bookmarkrole #415 - Breaking the Ice
#415 - Breaking the Ice
The first day of the exhibition began.
The crowds attending the exhibition surged in like a tide. According to official statistics, the number of visitors from local areas and around the world reached over a hundred thousand during the exhibition period.
Among them were many large automobile dealers from around the world, who would visit the new models on display and secretly observe the appeal of each manufacturer's new models to the audience.
They even secretly inquired about the intentions of potential customers who had an in-depth understanding of the models, all in order to accurately grasp which models would be bestsellers in the coming year or even several years.
After all, as dealers, their business was closely related to this.
If a competitor got their hands on a blockbuster while they were stuck with junk, they would suffer a huge loss.
For these dealers, they had no fixed stance. Whichever manufacturer's models could be sold was their pragmatic position, regardless of whether the car brand was famous or not.
However, based on past experience, big brands were much more attractive, so even if they were exploited by the big brands and forced to take on many cars that they might not be able to sell, they often reluctantly accepted it, and if it really didn't work out, they would resort to low-price discounts and dumping.
Therefore, the booths that these dealer clients were most willing to squat at were those with a constant flow of people.
Normally, it would be the dozen or so booths on both sides of the import section of the exhibition hall, where traditional well-known manufacturers such as BBA, GE, and FORD occupied the most prominent booths every year.
However, this year's exhibition seemed to be a little different from the start.
Two very cute panda mascots appeared at the entrance of the exhibition hall before the exhibition even started. They didn't do anything else, just held an even more exquisite and cute panda doll in one hand and wore a wide banner that read "Visit Booth W15-19 to Win a Free Panda Doll" on their backs, with the English version on the front and the German version on the back.
This mother thought she was one of the early birds, after all, she knew that the W booth was the innermost booth, and usually not many people would wander over there.
However, she guessed wrong this time. When she went straight to Booth W15 without having time to look at anything else, she arrived at the booth and found that there were queues of at least a hundred people at each of the 4 booths!
"Oh my god, how could this be?" Annie's mother covered her mouth with her hand and exclaimed in surprise.
The exhibition had just started, and the estimated number of people who had entered was over a thousand, but no one had expected that almost half of them would come directly here.
Although it was expected that it might attract a wave of people, no one had expected so many people to be attracted. According to this queuing trend, it was estimated that the panda dolls would be given away in one day!
Because there was no way to limit people from repeatedly queuing up to draw!
It was impossible to say that they had to register their ID cards or anything like that, not to mention that no one had the concept of an ID card at this time.
"Team Leader Geng, what should we do? The people are coming a bit too fiercely." The deputy team leader, a deputy director from the Ministry of Industry, said to Geng Pusheng in a low voice with some nervousness.
"Old Ma, don't worry, it'll be fine in a while when Secretary Fu and the others bring over the latest lottery rule sign." Geng Pusheng was not flustered at all.
This kind of situation was actually anticipated in the deduction plan.
Ren Zhong's suggestion was to draw a limited number of prizes on the hour! Once every hour, with a limited number each time. Assuming the exhibition opens at 9 am and closes at 5 pm, drawing once every hour from 10 am to 4 pm would be 7 times in total. Designing the lottery with a 5% winning rate, drawing 200 prizes every hour, would result in drawing 1400 prizes in a day, which would be enough to last until the end of the 5-day exhibition.
And if these draws were really crowded, theoretically the number of visitors attracted each day would be as high as more than 20,000, and over 5 days it would be more than 100,000. Even if half of them were freeloaders who came to queue for the lottery multiple times, it would still attract over 50,000 visitors.
For an exhibition, this was almost the treatment of the manufacturers at the entrance of the exhibition hall!
So it was not a loss at all!
It was not until this time that Geng Pusheng realized how powerful Ren Zhong was.
Sure enough, after the lottery rule sign, which was made by temporarily finding someone to make it, was brought over, the queuing crowd turned into numbered tickets. Suddenly, the people who were originally queuing to draw, after getting their numbers, dispersed to other places to browse the car factories that they had been interested in for a long time.
