New way to play cross-border e-commerce: use card game to do product research and development [E-commerce training]

　　If you want to make the cross-border e-commerce business longer, it is not enough to rely solely on product selection, but more importantly, product research and development.

　　After 10 years of working in cross-border e-commerce, his main job is product research and development. How to do a good job in product research and development? What kind of merchant can go to the R&D poker table?

　　"Only merchants who can choose clear market segments, study market segment competitors, and clarify the core ideas of product development can be invincible in the market."

　　Objective conditions for product development: stones from other mountains can be used to polish jade

　　The cards in your hand are objective conditions for product development. Xuanming Network believes that there are three objective conditions for brand research and development. First, only with an industrial foundation can one make truly valuable products; second, one has the ability to be an e-commerce company; third, one is good at grasping the key points of product research and development, and one can achieve twice the result with half the effort.

　　1. The industrial foundation of the product

　　① Production capacity and quality control capability. The first step in developing a new product series is that companies need to estimate their own production capacity and evaluate whether they have the industrial foundation to organize the development of new products. The second is quality control ability, which is why many people have their own products, even their own factories, and also participate in the CCEE conference. Quality control is a slightly higher-level thing. At this level, production-oriented enterprises and trade enterprises need to do quality control after years of OEM OEM in domestic and foreign trade.

　　②The style, style, mold and design accumulated by OEMs in many years. R&D is divided into two levels. The first level is to find experienced manufacturers to find the entry point for R&D from the accumulated molds and models in these OEM factories; the second level is to make full use of the surplus product design and mold library designed and produced by ODM companies for domestic and foreign brands, as well as their accumulated R&D capabilities to create cost-effective products.

　　③Many product categories have formed an industry belt with a complete upstream and downstream supply chain environment . For example, the paradise of fishing gear - Cixi. In Cixi, from the simplest raw materials to every accessories, every mold and all selling points can be achieved here. "When R&D personnel take root in Cixi, we will find that we enter a room full of toys like children, with all kinds of building blocks. I want to make anything by matching it with building blocks. This is the charm of the industrial belt."

　　2. The core capabilities of e-commerce companies: marketing positioning capabilities

　　Marketing positioning at four levels: product, price, distribution and communication is the most core thing that companies need to solve in the R&D process. Only by being superior to other competitors in these four aspects can we generate stronger value than our competitors in product research and development and subsequent marketing. In addition, traffic acquisition capabilities, visual presentation and brand packaging capabilities, supply chain control capabilities and channel marketing capabilities are also indispensable elements to help a product succeed.

　　3. Grasp the key points of product development: Create a new balance of cost-effectiveness

　　When a product enters the end of its life cycle, it is necessary to regain and create a new cost-effective balance through product research and development. Product research and development is a process of constantly creating a cost-effective balance, rather than finding ways to control costs, change raw materials, and make the product lighter in weight and cheaper in cost.

　　The core idea of ​​product research and development: Solve key problems and let R&D create well-known value

　　1. Choose a clear market segment

　　① The scale of the market segment should be large. Only by making sales and sales large enough market segments can a brand be produced.

　　②Match supply chain advantages. Whether a product needs to be made depends on whether it matches the cards in your hand. Never do "take poker to the mahjong table to play cards."

　　③ Avoid homogeneous enterprises. Find a large enough market segment, and through continuous visits, you can obtain different "cards" from other Chinese merchants to avoid homogeneity risks.

　　Xuanming Network gave an example: "In 2017, the company conducted a market segment capacity analysis of a small household appliance in the North American online market. The data showed that the overall sales of the product in the market was 17 million US dollars and the total sales volume was 260,000 units. Ranking according to the hottest sales and well-known order volume, generally sellers will choose products with an average order price of 20-50 US dollars, because the order volume in this range accounts for 33%, which is far higher than the second and third places. However, the company chose products with a price of 100-200 US dollars and paid attention to GMV to avoid Chinese peers and 'make money instead of making orders'.

　　The rationality of this measure is analyzed from the above three points:

　　First, the market segment is large in size, and there is room for 1.7 million in 1-2 years to obtain a 10% share;

　　Second, in terms of aggregation, homogeneous sellers rarely enter this category. Side sellers and European and American sellers make US$180-200. If the company makes newer functions, better features, and more beautiful molds, even if the price is 40%, there will be more than 35% of the gross profit;

　　Third, from the perspective of supply chain, in order to achieve a relatively higher supply chain matching, the company contacted foreign trade export companies with 20 years of operating experience in Shunde to achieve high cost performance.

　　2. Confirm sales targets: sales, production, sales plan

　　Ensure the sustainability and survival of the market supply of each platform, which not only ensures continuous goods, but also avoids backlog of goods and causes unnecessary losses. The most important thing is to conduct sales planning, timely testing of sales rates in batches and years, formulate a detection line, and use this as a standard to measure your own situation and make feedback as soon as possible.

　　3. Research competitors in segmented markets

　　First, the core selling points and secondary selling points of competitors are the most basic analysis angles, and they need to be sorted out first, analyze the traffic, profit and image models of competitors, and figures, and figures.

　　Second, understand the brand premium of competitors. The situation in each market is different, and companies need to conduct research in advance. Third, analysis of competitive product portfolio and upgrade strategy, including studying the upgrade ideas of competitor products, the composition of researchers, and even doing some "spy work" if necessary.

　　4. Conduct catch-up development for the selling points of competitors

　　Make full use of ODM resources in the manufacturing industry, arrange the most scientific mass production, and a series of work such as planned delivery, sales, and logistics.