Chapter 23 The marketing method of "customer is bigger than the sky"

Marketing is an intermediate link connecting social needs and corporate decision-making, a means to turn consumer needs and market opportunities into profits, and the key to corporate success.Marketing is the face of a business, and it accomplishes three goals: grow your business, create news, and improve your image. Huawei's marketing approach is quite distinctive.In Huawei, serving customers wholeheartedly is the purpose. "Customers are bigger than the sky", everything is for customers, and responding to customer needs in the shortest time has become a magic weapon for Huawei to win in the market.

Chang Xiangyu, a famous Henan opera performer, has a famous saying: "The play is bigger than the sky." This shows her artistic realm and her highly responsible attitude towards the audience. Ren Zhengfei believes that customers are the source of strength for Huawei's development, and customers are bigger than the sky.He said: "From the fundamental point of view of the survival of enterprises, enterprises must make profits, but profits can only come from customers. Huawei's survival itself depends on meeting customer needs, providing products and services that customers need, and obtaining reasonable returns. To support; employees have to pay wages, shareholders have to give returns, and the only ones who give money to Huawei in the world are customers. If we don’t serve customers, who else can we serve? Customers are the only reason for our survival!” Since It is the customers who determine the survival of the enterprise, and it is the customers who provide the survival value of the enterprise, and the enterprise must serve the customers.

Serving customers is the foundation of Huawei's survival, and everything must be customer-centric.In the severe winter and snow-covered land, Huawei people went to solve customer problems and were trapped in the car at minus 20 degrees; in summer, the sun was scorching, and Huawei people who went out were crowded on overloaded long-distance vehicles.On New Year's Eve, it is common practice to climb up a tall iron tower for maintenance.They stick to their posts day and night, safeguarding Huawei's reputation. In the first half of 2003, Huawei's Jilin Mobile Communications Company's equipment had several quality and man-made accidents.For this reason, Huawei's Changchun Office conducts 24-hour monitoring of Jilin Mobile Intelligent Network equipment maintenance.Wei Yunfeng, an engineer at the Changchun office, and Jilin Mobile intelligent network maintenance personnel worked from New Year's Eve to the early morning of the second day of the new year; another employee, Zou Shan, even lifted the floor, explored the ins and outs of each line, and analyzed network data until late at night.With the hard work of all staff, the problem was satisfactorily resolved.

On the morning of March 21, 2004, Miao Qing, an employee of Huawei, was on the train returning from a business trip, and received a report from a section chief of the network management center: Huawei’s HSTP1 (A plane) upgrade on the evening of March 20 may cause damage to other vendors (other companies that cooperate with Huawei) The SMS equipment provided by the equipment provider) works abnormally, and the delivery success rate is very low, which has already caused customer complaints.The friend has no technical personnel present, and the network management center should assist in solving the problem.Without further ado, Miao Qing got off the train with the service manager and went straight to the faulty computer room. After inspection, all the links that had been tested after the upgrade were normal and there were no major problems. Huawei was not primarily responsible for the problem this time.But they continued their work. The head of the department came here without eating in the morning. After the problem was found out, she could go to have breakfast, but she insisted: "Since you are here, you can work all morning. Let’s deal with more things.” With the solidarity and cooperation of everyone, the fault was eliminated.

In 1997, Chen Xuezhi, who had just arrived at Huawei, was sent to the Xi'an office, and encountered a difficult problem at the beginning.The ordered equipment was late to arrive, and Yan'an Telecom urged many times, and the goods finally arrived, but it was unknown which link went wrong.Due to the delay in the arrival of the goods and the frequent occurrence of problems of unknown origin, the leaders of Yan'an Telecom became furious and directly faxed multiple complaint letters to the headquarters.The headquarters assigned a company executive to handle the matter with Chen Xuezhi.The two of them took the train from Xi'an and arrived at night. The weather was cold. After searching for a long time, they found a hotel to rest.The next day, the two went to the Yan'an Telecommunications Bureau, and listened to the complaints and scolding of the other party's supervisor, and even smiled.The two wrote down the customer's opinions one by one, and planned to go back to the office to summarize and deal with them. When they rushed back to the office, it was already late at night, and the cold wind was blowing, and the two were shivering from the cold.

