2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 411 The Olympic Promotion Cycle Begins

I returned to Ningbo on April 26th.

Counting the days, Tan Jincheng spent 21 days in his hometown province, and was on a business trip for almost a month.

April 26th was a significant day for both Flashpoint Technology and Orange Technology. First, the design of the Olympic torch was officially unveiled.

Electric vehicles have been selling well in the past two years, with demand exceeding supply. Any assembly plant that doesn't produce such poor quality vehicles that they fall apart can sell them without worry.

Many assembly plants sell to nearby workers or farmers. Some don't even bother with branding; they either partner with repair shops or open their own stores and still sell well over the course of a year.

However, this approach is definitely not enough to reach the top; both R&D investment and marketing strategies must keep pace.

Flashcar's marketing has never stopped, but apart from its stores and official website displaying the title of the exclusive electric vehicle sponsor of the Olympics, it doesn't use this title much in advertising.

There's no way around it, the spokespeople are just too good, especially Jay Chou, whose fame has been rising year by year. He went from being a non-mainstream singer with unclear pronunciation to being gradually accepted by the public.

A song called "Blue and White Porcelain" has gained many elderly fans.

Using only these three spokespeople for promotion is enough to bring considerable exposure to Flash's products, making the title of Olympic sponsor seem completely unnecessary.

The Olympic sponsorship title, which was acquired at great expense, may seem useless, but that's only because there's still a long time before the opening of the Olympics. The second half of this year will be the promotional period for the Olympics.

At that time, signs announcing the countdown to the Olympics will be hung up everywhere, creating an unprecedented scale of publicity, and the whole country will be in the rhythm of the Olympics.

In fact, Beijing and Shanghai started their promotional campaigns last month, with signs marking the 500-day countdown to the Olympics already up. The brand influence during the Olympic cycle is completely different.

That was the time for Flash to promote its brand image. The official announcement of the torch design marked the beginning of Flash's Olympic cycle image promotion.

The grand spectacle of the 08 Olympics is unforgettable for those who experienced it. It was a display of our national strength to the world and a golden age when national pride reached its peak. Tan Jincheng doesn't really like watching these large-scale events; he finds some of the events incomprehensible and quite boring.

However, in Tan Jincheng's mind, the 08 Olympics was the most influential one, without exception.

By the way, besides being the main sponsor of the Olympics, Flash is also one of the sponsors of the women's volleyball team. The women's volleyball team designated Beicang as one of their home venues in 04, and Flash sponsored many matches held in Beicang in the following two years.

Because of this, Flash has been in contact with the Volleyball Management Center. After two years of friendly cooperation, and with Flash growing in scale and also being an Olympic sponsor, Flash finally secured a sponsorship contract for the women's volleyball team.

To be honest, securing a sponsorship contract for the women's volleyball team is even more difficult than securing a main sponsorship for the Olympics. The popularity and fame of the women's volleyball team in recent years are unimaginable to those born in the 00s who are used to watching short videos.

Ningbo is actually a very boring city. Whether you are a local or a visitor, a first-generation rich or a second-generation rich, everyone is busy making money. People who indulge in extravagance or enjoy entertainment are a minority.

There's a basketball team in the city that has a brilliant record in the CBA. In another city, such a team would be wildly popular, but in Ningbo, it's practically useless, and tickets often don't sell out.

However, the women's volleyball team is completely different. Whenever there is a match, the home games of other teams in Beicang are empty, but the women's volleyball team's match days are always packed.

The fact that a city with no interest in any entertainment events can be so enthusiastic about the women's volleyball team speaks volumes about their popularity and appeal.

However, this also shows that Ningbo's economic development trend is very good. Studies have shown that only when the economic environment is bad will people become addicted to some relatively cheap and widely spread entertainment activities.

Indeed, this seems to be true. Although there are many fans these days, it seems that there are relatively few in coastal cities with a very fast pace of work, and the fanaticism is not as intense as it was a decade or so ago.

At least they won't throw away their milk just to vote for their idol.

Besides the start of the FlashMotion Olympic promotional period, today is an important day for Tencent shareholders, as Tencent will officially release its annual report for the previous year and its first quarter report for this year after the market closes.

After rising for a year and a half, Tencent's stock price began to show signs of weakness after peaking at HK$31.90 on January 26. After more than two months of adjustment, the stock price bottomed out at HK$23.50 on April 19, with a correction of more than 35%.

The adjustment over the past two months is partly due to profit-taking and partly due to waiting for the financial statements.

The most important of these is naturally the financial report for the first quarter of this year.

From Tan Jincheng's perspective as a retail investor, looking at the previous year's annual report is useless; it's all in the past. The previous year's financial report can only prove how well you did last year, and these are all reflected in the stock price.

It's not that there's absolutely no connection. How much you earned last year only reflects how much travel expenses you have this year. The important thing is to look at the first quarter's financial report, which can almost directly reflect the company's market performance this year.

Earning 200 million last year and 100 million this year seems like a great achievement, but the stock market is all about expectations. If you don't meet those expectations, earning 100 million is useless.

