2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 441 The Domineering CEO Tan

Which category?

Tan Jincheng didn't know much about Huang Zheng's experiences before Pinduoduo became famous, but looking at the timing of Pinduoduo's emergence, he knew that he definitely wouldn't have been idle after returning to China in the first few years.

Like Huang Xin, he must have gone through all sorts of entrepreneurial ventures before he started his food delivery business. Huang Xin, who is currently working on Renren.com, is doing so because his family is rich and he has the money to do whatever he wants.

Although Huang Zheng's family wasn't wealthy, he was lucky. Google stock gave him financial freedom, and he had powerful backers, so he could easily do whatever he wanted.

I just didn't expect him to want to do vertical e-commerce, but it's not surprising that he wants to do e-commerce at this time.

Capital has not yet reached the point of monopolization. Social networking sites and e-commerce are still viable options. Even if you can't continue operating after achieving some success, you can sell the website.

"I have some connections with BBK Electronics, and I'm planning to create an e-commerce website for 3C products to sell BBK products," Huang Zheng said without hiding anything.

Consumers may not know what Orange Products sell, but those in the industry already know that, like Vancl, it mainly sells clothing.

Before their official launch, the two companies were considered direct competitors. However, Tan Jincheng himself knew that they sold different categories of products and were not really competitors.

It's quite surprising that Huang Zheng wants to create this 3C vertical website. This is directly competing with Jingdong. How can he possibly win?

Jingdong's 3C business is already very mature and doing very well. Even Taobao can't compete with it. Moreover, consumers of 3C products value reputation more than other consumers.

For example, in Tan Jincheng's previous life, if he were buying 3C products, he would definitely choose Jingdong first, because it was relatively more trustworthy. He could just buy other products on Taobao. That was a customer impression.

If you buy other items like clothes or snacks and it's difficult to return a bad product, you can just complain to the seller and never go there again.

But 3C products, like computer accessories, are things you're prepared to use for a long time, so encountering a poor-quality one is enough to cause a lot of trouble.

"You want to compete with Jing Dong? Can you beat him?"

It's not appropriate to ask such a question when you're not very familiar with someone, but Tan Jincheng couldn't help himself.

For 3C products, quality is paramount. A newly opened website can gradually build its reputation or credibility, but if it's selling BBK products, it raises some suspicion. BBK products may sell well, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're of good quality.

In the last century, electronic products were not abundant, and consumers had limited knowledge of product quality. Through marketing and advertising, coupled with addressing users' pain points, it was indeed possible to sell well.

What about the Little Tyrant learning machine? It's actually just for playing games. Isn't that just exploiting the pain points of parents and children?
But now it's the second half of 2007, and electronic products are about to explode in popularity, so your approach isn't very effective anymore. Otherwise, they wouldn't have abandoned this brand and created a new OV.

The new website sells BBK products; this project doesn't seem very reliable at all.

"There is indeed competition, but the market is growing rapidly, and BBK has a strong brand influence, so it seems like it's worth a try."

For my first startup, the direction was naturally in the internet field, but I didn't really have any good ideas. These days, the main options are social networking and e-commerce. Compared to social networking, e-commerce has a relatively lower barrier to entry.

He plans to leverage his network to do e-commerce and gain experience. As for competing with Jingdong, that's secondary. Huang Zheng doesn't really care about whether he can beat them.

The 3C market is so large, and the offline channels are currently in a state of fierce competition, with manufacturers' profits being squeezed rapidly. In order to increase profits, it is inevitable that they will shift to the Internet channels in the future.

Huang Zheng's acquisition of BBK's online direct sales rights is essentially a factory + internet model. Even if they can't compete with Jingdong, the website's survivability should still be quite good.

However, just from Tan Jincheng's two simple sentences, he could feel the domineering aura of this businessman. Could this be the secret to his success?
If you're making 3C products, your goal is to directly challenge the current industry leader in 3C products and treat that person as a direct competitor. This kind of domineering attitude is truly admirable.

We're not talking about whether we can succeed or not, but let's just set a goal for now, right?
Learned learned learned.

Huang Zheng approached Tan Jincheng not only out of curiosity, but also because he wanted to learn about Tan Jincheng's marketing model.

In his view, compared to those old-fashioned marketing models, Tan Jincheng's marketing methods are closer to modern shopping malls. After returning to China, Huang Zheng caught up with Orange Technology's spectacular second round of financing.

It also coincided with the overwhelming impact of the 6000 million yuan ultimate weapon on the entire electric vehicle industry, and recently Tan Jincheng has been deliberately marketing the personal image of Gu Qingqing, the CEO of Orange Technology.