Pei Jiaxiang, a Huawei employee, once told a story. One day in May 2003, a customer delivered 358 pieces of goods according to the contract.Huawei conducted an accurate review and verification of the 358 pieces of goods. When handing over with the customer, it was found that the customer made a mistake in counting and missed 6 pieces.Huawei people did not simply say that this is the customer's problem, not our responsibility.In order to ensure that the goods delivered to customers are correct and clear, the delivery team and the review team suspended other operations, overcame various unfavorable factors such as compact loading of goods, and actively assisted customers in unloading and re-counting.After re-counting and re-checking by the customer, they help to pack the goods and hand them over to the customer for shipment.The next day, they contacted the careless customer again, and the customer replied that there were still 6 pieces missing and asked for help.After analyzing the problem, they immediately rushed to Guangzhou Railway Station to assist customers in counting.In the end, their mission isn't complete until the customer is satisfied.

There are only two store rules in Wal-Mart Global Markets: the first rule, the customer is always right; the second rule, if the customer is wrong, please refer to the first rule.Ren Zhengfei transplanted this store plan to Huawei, asking Huawei people to keep in mind: the customer is not at fault, and only Huawei people are at fault. Treat customers with warmth like spring. Customer interests come first. Customers are always right. Customers are more urgent than the sky. This is Huawei's customer service philosophy. Another marketing tactic that Ren Zhengfei established for Huawei is the human sea tactic, which is to concentrate superior forces and attack at all costs.

In order to serve customers more effectively, Huawei uses a large number of personnel to form a sea of ​​people, sometimes 100:1 or more, to receive customers around the clock.Multinational companies usually only have three or four people in charge in each province, while Huawei has sent seven or eight people in counties. When encountering large-scale events such as exhibitions, Huawei is even more "inspiring and mobilizing the crowd", with a shockingly large lineup. In 1996, the Ministry of Information Industry and the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications held a national switch product order meeting in Beijing.The main officials and industry leaders of the telecommunications systems in various provinces and cities will come to participate, and Ren Zhengfei has made preparations early.A total of more than 40 leaders attended the meeting, and there were as many as four or five hundred people from Huawei.

In 1998, 19 provincial and municipal GSM switchboard exhibition order fairs were held in Beijing.Ren Zhengfei recruited more than 500 people from offices and company headquarters across the country to rent the best booths, costing tens of millions.In this exhibition, Ericsson and Huawei received a total of 2.8 million lines of orders from China Mobile, which is equivalent to 1/3 of the transaction volume of the entire order fair. In 1999, Huawei held an on-site observation and order meeting for the opening of the first mobile switch in Inner Mongolia.At that time, orders from a province could reach hundreds of millions of dollars.Ren Zhengfei launched a human sea tactic for this, at all costs.He rented a helicopter from the United States for a huge sum of money, quickly applied for flight permits, transported the customers to the exhibition site, sent people to airlift the hairy crabs from Shanghai, and specially invited senior chefs to steam the hairy crabs for the customers on the spot.

This is especially true when charging in the market. The soldiers who charged in front fell down, and the soldiers behind picked up the "baton" and continued to sprint forward. "Those of us who came back from overseas often say that it takes four groups of people to open up a market." Wang Guanzhu, who has been away from Huawei for more than two years, is still terrified when talking about that experience.In his view, Huawei's achievements today have been paid a heavy price. It is precisely by relying on the "crowd sea tactics" that Huawei has ensured the ability to quickly respond to customers and strive for more living space.Huawei's achievements today are the masterpieces of countless Huawei people.