When Tan Jincheng arrived home, it was almost closing time. He didn't go to the company; Li Yaohui drove him directly back to the villa. It had been almost a month since they last saw each other, and Tan Jinyue, as always, ran to the door to greet her brother. "Did you miss your brother?"

He picked up Tan Jinyue in his arms. As the weather warmed up, the little girl, who was already wearing spring clothes, was much easier to hold than in winter. Her chubby little face showed her adorable side, and her little eyes were bright and sparkling.

Just one glance was enough for Tan Jincheng to calm the recent irritability caused by work and public opinion.

Sure enough, going home when you're tired is more effective than any other remedy.

"I've been thinking about it. Why did it take you so long to leave this time, brother?"

"My brother is busy with work, but he brought you a gift. Also, Dad will be back in a few days."

Tan Jinyue paused for a moment, seemingly not quite remembering her father. If Old Tan saw this expression, he would probably be heartbroken. How could Tan Jincheng not understand Old Tan's little secret about not going back to Beicang with him?

Whenever Tan Jincheng said he wanted to go back to Yicheng, Old Tan would move back to the petrochemical family quarters, claiming it was closer to his workplace, and he especially liked to take a walk after dinner.

Is he going for a walk?
After putting his things down, Lai Yiu-fai played with Xiao Kam-yuet for a bit and then left. Of all the employees at Flash Company, he was most familiar with Liu Su-man and Tan Kam-cheng's family, and he could usually freely enter and leave the villa area.

Lai Yiu-fai's child is also a daughter, who is 5 years old this year. She has been brought to Ningbo to attend kindergarten and can play with Xiao Kam-yue. When Cheung So-chi has any difficulty going out, Lai Yiu-fai's wife helps her.

Lai Yiu-fai's wife was assigned to work at the headquarters of Flash Motors, in a relatively insignificant position, but with a decent salary. The staff in charge of attendance also knew that her husband was the boss's personal driver.

If she's in a hurry and has to leave, no one bothers her; she has a very relaxed life.

After spending some time at home with Jin Yue and chatting with her mother about some interesting things that happened when she got home, Gu Qingqing also came home early from get off work. Tan Jincheng had encountered a lot of things on his business trip, and Gu Qingqing was not idle at home either.

The development of Orange Shopping's website has entered the final stage and is expected to enter internal testing in October, with an official launch during the winter break. In addition to the website development, Orange Logistics also needs to be updated to serve the future online shopping business.

In addition, they also need to establish warehousing bases at various locations, which adds up to a lot more work than what Tan Jincheng does.

Both physical and internet companies are developing at a rapid pace, striving to solidify their foundations before the 2008 financial crisis.

Tao Qinian's feeling was indeed correct. Tan Jincheng was indeed in a hurry to grab everything he could before the financial crisis, increasing the company's ability to withstand risks and gaining more leverage for future development.

While the family was celebrating, Hong Kong stocks also closed today. Tencent rose 1.18% throughout the day, closing at HK$25.65. After bottoming out on the 19th, the stock has risen for five consecutive trading days, and after more than two months of adjustment, the stock price seems to be showing signs of stabilizing and rebounding.

Later that evening, Tencent officially released its 2006 annual financial report and its first-quarter financial report for 2007.

The first quarter report shows that as of the end of March, the number of active users of its QQ Space had reached 2.28 million, an increase of 25% compared with the previous quarter. The company's revenue from "Internet value-added services" in the first quarter was approximately RMB 3.35 million, a sharp increase of 147% compared with the previous period.

The so-called internet value-added services refer to social games. Judging from Tencent's financial results, which far exceeded market expectations, social games are currently extremely popular.

With a single-quarter revenue of 3.35 million yuan, averaging over 1 million yuan per month, the growth rate is truly astonishing. This has given those who follow financial reports a completely new understanding of Happy Farm, a product under Orange Technology.

Tencent explicitly stated in its financial report that, since the revenue of social games is generally split 50/50 between the game developer and the platform provider, Happy Farm will receive substantial profits from Tencent's revenue.

Tencent's social games include more than just Happy Farm, but Happy Farm definitely accounts for the largest share of its portfolio. Moreover, in addition to the QQ Space platform, Happy Farm also has tens of millions of users on its own platform.

In addition, there are other second- and third-tier websites connected to the school's intranet, Dianping, etc., which add up to a considerable number.

Friday, September 4st.

At the opening bell this morning, stimulated by yesterday's financial report which far exceeded market expectations, Tencent's stock price opened higher and continued to rise, surging 7.21% throughout the day to close at HK$27.50. During the session, it even touched a high of HK$28, recovering the losses of the past month or so in one day.

"It's a pity that Orange Technology isn't listed, otherwise it would definitely have surged today."

Over the phone, Shen Nanpeng expressed his regret, saying that he knew Tencent's financial report showed good performance, but even as a big investor, he couldn't possibly know the specific figures in advance.

Shen Nanpeng had considered that developing simple social mini-games would be popular in the market and had calculated their profitability, but he never expected them to be so profitable.

Since his misjudgment, Xie Junhong has been paying attention to the internet. When the specific figures for Tencent's financial statements regarding social mini-games were released, he felt ashamed.

(End of this chapter)