How To Deduce The Story Of Luxury Goods?

People are willing to spend tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, to buy a watch, of course, not just to take a look at the time.

Walking into the green garden surrounded by twined trees, there are waterfalls pouring down in front of them. The fragrance and the gems are blended with each other in the senses. In the light and shadow lining of the holographic effect, more than 300 pieces of jewelry worth more than 2 billion yuan are beautiful.

Cartier is the protagonist of the Jewelry Festival in Beijing D-Park square, but luxury luxury to the high-end show is luxury brands can not avoid the marketing attitude.

Besides the use value, brand value is the irreplaceable symbol asset of all luxury brands, which is the biggest difference between them and the parity brand.

A January study by the World Luxury Association showed that the price of luxury goods accounted for only 11% of raw material and processing costs, while brand value added accounted for 55%.

This year, Hurun is among the top ranking of luxury brand value rankings.

Brand value has reached US $20 billion 500 million.

The marketing of luxury brands is no longer just selling goods themselves, but is guiding consumers to identify the brand value of luxury brand technology and ideas, and willing to pay for them.

Therefore, providing emotional satisfaction and experience for consumers seems to be the starting point of luxury brand marketing.

In fact, in marketing and brand expertise Mark Ritson's experience, "luxury marketing is actually a more difficult matter than ordinary brand, because he needs to persuade people to buy a lot of unnecessary commodities at a very high price."

If consumers can not afford to buy Hermes Birkin handbags, they can be satisfied with having a Hermes scarf, which is a perfect marketing result.

But over a hundred years of history, luxury brands, from the European and American markets with mature consumer psychology, have entered the younger China with luxury consumption. Faced with totally different consumer groups, the marketing strategy is naturally not just a show to attract attention, it needs to adjust the strategy of different markets, and also needs to persist and change in the evolution of technology.

Art of storytelling

The ultimate goal of all marketing is undoubtedly to increase sales, but the long-term goal of luxury marketing is subconscious brand implants.

Perhaps not all brands need to start from the identity of young brands, just as they build their own luxury goods.

But every time a luxury brand enters a new market, or every time a new product is launched, storytelling is often their opening statement.

Today, if you want to know the time, it will be a very easy thing. Mobile phones or computers can tell us the time now.

But in the latest Digital Luxury group's latest luxury watch industry market survey report this year, China surpassed the US for the first time and became the largest consumer of high-end watches.

And people are willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars or even hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy a watch, of course, not just to look at the time.

Therefore, "if you want to sell a watch today, but there is no story behind it, then it will definitely not be sold", which is also the concept of IWC (International Watch Company) Global CEO Georges Kern.

IWC, which comes from the Rhine River in Switzerland, has six major lines, including Portuguese series (Portugese), Da Vince Da (Da Vinci) and pilot series (Pilot 's), but each new product will also tell a different product story.

This year's latest pilot series TOP GUN Marine Corps mechanical watches are no exception. This product tells the story borrowed from the 1980s movie "strong ambition Ling Yun", the story of becoming a top fighter pilot is quite masculine and tough, and IWC also gives the spirit of "strong ambition" to this traditional design wrist watch and named it.

Compared with the nostalgia of Italian slow tune in the 2011 Portofino watch, the story is quite different.

If you want to build a world's top brand, it may sound enough to tell a wonderful story and make a good product, but this is only a theory.

Georges Kern thinks, "the real difficulty is to tell this story to everyone in a suitable way", so how to execute is the moving place of luxury marketing.

In fact, for the wrist watch, the annual Geneva advanced watch and clock show is undoubtedly the most direct international show.

IWC did not miss this opportunity to tell stories to nearly 1000 guests at the January watch show.

IWC will build the exhibition platform into 1:1's prototype aircraft carrier "IWC12". The internal command Island, pilot dressing room and flight deck are all set up, and the new series of watches of the pilot series are displayed in the free access control tower.

Before entering the IWC exhibition hall, guests will be registered in the ground with white uniforms, and once they enter the exhibition area, the guests will not know themselves into the atmosphere of the story.

At the same time, IWC also held a dinner on the day around the flight.

It introduces the history of the pilot series watches, the mechanical characteristics and appearance design of the TOP GUN Naval Air Force watch, and integrates the watch short animation with the training fragments of the Top Gun Naval Air Force elite flying school.

