2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 1011 Can I handle the traffic generated by piggybacking on Tan Zong's popularity?

Have you noticed the recent trends in internet marketing? Shouldn't we make some adjustments as well?

After the live stream ended, Tan Jincheng called Li Xiang over. Faced with his boss's somewhat displeased expression, Li Xiang only needed to pause for a moment to know what was going on. Although he didn't have time to watch the live stream, he was still aware of what was happening in the chat room.

"Is this a question from chrysanthemum fans? This is indeed a very troublesome matter, and there are even more troublesome ones to come. However, we do need to adjust our marketing strategy regarding these issues, which was originally in my plan."

Not only that, he also had a verbal battle with Da Zui on WeChat Moments some time ago. The L1's great sales sparked continuous discussions about range extenders, and Da Zui was not about to let this opportunity pass. He promoted Seres' range extender as the best in China by forwarding articles, indirectly belittling Weilai L1.

How could Li Xiang let Da Zui belittle Wei Lai L1? He directly retorted that even the automotive industry wasn't worried, so why was someone who didn't even manufacture cars in such a hurry? He left Da Zui speechless.

When it comes to arguing, Li Xiang is no less formidable.

"Yes, the marketing in the automotive industry has actually undergone a qualitative change. Simply put, it has shifted from product-driven to fan economy, sigh."

The biggest marketing strategy in the mobile phone industry is the fan economy. When the product capabilities are similar, the competition comes down to who has the most fans. The intense arguments are not really about stealing users from competitors, but about consolidating one's own fan base.

If Da Zui applies this approach to cars, Lei Jun will definitely use the same strategy. In addition, Li Bing's current user base is also being managed in the same way, and user operations have shifted from selling cars to the user ecosystem.

In the future, the automotive industry will definitely be just as contentious as the mobile phone industry. There's nothing inherently wrong with this marketing approach, but it always feels a bit chaotic and unpleasant.

“Give us a concrete plan, but don’t make it all about arguing. I made it clear in the live stream today that Weilai will not be introducing the HI mode. I’m guessing a lot of people are already criticizing me and Weilai. You guys should do some public relations.”

Big Mouth has tried to provoke Wei Lai many times, but Tan Jincheng has never responded directly because he doesn't want to get involved in the controversy. His approach is the same as Musk's: you say what you want, and I'll ignore you.

If it weren't for concerns about damaging the brand image, Tan Jincheng wouldn't have responded this time either.

"Using HI mode? Fans really have some wild ideas, haha."

Li Xiang scoffed at this, saying that the so-called HI mode is actually just using advanced intelligent driving ADS, vehicle OS, and electric power systems all designed by chrysanthemum, and displaying the car company's brand and chrysanthemum's HI logo on the car body.

This model is somewhat similar to a laptop displaying both the laptop brand's and Intel's logos. As the automaker's sole supplier of intelligent features, this collaboration is not unacceptable for automakers that haven't made much progress in intelligent technology.

However, after the CEO took full control of the car manufacturing business, the so-called HI model was further empowered. In addition to the above, all channels, including exterior design and sales, were also handled by the CEO.

In short, car companies don't seem to have much to offer besides production and branding. Calling them contract manufacturers is not an exaggeration at all. Apart from car companies like Seres that are struggling to survive, how could other car companies accept such a cooperation model?

Even the cooperation between BAIC, Changan and Chrysanthemum is merely the establishment of a brand new brand, which is equivalent to the two registering a new company, without affecting their own core businesses.

This heavy empowerment, the biggest change from the original version of the HI model, seems to be a change in the head of the automotive business, but it is actually an internal struggle within Huawei regarding car manufacturing. One faction, led by Ren Zhengfei, did not want Huawei to directly participate in car manufacturing, but rather to intervene in the automotive business as a supplier.

However, those led by Da Zui made no secret of their desire for Chrysanthemum to directly participate in car manufacturing. For a time, Seres models even carried the Chrysanthemum brand, but it was forcibly suppressed internally and removed.