In 2002, the "winter" in the telecommunications industry was surprisingly cold. The world's major telecommunications operators laid off staff substantially, and China's major operators greatly reduced their investment scale.Ren Zhengfei sent a large number of vice presidents, including Sun Yafang and Hong Tianfeng, to the market to supervise the battle, but they have been "weakened." Huawei's sales revenue that year experienced negative growth for the first time since its establishment.Severe market pressure forced Huawei to rethink market sales. In the past, Huawei people from the perspective of products and technologies? ? ?It is difficult to accurately judge the final needs and preferences of customers. Products and technologies are out of touch with market demands. They lack long-term vision and compete in the market. Easy to be passive. As the saying goes, if you are poor, you will change; if you change, you will be successful;When you encounter a problem and rack your brains and can't find a clue, why not try another way of thinking.In order to reverse the passive situation and get through the "winter" as soon as possible, in June 2002, Ren Zhengfei launched a market and product portfolio analysis project at Huawei, namely MaPA (Market and Portfolio Analysis).So far, Huawei has realized that it is necessary to strengthen communication and interaction with customers, thus opening the prelude to the transformation from a sales model to a marketing model. Through this project, Huawei has established a strong cross-departmental team, correctly positioned the target market, formulated business plans, and rapidly increased the commercial value of Huawei's products and technologies. The old problem had just been solved, and before we could breathe a sigh of relief, a new problem emerged: how to better attract the attention of customers, improve Huawei's competitiveness, and strive to compete with large foreign companies.No matter how good the sales are, without an excellent service network, it will stumble in the market.For this reason, many large foreign companies attach great importance to service. Ren Zhengfei has also increasingly realized the value of providing customers with the most complete technical services possible.Therefore, in 2001, Huawei commissioned an authoritative survey organization, Gallup Consulting, to conduct a "customer satisfaction survey" for it.This is a comprehensive investigation, involving Huawei's brand value, product quality, pre-sales, sales, and after-sales services.In this survey, customers are dissatisfied mainly in pre-sales service and after-sales service. In response to this report, Ren Zhengfei proposed that Huawei should truly consider customers, strive to realize customer value, and provide them with satisfactory products, services and solutions. "Customers are Huawei's core competitiveness," and "customer pressure is Huawei's pressure." In 2002, Ren Zhengfei issued the "Huawei Customer Satisfaction Research", which was circulated internally.He asked all employees to study and discuss carefully, and a heated discussion took place within Huawei. Now, Huawei's marketing concept has really been established.Huawei is not just to get the contract, build a good network and leave. More importantly, it is to provide customers with good services; it is not to help customers solve short-term problems, but to establish long-term friendly cooperation. Among the "Great China", only Huawei is a private enterprise. Compared with state-owned enterprises, its competitive disadvantage is obvious.Initially, Huawei established offices in various places for sales.This sales model quickly opened up the market, but its drawbacks were also exposed.The director of the office keeps an eye on the orders, has serious short-term behaviors, unstable market relations, frequent personnel changes, and huge expenses. In order to establish a stable market relationship and understand the needs of customers as soon as possible, Ren Zhengfei began to explore new forms: "marriage" with customers, establish joint ventures, and form a community of interests, so as to consolidate and expand the market. Huawei's establishment of a joint venture company originated from Huawei Electric. In 1995, Huawei Mobeck Power Supply Company (the predecessor of Huawei Electric) took 18 enterprises directly under the Provincial Post and Telecommunications Administration as its shareholders. In 1997, Ren Zhengfei proposed the establishment of a joint venture for the first time to win the trust of customers by sharing profits. "We need to set up 30 joint ventures. If Huawei is listed overseas, the joint ventures will also be packaged and listed." Subsequently, Huawei and Tietong jointly established Northern Huawei. Since 1998, after Huawei in the north, it has established joint ventures with local government telecommunications bureaus in Liaoning, Hebei, Shandong, Sichuan, Beijing, Tianjin and other places to share profits and losses and share risks. The establishment of Shenyang Huawei took a lot of trouble.Ren Zhengfei went to Liaoning in person and had frequent contacts with senior officials of the Liaoning Post and Telecommunications Bureau for a year.Later, he approached Li Yuzhuo, who was in charge