However, most people stayed at the booth and began to carefully study the new models of Dongda, and unexpectedly discovered a new world!
The local people, who were originally ignorant of the Dongda automobile industry, were suddenly attracted by these Dongda cars.
The vast majority of people were queuing in front of the Golf and Jetta booths, waiting to sit and ride in them, and to understand the performance parameters and feel the workmanship of these two cars. The deeper they went, the more they discovered the differences between them and the current car models.
Whether it was power, comfort, practicality, or appearance, the more they looked, the more they felt as if they had been hit deep in their hearts.
"Excuse me, how much does the entry-level Golf cost?" The mother who brought her child Annie to the lottery was attracted by the Golf. Compared to the Beetle, the Golf was much more practical, with a larger space and a much larger trunk, which could even fit a stroller.
For families with children, these were all necessities.
The Golf perfectly embodied such a family feature.
"Hello, madam, in Europe, the suggested price for the Golf is 3600 marks, or 3000 Swiss francs," Xiaoying from the Golf booth replied politely.
"Wow, that price is really good," Annie's mother didn't expect that such a nearly perfect car for her would be several hundred cheaper than the Beetle. You should know that the low-end entry-level version of the Beetle costs 3950 marks, which is about 3290 Swiss francs.
The Golf outperformed the Beetle in almost every aspect, but the price was nearly 10% lower.
This price was undoubtedly the first car for a family, almost the lowest among similar compact cars. For a dual-income family like Annie's mother, buying it would not be stressful at all, after all, one person's salary was almost 2000 Swiss francs.
So after carefully checking the workmanship details of the car and other aspects, Annie's mother was convinced that the workmanship was even better than the Beetle she had seen several times, especially the details such as the door gap treatment, the Golf had exceeded the Beetle's level.
"When will this car be available for sale?" Annie's mother was really tempted. It would be even better if she could test drive it. As long as there were no problems driving it, she decided to buy the Golf and take it home to use first.
The Jetta next door looked even better, but the price might still be too high for her, even though she hadn't asked for the price yet.
That car could only be considered after they had saved up for a while.
As for the price of the Golf, Annie's mother could directly place an order now. After all, with a bit of saving, buying one a year wouldn't be a problem.
"Hello, Madam, our Golf model will be put into mass production before the end of this year. The specific launch time in Clockwork Country may need to be confirmed with local distributors before it can be determined. However, we now have a special offer package for first-launch users. If you register for pre-order now, you will receive a three-year car maintenance gift package with our first-launch user pre-order certificate," the receptionist, Xiaoying, said with a smile.
"The first batch of launch countries in Europe, including England, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Portugal, and Spain, all have this event. At that time, we will also advertise the opening time and the list of specific official distributors in the local mainstream newspapers. Of course, registering for pre-order does not require any fees, it's all free, and you can also cancel it yourself. Madam, please take a look, these are our pre-order rules."
Because Ren Zhong couldn't accurately gauge the users of this period, he could only use the exhibition to test how many users could be attracted after the pre-sale event was proposed in Clockwork Country.
The pre-order rules and lottery rules are on separate billboards, both divided into D-text and E-text, allowing Annie's mother to quickly understand how to pre-order and cancel.
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It was completely risk-free, so Annie's mother became the first pre-order user without hesitation.
"Congratulations, Madam Sophia, welcome to become the first pre-order user of Golf cars. This panda doll is for your beautiful little Annie. I hope the panda baby from the East can accompany little Annie to grow up happily." After registering, Xiaoying took out a panda doll and gave it to Annie, who had been curiously looking at her.
Sophia didn't expect such a good thing to happen. After registering, she didn't even need to queue up for the lottery. She suddenly had more goodwill towards the unfamiliar Golf brand in her heart. "Annie, quickly thank this sister from the East."
"Thank you, sister!" Annie looked at Xiaoying a little shyly, but quickly said thank you.
