The Changes in China Community Marketing
With the development of society, Chinese cities have shown a community-based lifestyle. Marketing derives a new marketing model-“community marketing”.
The Past of Community Marketing
The development of Chinese community marketing can be roughly divided into three stages:
1. The first stage – corporate direct sales
The enterprise walks into the community, sells and obtains profits in the form of direct sales promotion. Usually, this is carried out in the form of consultations, road shows, events, etc. However, due to the constraints of marketing thinking and experience, the performance of corporate direct sales is often not satisfactory. The community marketing at this stage is small in scale and lacks systemicity and planning.
2. The second stage – direct sales agency
After the first stage, the company has realized the marketing problem. In order to improve the professionalism and efficiency of marketing, the community began to use early media, such as blackboards, bulletin boards, etc., but did not take into account the cultural characteristics and needs of the community, so the activities generally did not sell. At this stage, the coverage of community marketing is narrow and user attention is low.
3. The third stage – community media
As companies penetrate into the community, major media companies have also joined the community. Enterprises have integrated communities and media, and various offline media forms have emerged, such as awnings, billboards, posters, and outdoor advertisements. Companies use community traffic to achieve media dissemination. Due to the poor interaction and one-way communication of community marketing at this stage, even if the scope of communication is wide, the performance is still not optimistic.
Current Community Marketing
In the past, community marketing lacked content, thought, integrity and system, and poor marketing effects were inevitable. Today’s community marketing model has matured, and the combination of marketing tools and marketing content continue to be integrated. Community + Internet is the next main battlefield of marketing.
In the future, community marketing will be fully Internet-based, especially in the fast-moving consumer goods industry. Enterprises should realize the importance of community marketing.