of the matter, and said: "In Liaoning, we want to set up a joint venture and use the method of raising funds from employees. I have already made an agreement with Director Meng of the Liaoning Provincial Telecommunications Bureau." When transferred to the National People's Congress, the successor responded indifferently to the matter, and no one responded to the fundraising.After many efforts, Shenyang Huawei was established in February 1998.In that year, Huawei's sales in 14 cities in Shenyang Province amounted to two to three hundred million yuan. Through the establishment of joint ventures with customers, Huawei has quickly stabilized the market. The two parties have divided labor and cooperated to obtain what they need for mutual benefit. However, these joint ventures are different from ordinary joint ventures in that the role of these enterprises is only to sign the bills and pay the bills.The investment of local operators and the government can even be paid in advance by Huawei.This has boosted Huawei's sales and smoothed out long-term customer relationships. At the beginning, there were great differences within Huawei on the issue of establishing a joint venture company.Especially in 1999, the performance of joint venture companies in various places was generally poor, and some even suffered losses.Around this issue, Huawei had a big internal debate, "the public says the public is right, and the mother-in-law says the woman is right." In the end, the side that supported it won the curtain call. From today's point of view, the joint venture has played a positive role in expanding Huawei's market and establishing a corporate image. In 2002, Huawei implemented reforms, dividing and registering subsidiaries by region, and joint ventures were also included.So far, large and small joint venture companies have come to an end. Ren Zhengfei was born in the military and has a strong sense of politics. What happened to his parents during the "Cultural Revolution" also allowed him to quickly mature politically. He believes that no matter how capable a person is, he must be recognized by mainstream values, otherwise he will have no chance of development. Luo Ruiqing's speech in 1982 and the subsequent disarmament let him know what predictive leadership is.All these made him further realize the great value of keeping up with policies.Therefore, he has a keen sense of politics, and his sales route is diplomatic. He said in "Crossing the Dividing Line between Europe and Asia": "China's diplomatic line is successful and has won more friends all over the world...Huawei's cross-border marketing follows the diplomatic line of our country, and I believe it will be successful. .” China's diplomatic line is to develop friendly relations with its neighbors, consolidate traditional friendship with the third world, and attach importance to establishing strategic partnerships with major powers.Huawei's overseas strategy also follows this route. In 1996, when the then Russian President Boris Yeltsin visited China, China and Russia established a strategic cooperative partnership.Ren Zhengfei immediately seized the business opportunity. On April 8, 1997, he went to Ufa, an important military town in Russia, to attend the signing ceremony of the joint venture Beto Huawei. From October 26 to November 3, 1997, President Jiang Zemin was invited to visit the United States.Two months later, Ren Zhengfei went to the United States to inspect big companies such as IBM. From June 25 to July 3, 1998, President Clinton visited China.Ren Zhengfei took advantage of the opportunity to open a research institute in Dallas, the United States, introduced the management technology of the giant company IBM, and then established a subsidiary FutureWei. Huawei's offensive and defensive advances and retreats in the U.S. market also well reflect the Chinese government's diplomatic wisdom toward the U.S., which is neither humble nor overbearing, and keeps it in check. In 1998, the Chinese government presented Uzbekistan Huawei with the 08 aircraft, and Huawei took this opportunity to enter the Central Asian market. In November 2000, Ren Zhengfei visited Africa with national leaders to help Huawei develop the African market.Subsequently, Ren Zhengfei sent Deng Tao into South Africa and visited 13 countries.Huawei people have gradually gained a firm foothold there and are welcomed by the locals.In Kenya, Huawei people are regarded as honored guests; in Tanzania, Huawei people have planned the entire network for it... In January 2001, Ren Zhengfei visited countries in the Middle East with the leaders of the country, and Huawei continued to expand its market in the Middle East.Immediately afterwards, following the diplomatic line, Huawei people opened up the South American market. Entered Ecuador in 1999, signed a contract worth 12 million US dollars, and quickly opened up the South American market. Keeping up with the diplomatic line, backed by strong national strength, provides political support for the development of the enterprise, and it is easy to win favor and recognition in the country where the target market is located. It also ensures the stability of investment, is less affected by political fluctuations, and reduces risk.