Through these events, Huang Zheng began to study Tan Jincheng's rise to power. During his time at Jinpeng Trading, Tan maintained a low profile, and there were few news reports about him, truly adhering to the principle of starting out quietly. However, after founding Flashtech Technology and establishing his own brand, his style changed drastically.

However, it is also quite reasonable. Building a brand is different from doing business through foreign trade channels. A brand needs influence, especially a brand that is completely new and faces consumers.

The first new spokesperson in the electric vehicle industry. Hiring a spokesperson is not a new thing, but this new spokesperson is not so sudden. This is a kind of inertia of thinking. Perhaps only a newcomer like him has the courage to do this.

In addition, his choice of three spokespeople was very successful in terms of timing and fit with his brand, and he was also very bold.

They dared to bet on Chun Ge during the Super Girl top ten competition, and Chun Ge did indeed give Shan Chi a great return. After winning the championship, and even now, Chun Ge is still the most popular Super Girl.

This spokesperson is arguably the best deal FlashCheer has ever made; their first endorsement fee was reportedly very low.

Moreover, in terms of brand positioning, the three spokespeople have very precise brand positioning. Chun Ge has extremely high popularity, but her fan base is concentrated among young people, especially those with lower incomes.

With a lower income, it is more suitable for the low-end brands under Flash, which offer excellent value for money and a suitable style. This is also the case for the second spokesperson, Liu Yifei.

The Fei Yi series features a variety of colors and stylish designs, and is primarily targeted at urban women. It is very popular among women, and women make up a large proportion of the buyers.

For a product targeted at women, Liu Yifei being the spokesperson isn't too surprising. Putting aside the men who buy it for their girlfriends, Liu Yifei herself actually has a lot of female fans.

As for Jay Chou, it goes without saying that this is a classic case of a marketing counterattack where the weak triumphs over the strong, which can be included in textbooks. FlashCheer snatched the Olympic sponsorship spot from Chip Japan.

This event marketing campaign alone has made Flashcart a huge profit.

The otherwise ordinary electric vehicle industry has been transformed by Mr. Tan, causing a huge impact on its competitors.

Huang Zheng learned that although Flash's marketing expenses were considerable in the early stages, the proportion of marketing expenditure in the company's revenue was not particularly high. It could be considered as achieving great things with little money.

When weak, it achieves the best results with minimal cost; when powerful, its charisma is awe-inspiring.

Spending 6000 million yuan to flood the market is the most aggressive marketing campaign FlashDrive has ever undertaken.

Unlike others who perceived Tan Jincheng as humble, Huang Zheng, upon first meeting Tan Jincheng, truly felt his domineering presence and immediately asked if he wanted to fight Jing Dong.

Is this something a startup founder should be thinking?
Huang Zheng's idea made Tan Jincheng ponder for a moment. His idea wasn't wrong. Everyone starts their business by focusing on familiar areas or personal connections. He was able to obtain the online agency rights for BBK, so selling BBK products wasn't wrong.

It's like having a factory owner you know very well, and then getting goods from him to open a supermarket offline and make a little money.

"I'm not particularly optimistic about it, but it's something we can do, so we'll just treat it as a trial run."

Based on the principle of building good relationships, Tan Jincheng honestly expressed his thoughts: selling 3C products is really different from selling clothes, and it took Jingdong several years to build up its credibility.

Moreover, Jingdong's 3C business has gained the trust of online shoppers, largely due to its self-built logistics system, which was launched this year. Fast delivery and good service are key factors in Jingdong's success.

If you buy some electronic products on Taobao, you might lose them. Huang Zheng has just started his business, and it's true that he has the support of big shots, but big shots can't just throw money at you like crazy right away.

You're talented, but are you cut out to be an entrepreneur and boss? The big shots at least need to observe you a bit more.
They'll give you a small amount of money to test the waters, so Huang Zheng definitely wouldn't be building his own logistics network in the 3C vertical e-commerce sector, and he probably didn't even have that idea in mind, as can be seen from his later collaborations with Pinduoduo and J&T Express.

Building your own logistics network is not something anyone can do; Jingdong almost went bankrupt because of it.

"Does Mr. Tan not have a good view of this market, or does he not think it's good to compete with Jingdong?"

"Yes, both are possible. However, setting up a website shouldn't be a problem. If Mr. Huang is interested in starting a business in the internet field, and he is convinced of this direction and has the necessary connections, it's worth a try. The investment won't be too large anyway."

For a typical vertical e-commerce company, the investment is indeed not that large.

(End of this chapter)