As a result, Da Zui (Big Mouth) received criticism within Chrysanthemum Auto. Although he was removed from his post, it can be considered a test for Da Zui both internally and externally, to gauge the market's and the company's acceptance of Chrysanthemum Auto.

Tan Jincheng shook his head: "They themselves are hesitant in the field of car manufacturing, so cooperating with them is destined to have a bad outcome."

Big Mouth assigned a brand to Seres and other partner automakers, putting them under an alliance. It seemed perfect, but it was actually pretty useless.

Essentially, whether it's Changan, BAIC, GAC, or Chery, which they later partnered with, these brands are still in a competitive relationship, and the formation of the alliance will not change this competitive and antagonistic relationship.

Take Chery and Changan as examples. Many of their models are direct competitors. Given this competitive situation, how could automakers possibly allocate all their resources to brands within the alliance?

Another very important reason is that the competition among brands within the alliance is also very fierce. If you sell range-extended electric vehicles, I will sell range-extended electric vehicles too. If you sell large SUVs, I will sell large SUVs too. Even the appearance of the vehicles is extremely similar, which makes it difficult for consumers to choose.

The establishment of Seres is an exception. Compared to Seres, other brands of cars, although they all come from prestigious families, look more like "generic brands".

Because of Tan Jincheng's perverse sense of humor, the Wenjie series has already been registered by Li Bing. Li Bing's main product is the Wenjie M series, which focuses on battery swapping. After Da Zui took office and made adjustments to the car manufacturing business, this brand can no longer be used.

The Smart Mobility Alliance is still the same alliance, but the brand has changed to the "Hong" series. The Seres Smart Choice series is not selling well, and their next new car will be launched under the Hongtu brand.

The Hongtu X series is an SUV, the Hongchi S series is a sedan, and the Hongyan M series is an MPV. The first of these three brands to be launched is Hongtu, and the Hongtu X5 under the Seres brand will be launched next year.

Apart from this difference, SAIC, which had cooperated with Chrysanthemum in its previous life, did not establish a new brand with Chrysanthemum in this life. Instead, it chose to cooperate with Weilai. Starting with the financing of Horizon, SAIC has established a close cooperative relationship with Weilai.

In terms of intelligent driving solutions, Weilai is not as domineering as Chrysanthemum. It can provide packaged solutions or customization. Alternatively, you can purchase only intelligent cockpit and other components. In short, it is up to the car company to choose according to its own needs.

Li Bing's Wenjie chose Jinshidai's battery safety solution, while SAIC's Zhiji series chose Weilai's supply chain standards. For intelligent assistance systems and vehicle systems, Weilai provided customized solutions.

In SAIC's promotional materials, there will be no mention of Weilai, but rather a focus on their own Zhiji brand. In April of this year, SAIC's high-end pure electric vehicle, the Zhiji L7, officially debuted at the Shanghai Auto Show. In terms of technology endorsement, it is backed by international companies such as Weilai, NVIDIA, and Ali.

This was also something Tan Jincheng fought for. SAIC's annual export volume has consistently ranked first in the country, and many of their brands are originally European and American brands, giving them a natural advantage. Tan Jincheng used a globalization strategy to persuade SAIC to reach a cooperation agreement.

In fact, cooperating with chrysanthemums is indeed very convenient for most car companies, but if they want to sell cars overseas, it will be more troublesome, as everyone knows.

When producing European and American car models, we try to avoid having chrysanthemums appear on the supplier list to avoid causing unnecessary trouble.

Tan Jincheng's remarks in the live broadcast room indeed caused a lot of heated discussion. Those in the know naturally just laughed it off. How could companies like Weilai and BYD possibly use Huawei's HI mode? Can you imagine Tesla cars using Huawei's Autopilot?

Chrysanthemum will only be one of the parts suppliers for these car companies, and it is impossible for them to have complete control. He just laughed off the fans' questions. However, the fans who did not understand could not accept Tan Jincheng's remarks.

"Alright, the scolding that Brother Bing got back then is now coming to me."

