How international big Adidas challenges the future: digital
Description：How international big Adidas challenges the...
Earlier this month, Gartner L2, a US technology consultancy, released an "Activewear 2018" report that analyzed the digital service capabilities of 74 sports brands with operations in the United States. The conclusion is that Adidas crushed Nike, becoming the highest in the Digital IQ Index, the only sports brand to be rated as the highest level of Genius.
According to the report, “Adidas has shown continued growth potential through direct-to-consumer channel sales, both online and offline.”
Regardless of whether the evaluation criteria in this report are controversial in the industry. An obvious fact is that in the past few years, Adidas has surpassed Nike in fashion trends and fashion.
As the sport's largest brand, Adidas not only seized the trend of fashion trends, but also experienced significant growth in performance. The Adidas Group's recently released 2017 results show that the group's sales rose 15% year-on-year to 21.218 billion euros, entering the 20 billion euro club for the first time, operating profit soared 31% to 2.1 billion euros, and net profit increased 7.9% year-on-year to 1.1 billion euros.
From the channel perspective, all distribution channels of the Adidas Group achieved double-digit high growth, especially in the e-commerce channel, with a 57% increase in revenue. The e-commerce channel is the most important source of revenue for Adidas.
Therefore, in order to adapt to the new market demand, let consumers pay more attention to the brand and realize the digital transformation of the brand, Adidas has accelerated the digitization process in sales, products and services, and production supply chain. Many of their attempts have become the vane of the industry.
Last year, Adidas e-commerce sales of 1.6 billion euros. However, according to the plan, Adidas is expected to invest nearly 900 million euros in digital operation this year, and the determination of digital transformation is evident.
Omni-channel digitalization, as well as digitization of products and services
Also this month, Adidas Group CEO Caspar Rothde told the Financial Times that the Adidas Group plans to close some physical stores in the next few years to strengthen its e-commerce strength. In the future, online websites will become the most important store in the world for Adidas. Adidas plans to increase online sales in 2020 from 1.6 billion euros in 2017 to 4 billion euros.
In the era of mobile Internet, mobile phones have become a part of people's body. They can view relevant product information directly from the mobile phone anytime and anywhere, and order one-click to buy what they want.
Previously, Adidas' main online sales channel was the official website and third-party sales platform. With the changes in consumer habits nowadays, Adidas realized that it needs to develop more channels, and the official website can no longer meet the needs of consumers. Therefore, Adidas began its own official shopping app in the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany in November 2017. Of course, this time is not too early.
The launch of the App, on the one hand, to achieve digital sales channels, mobile app plus PC-side official website, to achieve full coverage of digital channels. In addition, you can work with more third-party platforms. In the United States, Adidas and Amazon have always maintained good cooperative relations. At home, the Tmall and Jingdong platforms also have Adidas official self-operated stores very early.
On the other hand, branded apps also help digitize products and services.
For example, the App incorporates an AI experience, and consumers can track the location of their orders in real time. Through artificial intelligence to extract past shopping records and personal information, the App can generate personalized recommendations based on consumer interests and behaviors, not only to provide more suitable products, but also to push product news, sports events and other news. Real-time interaction with consumers, strengthening the relationship between brands and consumers, can also stimulate further sales growth.
According to Gartner L2's report, the Adidas e-commerce platform features informative pre-sales and release pages, including videos and personalized content generated based on user habits, and shows real-time inventory of products.
Of course, the self-built online channel is accompanied by logistics problems. Therefore, after the brand went online, Adidas began to strengthen the construction of the logistics system. Adidas CFO Ham Olmeyer said at the 2017 earnings conference that they are increasing their investment in logistics and striving to achieve the same day in major markets, in order to stimulate the trading volume of e-commerce channels.
This is a common problem that many brand owners need to face when building their own online channels. Because the logistics system with e-commerce and the past logistics model of Adidas are completely different models. “When you ship to a large retail chain, the target shipment may be a whole batch of sneakers, but when it comes to online end customers, you may simply ship a pair of shoes or a set of clothes.”