Celebrities are also indispensable elements in the luxury brand dinner. Besides Jean Reno, Mark Foster and other filmmakers, IWC also invited the actors and directors of "Marc" to tell the guests the scene of the filming at that time.

In fact, in the impression of Liu Peiran, a luxury marketing consultant, "luxury brands always seem to be doing some activities that are not related to the product itself in the marketing process, but there are subconscious brand implants in the consumer".

Although the story style of each IWC product is different, the pursuit of tabulation technology and perfect technology is consistent.

However, every event of luxury brand marketing will have influence only if it has such consistency.

In the introduction of Georges Kern, IWC also relied on the skills of storytelling in Geneva watch and clock show. After the annual clocks exhibition, customers who want to try the products will increase significantly. "Usually, this demand will reach the peak in 6-7 every year".

"Not everyone can own high story jewellery, but at least everyone can own jewelry with story brand."

Li Jingru, general manager of pinyue Consulting Management Co., perhaps is the value of story telling by luxury brands.

In this process, consumers' recognition of brand will naturally germinate, just as people will buy Burberry because of elegance, buy Ritz-Carlton because of nobility, or buy Tiffany just to feel love.

Customer relationship maintenance

Of course, storytelling is just a universal market entry rule, which is effective for attracting new customers.

In the latest data of the World Luxury Association, about 67% of the growth of the mainland's luxury market is coming from new consumers. Therefore, in the Chinese market with the development of new customers, the meaning of "show" will be stronger in the marketing method of luxury brands.

But in the European market where the consumption of luxury goods is just an ordinary way of consumption, sales are almost saturated.

What consumers need is no longer a pleasant story, so the relationship marketing of maintaining top customers becomes a strategy for luxury brands to cope with the mature market.

Almost no advertising in the mass media, and never ask celebrities to endorse, which makes Hermes a heterogeneous brand. But Hermes has always insisted that word of mouth can be passed on in the same social class, and word of mouth marketing is the best marketing strategy for top brands. It has also become a model for maintaining high-end customer relationships.

In the 2011 annual earnings report, Hermes marketing costs account for about 6% of annual sales, which is far below the marketing cost of Chanel and Dior and other similar brands 8%-10%.

Michael Barbarino, director of customer service at Hermes, said: "

The customer service department is the epitome of the whole Hermes group, and all products and service problems can be reflected here.

Customers only need to shop once, they will enter the company's CRM system, and Hermes can provide a one to one solution for customers in the system from all aspects of the sales market to customer service.

Hermes will also use this system to screen out top customers from various kinds of customer information such as occupation, income and purchase experience, and invite appropriate customers to hold private parties to watch fashion shows in Paris, or to participate in the domestic sales of commodities.

This small circle of Sharon and private activities is undoubtedly the most effective way for Hermes to maintain the loyalty of top customers.

However, all the services aimed at the top customers are actually fulfilled by the employees. Hermes, China public relations and communication department, Jessica will regularly go to France for training. The salesmen will also come to Paris regularly to learn the design concept of the next season, while the company will arrange the staff to visit Paris in Hermes.

Not only that, but since Hermes started the "dream project" in 2000, thousands of employees have traveled to countries such as Russia and Greece, and these are undoubtedly aimed at expanding the life experience of employees to better communicate with and serve high-end customers. Therefore, it is not surprising that many Hermes employees maintain stable relations with customers for more than 10 years.

In addition, with the marketing method of "waiting" psychology, Hermes has been taking the initiative in grasping market demand and maintaining high-end customers.

Kelly series and Birkin series are classic models of Hermes handbags.

But if we are lucky, we may see Kelly handbags in Hermes stores, but Birkin handbags never appear in any Hermes store.

If a customer wants to buy, he can only place the order at the store, and select elements such as color, leather material and metal buckle. Under normal circumstances, customers will wait for 2-3 years before they can finally get it.

Of course, this waiting list is not a psychological skill of Hermes's bluff. Birkin handbag is made by hand. Each piece of leather needs to be processed by many complicated steps. From leather material to final product, even maintenance and maintenance will be done by the same craftsman. The whole production process will take nearly 20 hours.

But this kind of "not easy to get" wait helps Hermes cultivate loyal top consumer groups.

Bain&Co.Sales's statistics show that in 2009, the average sales of luxury goods dropped by 8%, but sales in Hermes2009 increased by 4.1%. Kelly and Birkin handbags remained unabated even during that crisis.

