Value Added And Transformation Of Sales Channels

When Kodak decided to concentrate on China market At the same time, 18 offices were set up in China at one breath, and a large scale rapid color expansion chain program was launched. In just 6 years, more than 5000 fast color shops have been set up in 500 cities across the country. The market share of Kodak products has increased rapidly from 26% in 1993 to 53%. Kodak launched the "90 thousand and 9 boss" plan when establishing a color store. Kodak provides comprehensive support for retail management including product, technology and training, including large-scale advertising, and investors recover their investment within 3 years. Less than a year ago, Kodak's fast expansion shop added nearly 1000, absorbing nearly 100 million yuan of private capital. Through this plan, Kodak not only succeeded in realizing "borrowing chicken and laying eggs", but also made those small and medium-sized investors consciously and unconsciously form a "destiny community" with Kodak. In May last year, Kodak signed a financing agreement with the ICBC Shanghai branch. Its main body expanded the loan of equipment, up to 90% of the owner's purchase price, and the longest loan period was 3 years.

Analyzing the rapid progress of Kodak in the Chinese market has made a difference for us. Sale Knowledge of channels, fully developing the functions of sales channels, discovering and excavating potential and potential. Resources It is very meaningful to make it realize value added.

To increase sales channel value, we must start from three aspects: 1., give full play to the functions of the channel, strengthen the promotion and competitiveness of the channel, enhance the market share of the product, cultivate and develop the brand advantage of the product; 2., reduce the cost of the channel, balance the scale and benefit; 3., explore the reform and innovation of the sales channel according to the different stages of product development, using information technology and network resources.

Channel value-added starts with increasing the service function of the channel.

Sales channels include not only sales of products, but also sales of services. The access should have dual functions of providing products and services to consumers. This change will increase the sales cost of the manufacturers, but it is the inevitable result of market competition. Especially in the era of homogenization of products, increasing the service function of the channel is an effective means to make the products more competitive in the market. The rapid development of Kodak's thousands of color expansion stores aims to make consumers get the convenience of "you just press the shutter and the rest will be done by us." The extended after-sales service provided a guarantee for Kodak to quickly occupy half of the color film market. Today, channel competition makes almost all air conditioners require businesses to provide installation services for consumers and pay for them. When sales of cosmetics and beauty salons go together to female consumers, it will not be far away to turn manufacturers and brands into an indispensable part of their lives.

According to the characteristics of products, it is very important to increase the service function of consumers in the established sales channels. This is a shortcut to increase the value of the channels.

To provide a "long-term commitment".

The establishment of the sales channel should be determined by the manufacturer's demand for the channel function and side weight, emphasizing three adaptations: that is, it must adapt to the business objectives and sales policies of the manufacturer; must adapt to the needs of the market and the needs of the consumers; and must adapt to the increasingly fierce market competition. There is no uniform and perfect mode in the establishment of the channel. There are advantages and disadvantages in the path of the manufacturer's self building and the agent nature (agent and agent). The evaluation of the advantages of the channel should be based on whether or not the sales target and business strategy can be achieved.

For the manufacturers with "agent system" as the main gateway, the construction of the access network should be a huge systematic project aiming at "win-win". The passage is not just a simple flow of goods and capital withdrawal. When manufacturers can provide distributors with broader profit margins, more technical support, professional training and more advanced management measures, the access will be more stable, more loyal and more sales force. We must not only pay attention to the outcome of the pathway, but do not ask the extensive management of the process. Philip Kotler, a famous marketing expert, said: "the company's channel decision also includes a long-term commitment to other companies." As a key external resource, sales channels can be managed and controlled simply by adopting various positive incentives and negative sanctions. The management of access should start from the needs and desires of the members of the channel, treat them as the "customers" of the manufacturers, provide more rigid support and soft services while providing products, and establish a long-term cooperative relationship of coexistence and common prosperity. Kodak not only provided technical training to small owners of color TV shops, but also helped hundreds of colored shops to get loans through their own efforts. Such services and support could establish a "fate community" approach.
An important means to increase channel value is that manufacturers can achieve their business goals through channel promotion. However, things are far from simple. The implementation of channel marketing will encounter some challenges from channel members, such as not actively implementing consumer oriented marketing, embezzling promotional tools, rushing goods, etc., even in self built channels, which will seriously affect the implementation and implementation of promotion policies. To strengthen the management and control of channel promotion, especially to win channel members' support, to implement the channel promotion plan and achieve the goal of channel promotion has become a difficult point in channel construction.

To establish partnership marketing relationship with channel members is the "golden key" to solve the above channel promotion problems. The core of partnership marketing is to establish long-term cooperative relationship. Partnership marketing based on long-term cooperation and long-term interests will enable channel members and manufacturers to work together in product growth and development, market expansion and extension, brand training and maintenance. The two sides will enhance the market share of products to jointly implement the sales promotion strategy and achieve value-added channels.

The Kodak color store, which was first built, did not print the lucky film, so it became choke on the after-sales service. It was said that the color expanding device was not suitable for the lucky film. Afterwards, under the government's intervention, the Kodak color store only accepted the print business of lucky film. However, the small owners would still throw a word "no responsibility for quality" to let the consumers worry about the technical support, professional training, management support, and the promise to ensure the profit, so that the local owners and Kodak formed a "destiny community" and forgot to support the national industry. Why do manufacturers worry about the implementation and implementation of channel promotion policies?

The core of access financing lies in the direction of investment.