During a live stream last month, Li Bing directly denied the possibility of collaborating with Chrysanthemum on the HI mode. Like Weilai and BYD, Li Bing and Leapmotor, both new forces, have the idea of ​​creating a full-stack model.

Even Nezha didn't actually collaborate with Chrysanthemum on the HI mode. They merely used Chrysanthemum's name to promote their intelligent solutions. As for why they didn't collaborate with Wei Lai...

On the one hand, Zhang Yongyou wanted to get rid of Wei Lai's influence. He couldn't live in Wei Lai's shadow forever. Since taking office, he has brought Nezha from a marginal brand to a near-first-tier emerging brand, which is proof of his ability.

However, if they continue to maintain a close partnership with Weilai, the results will be greatly diminished. Another reason is that Weilai currently wields significant influence in the new energy vehicle sector by investing in three new energy vehicle brands: Wenjie, Xiaopeng, and Leapmotor.

In a sense, having a monopoly isn't necessarily a good thing. The cooperation with Chrysanthemum and Ningde was a decision made by Nezha's top management. In addition to these, there are also reasons related to the capital behind Nezha.

Zhou Hongyi and Tan Jincheng didn't have much of a relationship. Although Tan Jincheng had a bad reputation, he was an extremely arrogant person. Since the two didn't have much of a relationship, Tan Jincheng wasn't interested in the rather demanding cooperation terms proposed by Wei Lai.

Wei Lai's terms for Nezha were simple: the supply of parts, intelligent driving, and vehicle system solutions could all be provided in the same way as SAIC, but the only requirement was a short payment period.

Simply put, the supplier agreed to supply goods, but payment had to be made on time. If payment was not received on time, the supplier would be immediately cut off, which made Zhang Yong lose face.

Others may have forgotten, but Zhang Yong knows very well that this tactic was used on WM Motor before and on LeEco before that. LeEco is now defunct, and WM Motor is also close to being defunct.

Clearly, the boss still doesn't have a high opinion of Nezha, which he joined. Even though sales and financing have been very good this year, as long as the boss doesn't have a high opinion of it, Weilai's supply chain will maintain this attitude.

It's difficult for any supply chain company to avoid bad debts; many companies may not be able to collect a significant amount of money. However, large and well-established companies generally don't care too much about small amounts, and if the other party has a good reputation, they might even offer some assistance. In this respect, many suppliers and OEMs can be praised for their generosity in paying their suppliers promptly, and many companies are willing to cooperate with their subsidiaries.

However, if Tan Jincheng deems a company unsuitable, he will demand extremely stringent conditions from the supply chain. Even if they cease business operations, he will not lower his standards. Take India, for example; in recent years, domestic mobile phone manufacturers have performed exceptionally well in their overseas expansion.

India is a very large market, and companies like Xiaomi and OPPO have captured a significant market share there. Meizu's export business is also doing quite well, but Tan Jincheng does not allow them to develop the Indian market.

Just kidding, Meizu isn't a publicly listed company, and the market demand isn't that high, so there's no need to boost its stock price. Why would they go to India to try and get involved?

The standards that Weilai uses with other companies in the supply chain are actually the same as Tan Jincheng's standards. It is precisely these standards that ultimately led to Weilai not having the opportunity to cooperate with Nezha. In 2021, there were new car brands such as Xiaomi and Chrysanthemum joining the team.

Similarly, many brands are facing bankruptcy and operational difficulties. Under Tan Jincheng's standards, Wei Lai will not show any leniency to these struggling companies. Once a debt becomes overdue, the company will not hesitate to cut off the supply.

Tan Jincheng's philosophy is that stopping losses is better than endless misfortune. Look at the belt suppliers; if they could stop losses in time, they could at least reduce a lot of losses.

After responding to comments about collaborating with Chrysanthemum during a live stream, Tan Jincheng was criticized by many Chrysanthemum fans. However, it was this live stream that made Tan Jincheng and Wei Lai realize that marketing methods are changing at an increasingly rapid pace.

