How to create a brand at zero cost

Is a brand the product of a successful business? Does creating a brand require high costs? The author starts with the positioning theory and provides a method to create a brand at zero cost. Three real brand cases and three different winning strategies. This article recommended today will take you closer to "correct positioning".

Many people have a misunderstanding that creating a brand requires a lot of money, so branding is something that can only be done after a company is successful.

However, this is not the case. It is not that a company can only create a brand after it is successful, but that a company can only become successful if it has a brand.

Thinking that a brand can only be built if a company is successful is like thinking that hard work can make you rich. Both are cognitive biases.

The real way to get rich is to occupy a key node. The ancients said: Wealth lies in numerology, not in hard work; profit lies in the situation, not in hard work.

A true brand also occupies a key node, but it occupies it in cognition. And cognitive resources are public.

So in essence, creating a brand is to occupy a public mental resource, and its cost is 0.

1. Strategic repositioning, focusing on core groups

When we were consulting for a dance school in Boston (Bailemos Dance Platform), the founder Pan Hongquan said that students prefer white teachers because they feel they are more professional, and Chinese students also think that their dancing talent is not as good as that of white people. However, all the teachers here are Chinese.

Our suggestion is to first change the perspective and turn the disadvantages of Chinese teachers into advantages: who says that only white people can dance professionally? Chinese can also be professional enough. At the same time, we should export the same confident values ​​of ethnic minorities and focus on dance training for the Chinese population.

After gaining a foothold in the Chinese population, the target population will be expanded to include Asians, Latinos and other ethnic minorities, and finally the minority in the white population will also be its target population. The minority will eventually become the majority, which is the idea of ​​expanding the category.

If it is limited to the Chinese population, the category share will naturally be limited. We can also understand it as developing from a flanking war to an offensive war, continuously injecting brand potential.

Of course, the flanking war must start in a narrow enough area, and there must be a position narrow enough to defend. We suggest that Bailemos focus on Latin dance training for Chinese teenagers aged 5-14, first win the competition in the focused market, and then gradually expand.

Bailemos founder Pan Hongquan agrees with our suggestion. She graduated from Salem State University in Massachusetts and received a performing arts scholarship from New England while in school.

From 2016 to 2018, she was a member of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Ballroom Dance Team, Salem State University Dance Theatre, and Salem State Repertory Theatre.

She has played the leading female role in the Broadway dance drama "Cell Block Tango", the original dance dramas "Yi Nationality", "Am I The Only One" and "Need a person to accompany".

Her strength is enough to support her early positioning. Her own experience also proves that Chinese people have the same dancing talent, which can give Chinese students enough confidence.

In fact, this was also Martin Luther King’s strategy: at first he spoke for the human rights of black people and fought for the rights that black people deserved, and later he fought for the rights that the lower-class white people deserved, and was no longer limited by his origin. From the perspective of brand positioning, this is also a strategy to expand the category.

Bailemos' values ​​were recognized by the mayor of Boston, who invited Pan Hongquan and her team to participate in community activities.

Boston Market is also of Chinese descent. She believes that Bailemos’ values ​​are consistent with the tradition of mutual support among Chinese people who first arrived in North America more than 100 years ago.

And because of this opportunity, Bailemos cooperated with the North American Chinese Federation, and the latter became her partner.

The key to this case is "repositioning." Positioning theory holds that behind every powerful thing there is a structural weakness that cannot be overcome.

For example, the United States is the world's number one country, but it rose as a hegemon, and its inherent weakness is that it cannot achieve a peaceful rise. This has become the national strategy of the Eastern powers.

Since every powerful thing has weaknesses, seemingly weak things also have strong parts.

For example, Bailemos was founded by a Chinese-American founder. Many customers believe that Chinese people have no talent for dancing and that Chinese coaches are not as professional as white coaches. These are weaknesses. However, this weakness can be turned into an advantage.

2. Explore cultural traditions and create unique advantages

The second case is a hot spring brand in Linyi, Shandong, whose competitors are hot springs in Qingdao, Yantai and Weihai.

The other side is a coastal city with better infrastructure. Customers in central Shandong like to go to the beach, and even many local customers in Linyi prefer Qingdao's hot springs.

3. Focus on core items and penetrate core categories

This brand is a typical tea chain brand in Xiamen. Like all tea chain brands, it tries to win customers with various creative ideas.

