure Water."
However, compared with the previous spokesperson Wang Leehom, there was currently a big gap in terms of popularity and works. The most important thing was that more than 20 years of brand endorsements had allowed Wang Leehom to shape the unique temperament of the Wahaha brand itself, such as "sunshine, purity, ability", etc. This unique temperament suddenly changed, which was of course unacceptable.
This is also the reason why Xu Guanghan’s brand endorsement encountered opposition from a large number of fans.
It can be seen that Wahaha has decided to replace the spokesperson in order to better achieve brand upgrading and complete brand rejuvenation, but this goal cannot be achieved by replacing Wang Leehom with Xu Guanghan.
For a company with a solidified system, when sales decline, it is inevitable to toss, and there is no market competitiveness in product innovation.Otherwise, the first thing to do in publicity is to change the logo and spokespersonThe problem is that the product has not changed, and just changing the spokesperson will only treat the symptoms rather than the root cause
Take advantage of the trend and start with youth
Old brand label
If the product has been launched for a long time, then Coca-Cola, Pepsi, 7-Up soda…Which is not a beverage that has been launched for more than a hundred years and is still selling well around the world today?
But at the same time, these brands are not aging at all, and even at the forefront of youth trends, creating a lot of young social topics every year. And keep the brand young,The most important thing is to break into the circle of young people and communicate with them in the unique language of young people…
For example, in 2013, Coca-Cola published an article on the packaging, launched a nickname bottle, and added hot words such as white rich beauty, otaku, straight-A student, etc. to the original product packaging. Label-based marketing allowed young people who were actively looking for self-identification to take their seats, and the nickname bottle even became a social currency for young people for a while.
Oreo, which is also a product that has been selling well for more than 100 years, can always convey Oreo’s brand perception of "big brain", "interesting" and "cool" through endless marketing methods.
A long time ago maxed out Moments Oreo joint universe Internet celebrity brand supreme, change the color can be sold for hundreds of dollars.
Wahaha’s Road to Change
In fact, as early as the end of 2018, after Zong Fuli served as the head of Wahaha’s public relations department, she has always been committed toBrand rejuvenation…Enter the campus, launch the Wahaha campus marketing competition, and listen to the voices of young people…
This year’s 520, combined with young people’s favoriteBlind box gameplay, launched "Blind Water". By selling 5,000 boxes at a price of 66 yuan per box, 1,000 boxes were launched every day, and every time it was launched, it sold out in seconds, achieving good results. And on May 29 this year, Zong Qinghou even played a live broadcast on the Douyin platform.
Wahaha, the "elderly trend", has made a lot of efforts so far. However, maybe it was because it was too much about marketers and channels in the past, and in today’s traffic era, Wahaha always felt that it was a little too much.
Although there are many activities, the volume does not seem to be large. After 33 years, Wahaha has to move towards a successful transformation.Just relying on the marketing strategy of one hammer in the east and one stick in the west is probably not enough.
How to stay young depends on these four points
Marketing creativity
I don’t know if you have noticed that for so many years, whether it is from Wahaha’s packaging or design, it has basically remained the same. It has always followed the consistent style, reflecting the brand’s lack of innovation.
I believe that many people grew up drinking Wahaha when they were young, but there are so many choices in the market now. Who would choose "soil" products.After all, something from a very early age is unlikely to match the tastes and aesthetics of today’s consumers.
Compared with Wahaha, Nongfu Spring does better in this regard. Nongfu Spring’s various new packaging designs have won foreign awards repeatedly, and it integrates design elements into marketing.Let every bottle design become an event marketing, attracting the attention of the industry.
Channel selectivity
According to the data, Wahaha has deeply cultivated nearly 10,000 dealers, hundreds of thousands of wholesalers, and more than 3 million retail end points across the country, and can spread new products to every commissary in remote rural areas across the country within a week."Wherever there is a commissary in China, you can see Wahaha products."
And Wahaha’s channel-based marketing model has also been cited by Harvard Business School as a case of Chinese channel innovation.
Of course, for FMCG, channels are extremely important. But inIn today’s mobile Internet, many brands have begun to advocate de-channelization and become D2C brandsOnline marketing and sales have become an important source of corporate revenue. And with the rise of e-commerce, Wahaha has missed the dividend period.
This is not to say that channels are not important, but that the trend of direct-to-consumer sales cannot be ignored because of over-reliance on channels. If you rely too much on channels, then this may also be one of the reasons why Wahaha has not seen Internet celebrity brands in recent years.
Adapt to the times and catch up with the dividend period
Due to the excessive emphasis on the effectiveness of offline marketing channels, Wahaha has also resisted e-commerce for many years.
In 2016, Ma Yun raised the issue ofThe basic concept of "five new" in e-commerceAfter listening to this, Zong Qinghou said that "except for the reliable new technology, everything else is nonsense". After that, Zong Qinghou felt: "E-commerce is easy to dump at low prices, which will disrupt the market, so in the end, business has to return to the real economy." At this moment, he still believes that marketing channels are the key.
In 2018, Zong Qinghou made a change in his treatment of e-commerce, publicly stating in an interview, "We do not boycott e-commerce, nor do we embrace e-commerce.".
The result was predictable.
At this moment, Wahaha has only just begun to fully embrace e-commerce, but it has to be admitted that this has been delayed for several years.Due to Zong Qinghou’s resistance to e-commerce, Wahaha lost a great opportunity…
As a middle-aged brand, Wahaha naturally wants to complete the brand rejuvenation, but this problemIt is not something that Xu Guanghan can completely solve.…
From product and design innovation, to the transformation of marketing methods and channels, to embracing new platforms such as e-commerce and live broadcasting, all of these must be done with great care.Otherwise, the so-called brand rejuvenation is just a slogan for Wahaha.
Take the lead and start now
From a big brand of Wahaha to the current sunset, we have witnessed their glorious side, and Wahaha advertisements can be seen everywhere in the streets. Up to now, the dazzling array of advertisements has dizzied us.In the market of traffic, it is essential to seize the opportunity, seize the opportunity, and have a keen business sense…
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