As a result, Weilai made a major adjustment to its previous marketing strategy, with the biggest change being that the marketing budget for next year will be increased from 4.9% this year to 6%.

In just six months, Li Xiang had a significant impact on Wei Lai. He was known for his "stinginess" at Autohome, and the same was true at Lotus. When he took over as CEO of Lotus, his first action was to cancel non-essential benefits such as free coffee and holiday gifts at headquarters.

This drew complaints from employees. However, Li Xiang's stinginess was not true stinginess. His stinginess was focused on non-core costs and controlling the cost of trial and error. He did not reduce the money spent on R&D and other necessary areas.

After arriving at Weilai, Li Xiang made significant changes to Weilai's cost control. He decisively cut some non-essential innovation and R&D projects, emphasizing that the company should not innovate for the sake of innovation.

Regarding employee perks, Li Xiang originally intended to cut them out completely, just like he did at Lotus. However, at Tan Jincheng's request, he didn't do that; he simply reduced them a bit and also imposed restrictions on the purchase of snacks and other items.

Weilai has always been known for its good benefits, and Li Xiang's stinginess in this regard is somewhat inconsistent with the company culture, but it is still relatively beneficial for the company's cost control.

Without compromising quality, Li Xiang eliminated a large number of redundant processes, saving Wei Lai a significant amount of money. This is something Tan Jincheng lacks. Neither his personality nor his status as the founder would allow Tan Jincheng to do this unless the company is facing difficulties.

But Li Xiang is different. He doesn't mind being criticized by his employees for being stingy. Reducing the company's operating costs is what he, as CEO, should do.

Li Xiang's style has both advantages and disadvantages. In the fiercely competitive new energy vehicle market, Li Xiang's cost-cutting approach can increase the company's profits and cash flow, while also making the financial statements look better and increasing its appeal to the capital market.

His pragmatic style is more down-to-earth, but there are also points of contention. The pressure of being his employee is definitely greater than that of Tan Jincheng. He is more strict about efficiency than Tan Jincheng, which can easily lead to employees complaining about the intense competition.

In addition, excessive cost-cutting may also affect long-term innovation, but this is not expected to happen for the time being, as Tan Jincheng added that the Weilai Research Institute also has someone like Hu Zhengnan in charge.

Under Li Xiang's control, the biggest change in the major marketing adjustments to Weilai was the significant update to the Weilai APP. Upon entering from the homepage, the six major brands—Weilai, Xingtu, Yuechi, Tank, Yangzi, and Zhidou—appeared together on the main interface.

Users do not need to register and can switch to the interfaces of various brands according to their own interests to learn about the models. Each brand's sub-interface integrates functions such as test drive appointment, community interaction, and points benefits.

Operating as a community was the original form of the Weilai APP. Now, by integrating its brands, Weilai connects all brands in the form of a single APP, which also allows users to better understand Weilai.

OTA upgrades continue to provide users with solutions. For example, the earliest ES6 model version, although the hardware is not keeping up with the current software updates and there are some lags, will still provide users with solutions.

By using hardware and software OTA updates, users can experience the latest intelligent assisted driving features without changing their vehicles.

The update to the Weilai APP clearly stated these contents, which stunned new users.

"Holy crap, the earliest ES6 was delivered in 2013, right? That's almost nine years ago, and they're still offering OTA updates after nine years?"

"Haha, are you new here? Actually, we've been updating all along, but our Boss Tan didn't promote it much before. This time, he probably got a lot of flak from Chrysanthemum fans, so he's finally promoting it."

The lifespan of pure electric vehicles varies depending on battery characteristics, usage habits, maintenance, and other factors. Generally, the lifespan is between 7 and 15 years. For non-commercial vehicles, it is only recommended to scrap them when the mileage exceeds 60 kilometers, but there is no mandatory scrapping system.

The owner of the oldest pure electric vehicle in Weilai has actually been in the car for nearly ten years, but the vehicle system and other aspects have been continuously updated, and the same service attitude as that of a new user has been provided to the user.