The financing function of sales channel is relatively strong. In the channel, the considerable amount of money that has been surging from dispersal to concentration is the "blood" of the way to fulfill the access function. Therefore, how to grasp and make good use of it is very critical. No matter how we look at the failure of "Ai Duo" now, Hu Zhibiao, who started his own business at the beginning of his venture, relies on his credibility and ability to invest enough in the upstream to get enough quantity of movement. In the lower reaches of the river, there are tens of millions of billions of dollars in the access funds. Before AI became a "champion king", Hu's use of this part of the fund should be correct. Otherwise, he would not quickly get out of the competition between the more than 200 VCD enterprises and realize the dream of the first sales volume in the country.

The "Zheng Baiwen" who obtained the Changhong distribution rights by bank guarantee and commercial acceptance was quickly and cheaply launched after accumulating a large amount of Changhong's supply, and accumulated huge amounts of money. Zheng Baiwen spent a lot of money on shop stalls, which led to investment failure and no benefit and was in trouble. It can be imagined that the damage caused by careless investment after the financing of the channel will not be borne solely by the Zheng Baiwen family.

One of the main features of channel value-added is the powerful financing function of the channel. However, it is very important to use this fund well. Through the "90 thousand and 9 boss plan", Kodak quickly mobilized nearly 100 million yuan of funds from the public to build its sales channel.
Finding balance between strength and ability, scale and effectiveness

Reducing channel cost and reducing channel risk is another important way to increase sales channel value. We generally use four indicators to measure sales channels: the length, width, depth and elasticity of the channel, that is, the number of channel levels, the number of middlemen at each level, the number of channels, and the ability of manufacturers to improve and transform channels.

However, enterprises have strong desire for possessions and expansion of sales channels, so that many enterprises choose "self built" when constructing the network. They take the cost and risk of the channel themselves. When expanding the scale of the road, they neglect the organic combination of the four lengths, widths, depths and elasticity of the channels, and blindly pursue the development mode of maximizing the channels, diversifying the channel forms and strengthening the sales channels. The excessive speed of road expansion has made it difficult for enterprises to manage their own passageways, and the psychology of occupying channels in "mouths" can not be enough, which has led enterprises to neglect the improvement and transformation of the channels, and the sales power of channels has been lost a little bit, and the management cost and financial burden of enterprises have been increasing day by day.

There are many enterprises that are going to decline due to improper sales channel construction. However, the enterprises tripped by the same stone are still in flux. Why? One of the most important reasons is that we have not grasped the balance of strength and ability, scale and benefit.

The theory of "one salt" advocated by Vatti group in Zhongshan of Guangdong is rather smells. "I have a big pot of soup, only a little salt, how to make soup taste? If you put all the salt in the pot, a pot of soup will be tasteless. If a bowl is ladled out for salt, each bowl will taste good enough, and the rest will be drunk when there is salt. " This is an appropriate metaphor for building a sales channel steadily with a rational mind.

Effective use of ready access resources. It is wise not to invest more money. Even with a self built access, the product has to rely on the best selling channels in the locals. It is a choice for manufacturers to transfer and share the cost and risk of self built channels to make some profits. This is not only in line with the market's rules for optimizing the allocation of resources, but also benefits the manufacturers in expanding the scale of the access. The focus of the work of the manufacturer is to continuously promote the value added of the channel by continuously improving the access management, improving the information collection function and service support function of the channel.

A correct and rational view of the management, control and service capabilities of the enterprise itself is the foundation for building a sales channel suitable for the development of enterprises. Avoiding the risk of the channel, reducing the cost of the channel, and making the most suitable choice of the enterprise's own interests between capabilities and strength, scale and efficiency is a great test to the ability of the leaders of the enterprise.

Adjustment and transformation of access

For manufacturers, adjusting the whole access strategy is a difficult decision. The reform path will face many challenges of risk and habitual thinking. Facing the huge cost investment and uncertain return, it will face the instability of the channel and the brutal market competition. However, once there is a gap between the current distribution channel and the goal of meeting the needs of customers, the transformation of the channel can not be avoided. The transformation of enterprises and the assurance of change are the most important tests for entrepreneurs.

There are many factors that influence and determine channel transformation. An important aspect is the need for different stages of product life cycle. With the evolution of product life cycle, the strategic objectives of enterprises are adjusted accordingly, and consumers' perceptions of products are constantly changing. Accordingly, the purpose of enterprises' use of channels is changing accordingly. From this point of view, the adjustment of channels is the inevitable result of product growth.

Another aspect of the path change is competition development and market situation.

With the increasingly fierce competition, the demand for enterprises is getting higher and higher. Correspondingly, the function that the path can achieve is becoming more and more complete. Sales channel not only has lower cost, but also has higher efficiency, more direct competitiveness and faster information communication ability, Dell company is a typical representative of this change. Over the past two years, in the domestic market, we have seen some enterprises, such as Procter & Gamble and Mei et al, vigorously push ahead with this change. Summarizing these cases, we can find that there are several characteristics of the path reform: 1., take shortcuts, choose unconventional sales channels; 2., use information technology and the Internet to establish their own access; 3., make the access shorter and try to face the consumers directly, so as to provide personalized communication services and more convenient and convenient information exchange; 4., avoid competition in the channel or reduce the degree of competition to the lowest point; 5., reduce the cost of the channel, so as to reduce the price of the product and make it more competitive.

As a member of the sales channel, we must have a clear and positive understanding of the transformation of the channel. Reform makes the value of the channel not only to provide a product and capital circulation channel, but also to have the function of "increment". The members of the channel should not only reflect the network value, but also reflect the promotional value, the promotion value, the information value, the service value and the public value, which reflects the effect of expanding the market. No matter manufacturers or distributors, the awareness and strategy of channel transformation are particularly important. Only one step ahead can we take the lead in competition.