Mr. Ai Chis, The Father Of Positioning, Talks About Lining'S "Face Changing" Incident In Shoe Enterprises.

Some time ago, Lining announced in a high-profile manner.

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Ai Chis: when you build a brand, you need to think about "decades" as a starting point, not just a few years.

It takes a long time to build a strong brand in the minds of customers. For example, BMW uses the same brand slogan (driving machine) for 35 years.

This does not mean that a brand must always abide by the same strategy, especially when the strategy does not work.

I think Lining's original LOGO and slogan did not help this brand.

Lining's original LOGO will no doubt remind customers of Nike's "hook"; the original slogan (Everything is possible) is just another way of saying "Adidas is impossible" of Adidas.

So Lining has enough reason to change its LOGO and brand slogan.

Unfortunately, we believe that the "change of face" actually does not help the brand very much.

The new slogan (Make the Change) is meaningless.

Why should customers change? This is the question that Lining brand should answer.

The new LOGO is better than the original one, but it is still unable to effectively convey the information to customers who do not speak Chinese.

Excellent slogans and LOGO usually emerge after a strong strategy is developed by the brand.

So what is Lining's brand strategy? CEO Zhang Zhiyong said Lining's strategy is to create brands in the country and expand the international market through product innovation and brand marketing.

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Is this strategy right? We don't think so.

The longer the preparation stage before Lining's internationalization, the weaker the international positioning of his brand.

The 2008 Beijing Olympics is a great opportunity to build global brands, when athletes from all over the world are watching the Games in China.

However, the positive cognition created by the Beijing Olympic Games is gradually fading away.

What do you think of Li Ningxin's brand positioning and brand characteristics? What influences will they have on Lining's comprehensive internationalization?

Ai Chis: my instinct is that this change is not enough to trigger a major change in customer awareness or brand market share.

There was also a price problem, and Lining was in the middle of the mud.

Its product price is 20% to 30% lower than that of Nike, Adidas and other international brands, but 35% to 45% higher than that of local brands.

This is not a good position.

The two most powerful driving force in marketing is "quality" and "price".

Most customers either want to buy the best quality, or want to get the cheapest.

The price of Lining is much lower than that of Nike or Adidas, and it is very difficult to persuade the customer Lining to be "the best".

So should Lining raise the selling price? That's also hard. Most customers know that Lining has always been cheaper than international brands.

At least in the short term, raising prices will not work.

What will work? Make Lining a global brand.

If Chinese customers believe that Lining and Nike and Adidas are the same in the global market, it will be possible to raise prices in China.

Therefore, the proposal we put forward for Lining is exactly the opposite of Mr. Zhang Zhiyong's proposal: first we should create a strong global brand and then raise the brand in the Chinese market.

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How does Lining win young consumers?

Ai Chis: China is a huge market and has the potential to become the world's largest market in every category of products or services.

We firmly believe that if a company wants to dominate a category rather than a niche market, it needs a multi brand strategy.

For Lining, a better strategy is to have two brands: a high-end, a low end.

High end brands can compete with Nike and Adidas on the global market, and low-end brands can compete with other local brands in the Chinese market.

How does Lining face the "competition between the enemy and the enemy"?

Ai Chis: two brands will greatly simplify the process.

High end brands compete exclusively with Nike and Adidas, while low-end brands can compete specifically with Chinese brands.

This also allows Lining to avoid falling into the muddy middle ground.

But what brand should Lining use? Should the brand of Lining become a high-end brand or a low-end brand?

We chose Lining as a low-end brand.

Lining has been a well-known brand in the Chinese market, but he has little knowledge in the global market.

In addition, it is simpler to shift a brand from high to low price than reverse.

Of course, Lining's brand name, brand strategy and LOGO will also have problems in the global market.

Let's start with Lining's brand name.

It is similar to the common English word "lining", which means the lining of a garment or a dress, or an inner membrane of an oil tank.

"Lining" is not a very prestigious word.

Lining's brand strategy.

"Make the Change" is of great significance in Lining's high - known domestic market, but in the global market, it makes no sense to make customers change and use a brand that has never been heard.

Let's take a look at Lining's LOGO.

Maybe Chinese customers can see that the LOGO is a variant of the Chinese phonetic alphabet "LN", but other customers in the global market can not, and those strange shapes are meaningless in the global market.

For a Chinese brand, a better LOGO is probably recognized as a symbol of China, for example, dragon.

Because of these problems, perhaps Lining should have a new high-end brand name, a new high-end brand strategy and a new high-end brand LOGO.

After that is the most difficult part: how to build a high-end sports shoes brand? Apart from the positioning and category strategy we often talk about, we need the support of famous athletes.

Let's see what Michael Jordan has brought to Nike.

Today, Nike occupies 35% of the total sports shoes Market in the United States, but it has a 93% share in the basketball shoe market.

Nike's Air Jordan brand is still the most popular brand after Michael Jordan retired 7 years ago, accounting for 73% of the market.

To build a global brand, Lining needs a "Michael Jordan".

A sports superstar supports a brand. The perfect thing is to invite a Chinese athlete superstar.

Unfortunately, Liu Xiang quit the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games because of the pain. He was a perfect candidate.