The same applies to Yuechi cars. This alone has brought Yuechi a high level of user loyalty and earned high praise from users.

Normally, Wei Lai would emphasize his services and mention them in advertisements, but in formal occasions, Tan Jincheng rarely used users as a topic, which was somewhat suspected of moral blackmail.

In Tan Jincheng's view, these are just things a normal company should do. It's just that when everyone is acting abnormally, your normalcy seems a bit out of place. For example, Daqiangzi's social security contributions are just something a normal company should do.

Unfortunately, few companies acted normally, giving Daqiangzi a lot of marketing opportunities.

Realizing the impact of cross-industry technology on traditional car companies' marketing methods, Tan Jincheng had no choice but to enhance the community marketing of Weilai, making Weilai's users more united and ensuring the brand's competitiveness.

Before Xiaomi officially entered the market and before Huawei gained momentum, Weilai took the lead in building its own user base. To be honest, Weilai's user base overlapped to some extent with Xiaomi and Huawei.

Tan Jincheng's remarks in the live broadcast room offended some of these uninformed overlapping groups. These people may not necessarily buy the high-end models under the Weilai brand, but there is still a lot of room for them to compete with models like Exeed, which have a sense of technology and fashion and are not expensive.

In addition, a UGC incentive mechanism has been added to the community. Points earned by users for posting their car usage experiences can be exchanged for charging vouchers, maintenance discounts, and more. An online co-creation section has also been launched.

Users vote to choose the color scheme and features of the new car, and the company uses a user demand ranking to meet user needs. This is equivalent to letting users participate in the design of the new car, which is full of novelty.

In addition, Weilai has added a sense of ritual to OTA upgrades. Each major OTA upgrade is accompanied by a dedicated push animation and a live broadcast explaining the update. The latest major OTA upgrade for "Between the Sky" is already in the preview.

"See? President Tan just doesn't like to talk big. Anyway, his company already has Li Xiang who is good at talking big. When it comes to marketing, our President Tan is just as good at talking big."

The comprehensive upgrade of the Weilai APP has spread at an extremely fast speed amidst the impact of the private domain traffic of nearly 10 million users. Since its launch, the Weilai APP has always been one of its highlights, with a simple and clear APP interface that is better than many mainstream APPs.

The innovative car buying method has also impressed users. Now that Weilai has brought all its brands together under one APP, it has increased brand cohesion. The key point is that although the APP has added many functions, the interface is still clean and not bloated at all, which has been well received.

"There's another hidden benefit to Mr. Tan's approach: it can boost sales of other models by leveraging the popularity of a blockbuster car."

Imagine that the owner of the Weilai ES8 has a new girlfriend who needs a car for commuting. Wouldn't the Zhidou Rainbow on the same app be the first recommendation?
"Haha, there's another hidden perk we can promote, which is something like a dating website."

Zhidou Rainbow has a significant number of female car owners, and the proportion of female car owners in the Exeed S01 is also around 40%. Through the community, it provides a platform for many male and female car owners to communicate with each other.

Whether it's morally right or wrong is another matter, but it's very useful for increasing community activity. Anyway, these kinds of things happen quite often in car owner groups, and even just arguing to pass the time is not bad.

In addition to the major adjustments and updates to the Weilai APP, Yuechi Auto's dealer system also underwent significant changes during the peak sales season of September and October, resulting in a surge in traffic for Weilai, which already boasts two super-popular models, in the car market.

The competitors are also having a headache over the things that Tan Jincheng has done. Tan Jincheng has just kept a low profile in recent years. Back when he first entered the industry, he dared to compete with joint venture brands like Toyota. During the Double Eleven event at Orange Products, he dared to go head-to-head with Ali. Did they really think he was easy to bully?
If you're trying to ride his coattails, you should consider whether you can handle the attention he's generating.

"That big mouth! Their car sales are so-so, it won't have much of an impact. We're the ones who are suffering."

(End of this chapter)