"You're welcome. Welcome to come to our Dongda to see real pandas when you grow up. In my hometown, in a few years, you will be able to go to the panda nature reserve to see pandas." Xiaoying said with a smile. Although the panda park has not yet been built, Dongda has already divided more than 20 nature reserves in the newspaper, of which the panda reserve is the most famous, and even plans to set up a panda breeding base in the future to expand the number of pandas, while opening up tourism areas. Xiaoying, as the most active university student class in this era, is very sensitive to this news.
"Really? That's great. We will definitely go to the magical East to see it if we have the opportunity." Sophia didn't expect that the country that was still full of queues in her impression not only created such beautiful and practical cars, but now also began to build high-end projects such as nature reserves.
For a time, her impression of Dongda has greatly changed, especially the exhibition service staff from Dongda at the scene, all dressed in neat suits, and there was no difference from their elite business people.
Even in terms of language, she saw many reception representatives opening their mouths with fluent D-text and E-text, and there were also many Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian languages, which shows that Dongda is not the uncivilized tribe promoted in the original newspapers.
It's just that there is too little information about the ancient country of the East that can be seen from the media now, especially since Clockwork Country has no historical entanglement with Dongda, and there are even fewer pictures of Dongda in the media newspapers.
For ordinary working-class people like Sophia, the most information they can access is that this country recently achieved the first global voyage of a nuclear submarine. As the most explosive news at the moment, Clockwork Country also carried out a considerable number of reprints.
It is precisely because of the backing of such major technological breakthroughs that ordinary people like Sophia did not equate Dongda with Black Africa. After all, it is said that the nuclear submarine is the most powerful technological breakthrough in the world today. Being able to create such a powerful thing, Sophia would subconsciously believe that there should be no major problems with Dongda in terms of automobiles.
After all, the actual car seen on the spot was so perfect for her.
Geng Pusheng has been paying attention to the various situations on the scene. Seeing that not long after the opening, he welcomed someone like Ms. Sophia who dared to be the first to eat crabs, the stone hanging in his heart finally landed.
Although he has strong confidence in building Golf into a hit, everything is an estimate and speculation before accepting user testing. Only by truly winning user purchase intentions at the exhibition and ushering in a concentrated bombing of dealers can it truly land!
Now it seems that in the Western market, Golf already has users who don't consider the brand at all, and simply rely on the image displayed by the on-site product and the very favorable price to impress people. If it can accept thousands of potential customers' pre-orders on the spot, then next, it can fully launch advertising campaigns to shape the brand and awareness, and then fully recruit merchants to set up sales channels.
These next steps of the plan, once started, will cost a lot of money. For Dongda, which is not rich now, if the investment does not see a return, then the decision-making level will not dare to decide on a large-scale investment.
Advertising and channels are purely money-burning, and it is impossible to achieve a balance between profit and loss in the short term.
According to the most optimistic plan, it would be a miracle for the overseas automobile project to achieve a balance between profit and loss within three years.
So Geng Pusheng is more concerned about the views of ordinary on-site visiting users on the product.
Now that there is the first customer who truly shows intention, it proves that the Golf model is attractive to ordinary users in the West. Whether it is the model itself or the price, Golf has a certain competitiveness.
Geng Pusheng doesn't know how many potential customers can be harvested in this exhibition, but having a successful start is also a good thing to celebrate.
Ms. Sophia's pre-order did not form a herd effect for other viewers at the current scene. Even if some people saw that pre-ordering can directly get a panda doll, these viewers who came to watch the auto show are more or less the backbone of society, and they pay more attention to their own credit. Even if it is written in black and white that they can freely cancel the order, they will not easily make a decision before comparing all the intended models of the exhibition.
Buying a car is still a major expense, and for them, it definitely requires careful consideration.
But after reading Golf, for most ordinary customers, at least they have more expectations for the models they want to buy.
Some of the characteristics of the Golf car have gradually become some benchmark needs for them to buy a car. The model should look good, and it should also have a certain cargo space. It is best to support a family of 4 to travel together, the power is strong enough, and the price should be cheap.
Let these potential customers find a new benchmark that they want both.