There are hundreds of product models in the warehouse, the prices on the shelves are endless, and the product categories are fully covered. As long as you can name a famous tea, they have it.

Its expectation for brand positioning is to attract everyone's attention with a new idea. But my suggestion to it is to cut off all product models and focus on making a small box package.

At first, the boss did not understand the strategy of "focusing on a small box and standing in opposition to the small can tea". He thought that he had tried this small box before and the effect was not good. He expected me to give him a new idea and add a new item to the hundreds of items.

This is obviously not common sense. If you can't do well with hundreds of products, how can you do well by focusing on one brand?

After a long period of anxiety, he understood "focusing on a small box", but he still didn't understand "standing on the opposite side of Xiaoguan Tea". This tug-of-war lasted for a long time, until Xiaoguan Tea launched a new brand 2000m Plateau Black Tea, and he finally accepted it.

Because the core of the strategy I gave is "New-style Chinese tea, national gift tea", the strategy of 2000-meter plateau black tea is "New-style Chinese tea, good Chinese black tea".

But the best dissemination window was also missed.

In May 2020, I was both sad and happy when I saw the branding plan of Xiaoguan Tea's new brand - 2000m Plateau Black Tea. I was glad that Xiaoguan Tea finally started its own attack and filled in the missing link, and I was glad that our plan coincided with Xiaoguan Tea's.

Sadly, my proposal was submitted to Party A more than a month and a half ago, but was not adopted. Now it has been taken over by 2000-meter plateau black tea, which is a pity.

Du Guoying, the founder of Xiaoguan Tea, recommended "Positioning" at Chaos University. Judging from the brand operation of 2000-meter Plateau Black Tea, he must also be familiar with "Business War".

The book "Business War" introduces four models of war: defensive warfare, offensive warfare, flanking warfare, and guerrilla warfare. For leading brands, the most effective defensive warfare is self-attack.

Where does self-attack begin? It starts from one’s inherent weaknesses. Opportunities for new brands usually come from the weaknesses of leading brands, which is what positioning theory has always emphasized.

For example, the development opportunities of traditional Chinese medicine should start from the weaknesses of Western medicine: Western medicine only treats the symptoms but not the root cause, has strong side effects, and focuses on parts rather than the whole. The characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine are that it has few side effects and focuses on the whole system.

When we were consulting for a tea brand, we had the same idea: starting from the shortcomings of Xiaoguan Tea and attacking its inherent weaknesses.

Xiaoguan Tea is expensive, ours is cheap; Xiaoguan Tea is over-packaged, ours is simple; Xiaoguan Tea uses the word "Master" which makes it old-school, ours is modern; Xiaoguan Tea has many categories, we focus on one.

Now, Xiaoguan Tea’s new brand - 2000m Plateau Black Tea - has started its self-attack along this line of thought, and every move is aimed at its own weaknesses.

The best way to defend is to attack yourself. Mr. Du is familiar with Business Warfare and puts his knowledge into practice, which is admirable.

First, the new style attacks the “oldness” of Xiao Guan Tea – since it is a master, it cannot be too young, otherwise it will look old. Secondly, the price and packaging, which we will analyze later.

The slogan of 2000-meter plateau black tea is: New Chinese tea, the nation's best black tea. Our slogan is: New Chinese tea, the nation's gift tea.

——"The Defense of Xiaoguan Tea: 2000-meter Plateau Black Tea"

Fortunately, the strategy of focusing on a small box was implemented. The current result is that there are more than 1,000 stores nationwide, which is quite good among mid-level tea chain brands.

In conclusion

Creating a brand is not only free of cost, it can even help you save money. For example, in the case of a tea brand, they originally had more than 100 items, but after focusing on a small box, they saved a lot of material costs.

Not only does it save costs within the organization, but it also creates results outside the organization. In other words, this strategy is to create a brand in a cost-saving way!

For the Boston Dance Training brand, it originally covered students aged 8 to 80, and taught white, black and yellow people. After repositioning, it focused on yellow students aged 8 to 14, saving a lot of marketing and communication costs.

And through this strategic cooperation with the Chinese Federation of North America, we have opened up the entire North American market. Similarly, there is no increase in any cost, and even reduced operating costs.

Correct positioning is the secret to creating a brand at zero cost.

Author: Zhang Zhiyu

Source: WeChat public account "Zhang Zhiyu (ID: zhiyu2307)"