Close the store, but strengthen the offline store experience and brand communication significance
After allowing consumers to realize the circulation of offline stores, official websites and apps on the shopping choices, the brand has more comprehensive control over the product channels, but this smooth shopping experience is not enough, consumers are more inclined to have emotional needs. Brand.
As the brand master Ogilvy said: The final decision on the brand's market position is the brand itself, not the negligible difference between the products. Just like Apple has long been a mobile phone in the eyes of many people, Starbucks is no longer a coffee in the eyes of many people. Adidas is not simply sportswear and equipment. It is the ultimate attitude of the brand to become a target group. aims.
So, the question is, how do consumers let consumers experience and feel the attitude and way of a brand's life? There is no better way than a real offline store.
“With time, we will have fewer stores, but the overall performance will be better.” Adidas CEO Caspar Roth told the media that the number of Adidas stores will shrink in the coming year. There are reports that in 2018, Adidas Light has 110 stores closed in the United States.
At the same time that the physical stores have been greatly reduced, Adidas has made every effort to strengthen the experiential development of offline stores. The store is defined as the main brand driving force, instead of targeting sales, but aiming at increasing brand image to consumers. Communicate more brand culture.
The Adidas store will make a comprehensive change in the design concept, product line and personalization of the online store, enhancing the consumer experience.
“Our store was the most important source of income 10 years ago, and in the future, they will also be the driving force of the brand. Take a new store in Chicago as an example. The brand works closely with local artists to showcase more different products. This is One of the new modes of physical stores."
This case introduced by Caspar Rose is the cross-border cooperation that many brands are now keen on and the exploration of new offline experience stores. The purpose of these experiential stores is primarily to interact with consumers, to convey brand culture and influence, and to achieve emotional and practical connections with consumers.
Now, the store strategy of branded flash stores is often used, because it is more conceptual and interesting, and can provide consumers with more new product experiences. For example, this spring, Adidas opened a coffee flash shop at AUNN CAFE in Jing'an Temple, Shanghai, China. There are several different themed experience spaces in the store. Each of them will have a staff to help take photos, collecting photos from three locations. You can print a poster of your own!
Smart supply chain of the future: rapid response and meeting market demand
In the view of "Real Star Planet", the brand's digital channels, products and services actually provide a data foundation for smart supply chains and smart factories. In fact, Adidas is speeding up the supply chain and creating a smart factory, SPEED FACTORY, to start using smart technology to make shoes to keep up with what the industry calls “fast fashion” consumer demand.
Of course, at present, the Adidas smart factory can only meet a small part of the production needs, and also need to cooperate with other production lines to meet the production volume. But for Adidas, the biggest significance of the emergence of smart factories is to explore new technologies and be closer to consumers. The biggest feature is “customer customization”.
For example, Adidas SpeedFactoy produces a revolutionary rugby football shoe with a new digitally designed AM4MN stud. SpeedFactory's production speed is three times that of standard shoes. The key point is that each pair of shoes is tailored to each player and can be adjusted in digital engineering according to different performances.
SpeedFactoy uses NASA ARAMIS motion capture technology to understand the precise needs of the athlete's foot in the American football game. The front of the shoe uses staggered stickers to enhance the support, protection and stability of the shoe facing the foot. Adidas calls it "the future of soccer shoe manufacturing and customization."
“我们希望改变设计流程，能够使所有的原材料准备就绪，那么在当季产品一旦售空即意味着这个产品卖得很好的时候，能够当季重新再生产，重新再补货，来快速满足这个市场的需求，特别像中国这样的市场。”
在提高供应链的速度方面，阿迪达斯希望能够达到两个目标：“第一，如果一个产品卖得很好的话，那么阿迪达斯能够有足够产能快速组织再生产，补货并投入市场。第二，有了这种快速的生产流程和材料的准备之后，能在一个季节推出多轮产品，能够更好、更快地对市场的需求做出反应”。