In recent years, even LV, Gucci and so on can not borrow the young elements freely, in order to occupy more emerging market share. However, Hermes still insists on standing with top customers and never reducing its status, which makes Hermes's development have obvious introverted temperament.

But in the past 15 years, the sales scale of Hermes has increased by only 3.7 times, but its net profit has increased by 9 times. This year, Hermes plans to open two leather factories in France, and employs 600 employees to ease the stock tightening. The brand loyalty of Hermes customers has already become its intangible assets.

Between change and persistence

For many family luxury brand operators, brand management is a lifetime matter, so they will not easily make changes, but timely adjustment is another rule of survival.

For some financial investors with luxury brands, a shortcut to profit may be to extend the product line, so that the brand can survive in different latitudes.

But a 2010 study by the World Luxury Association points out that over 90% of the world's luxury brands have extended product lines for reasons such as business difficulties and increasing profits, but 90% of them have not been successful, and only 10% have survived.

Armani, which is blurred because of its long product line and its brand value plummet, seems to confirm the old saying: "if you want to destroy a brand, the most effective way is to label it on everything."

Burberry, however, described a similar story as another outcome, a special exception to this rule.

In fact, until 1990s, Burberry only had a few products such as raincoats, umbrellas and neckties. Until 1997, after Rose Marie Bravo took over Burberry CEO, Burberry began to launch various sub positioning cards such as BurberryProrsum, Burberry London, ThomasBurberry and so on. Besides costumes, it extended the product line to handbags, glasses, scarves and perfume.

In the face of the possible brand weakening, Bravo has always considered it an easy problem. Her method is that no matter how the brand extension and the product line extend, they all need to be separated from each other in the position of the buyer. The product image extension must be consistent with the brand positioning, and the marketing channels for each product line need to match their respective positioning.

Burberry product lines are very personalized in terms of design and positioning. BurberryProrsum is a high-end customized brand for high-end wealthy people, while Burberry London, which is suitable for all age groups, is very British. ThomasBurberry continues the traditional style of outdoor sports, targeting young people aged 18-24 years in the European market.

In addition, Burberry authorized the San Yang chamber of Commerce in Japan to produce Burberry Blue Label series for young women and Burberry Black Label series for young men's market, but both are limited to the Japanese market.

Although the style of these product lines is quite different, the refined and restrained high-end temperament of the windbreaker culture has never changed.

The growth rate of Burberry since 2009 is 20% from its persistence in brand positioning and its innovation in marketing methods.

The habit of avoiding mass media luxury marketing has rarely touched on the network with "civilian" signs. But in 2009, when the same brands were still looking at the Internet, Burberry has become the pioneer of digital marketing in the luxury sector.

Customers can publish new information and pictures on the Burberry page of Facebook. In the list of Facebook in February this year, Burberry received more than 130 thousand "Zan" clicks, and once exceeded Dior.

Burberry's user content production website "Art of Trench" will invite customers who own Burberry brand clothes to upload their photos, and ask professional photographers to upload photos and communicate with consumers about their wearing experience.

For Burberry, fashion show is an important project in their marketing plan. Since the first live webcast of BurberryProrsum in Milan and London in 2009, Burberry has broadcast 11 fashion shows on the global line, and users can watch live broadcast on mobile devices such as iPhone and iPad.

"Digital technology has become a part of everyone's life", which is the way to promote Burberry digital marketing.

Christopher Bailey has always been the concept, and Burberry is also based on this idea to push the product information to target customers at all levels through digital technology, and to find a balance between popularity and high-end through website invitation.

Mr. Drabicky, a digital marketing and strategy consultant, believes that "in the process of brand marketing, Tiwtter, Facebook and all traditional marketing methods are all interrelated, and successful marketing is to balance all market means to achieve the ultimate goal".

Since 2009, Burberry has pferred most of its marketing costs to the Internet and used it as the core of marketing strategy. In that year, Burbrry global sales grew by 29%.

Of course, in the face of all marketing practices, the irreplaceable nature of the product itself is still the foundation of all marketing.

As Hermes chief executive Patrick Thomas once said, "even if we print" H "on a big bag, we will sell millions, but if we lose quality and brand, then people will say, you know, Hermes is no longer from the previous Hermes.

After having the irreplaceable product, in order to get the value recognition of consumers, these luxury brands will tell a new story to the new customers, and will try their best to retain the hearts of the old customers, or carry out the necessary strategy updates in the technological evolution.