What does marketing mean?
Marketing creates a favorable environment or context for a product promotion and sales by meeting or exploring the needs of consumers.
Starting from April, Smart launched on the vast platform with designs from Mercedes-Benz and production from Geely. With its avant-garde styling and consumer awareness accumulated from conventional vehicles, the brand was guaranteed to be a strong competitor in its price range. In addition, I have experienced the superb quality of the vehicle thanks to my Geeking 001 and the support from the vast platform.
However, disaster struck when pre-orders began in June. Using hunger marketing, they informed potential buyers that the production capacity of Smart would be sold out after June 7th. The servers crashed as people rushed to take advantage of the 12,600 yuan subsidy, resulting in chaos. After experiencing the disastrous delivery of my Geeking 001, I knew that pre-ordering Smart would be a painful experience. I would not pre-order blindly before seeing the actual car, waiting for a good laugh.
In July, I went to the Shenzhen Happy Bay experience store twice after seeing it as one of the first to open. The first visit was an offline experience, and it was a poor one at that. I had to wait in line to see the car and the salesperson was unpleasant, telling me not to touch and blocking me from seeing the trunk. The car steering wheel was even locked. The second visit was in August, for my scheduled test drive. I arrived at the store about an hour early and the salesperson arrived sleepily. Two customers had to take the test drive together, and it was a very poor experience. Personally, I did not feel much driving the car. I was used to my Geeking 001, and I only noticed how short the car hood was.
My pre-order date was July 18th, and I was not expecting to receive my car this year. However, after seeing Smart’s recent actions, I cannot help but criticize this mediocre company.
A Confusing Amount of Orders and Deliveries
Starting in August when I joined the group chat, I saw numerous car enthusiasts posting on Xiaohongshu about the large number of produced vehicles parked at the Xi’an factory. I thought that the Smart brand could not disappear, but it turns out that I was wrong. They repeatedly postponed deliveries until the end of September when they finally began the first 500 nationwide deliveries. In October, they delivered 1,600 cars, boasting a 287% growth rate. Smart, are you shameless? Don’t you know that fast progress stems from the low starting point?
In the first two weeks of November, 847 cars were delivered, and if we calculate the numbers, they delivered 500 cars in September, 1,600 in October, and 1,800 in November. Based on their claim to have sold out of orders and capacity this year before the release event for pre-orders, this means that their order volume is less than 10,000 cars! The implications of this go without saying in such a competitive environment. In August, due to a large number of price increases, the top configuration of Smart followed suit and increased by 5,800 yuan. In my opinion, this is not only due to the slack production capacity, but also to retain their customers, most of whom had pre-ordered the top configuration. In September, they suddenly announced that by ordering the middle configuration, they can deliver cars this year and enjoy national subsidies! Are they trying to trick customers into paying a deposit for nothing? The capitalists’ ugly face is hard to bear. They have done everything they can, even opening up more options for the middle configuration, which only made their top configuration customers feel disgusted. They even released a “heart attack edition,” which is just a disguised price reduction, isn’t it? To make matters worse, they locked in orders for the middle configuration overnight and did not allow any changes. They are just trying to satisfy their profit margin and explain themselves to their shareholders, using any means necessary. If Tesla comes out with a 210,000 yuan car next month, what is Smart’s advantage? Don’t talk about the status of Mercedes-Benz in consumers’ minds. In this era of disorderly expansion of new energy, where all countries are competing, production capacity, delivery, and price are the biggest drivers of customer willingness to pay. Imagine a scenario: I want to pre-order the top configuration of Smart. Smart: Sorry, we don’t have it. See you in the fourth quarter of next year. Tesla: I can give you the car this month. The customer turns around and pre-orders from Tesla without any hesitation.
Let’s talk about delivery. In the early stages, it was very rigid, and we would produce according to the order payment time sequence for the orders from June 6th to July 31st. This is not something I said, it’s what their official website said. Now, if there aren’t enough orders, they will reduce the configuration and indirectly reduce the price. They will also change the delivery strategy, and of course, they must have a good excuse. They say it’s because of the COVID-19 supply chain, and to improve efficiency, we have to disrupt the production sequence and no longer follow the order sequence, but don’t worry, we still have a two-month delivery buffer period. Therefore, under extreme conditions, customers who have ordered after me, can pick up the car two months earlier than me!!! After optimization, the vehicles with different configurations will be independently produced. This means that they’re not in a hurry, anyway, whichever configuration supplier provides enough parts, that configuration will be produced first, and the configuration that lacks parts will be moved to the end. It’s really frustrating. As a customer, it seems like I’m powerless to argue? It’s like a scholar meets soldiers, they can’t argue with each other?
The chaos in delivery can be blamed on COVID-19, while the poor production capacity can be blamed on suppliers. Everyone is doing it for the benefit. The price of raw materials keeps increasing. Plus the poor sales volume, in this era where sales volume and suppliers negotiate prices, if your Smart order is less than 10,000, then just stand aside. Even BYD Daddy can’t keep up, who are you, Smart? The gross profit of the entire car can’t come up, and selling one vehicle will lose money. It’s hard to write a good financial report. Oh, right, you’re not listed, so you don’t have to disclose it publicly. Just let your shareholders take a look. Introducing a new version, there’s nothing else but either production capacity for silicon carbide motors can’t keep up, or the pricing was too low in the early stages, which means they’re taking a big loss, or the quality of the Euler vehicle is not up to par. It’s all about money, so if you have the guts, just raise the price against the trend! If it’s a supplier problem, then just tell the customer! Apologize, say that we can’t keep up with the production capacity of silicon carbide motors, and that it may be delayed. Compensate the user with points, explain the situation. The user can understand and support it, which can even increase user stickiness and goodwill. Doing things like this only ruins the company’s reputation. Even a marketing manager who has a little knowledge of users wouldn’t do such a stupid thing. From all of these, it can be seen that this is a company that doesn’t need to face customers. Once people climb up high, their feet leave the ground. If they look back, they see smiling faces, but if they look forward, all they see are shareholders’ buttocks.
Sales are sloppy and accidents are not handled responsibly
In my short three months, I have already had three different salespeople and one manager that left! Yes, three. At the beginning, I placed an order in Shenzhen, but because of a “twist egg” activity, I went to the new store in Guangzhou to pick it up. The salesperson there tricked me and said that I should transfer the order back to Shenzhen because it’s more convenient. I asked repeatedly if transferring the order would not affect the original sales performance. He was very certain and said that it would not, and then he picked up my phone and said that we should call 400. Okay, not even five minutes later, the salesperson from Shenzhen called. I can only say that you did a great job, as a customer, I felt like I was caught between your sales commissions. Sure enough, within one month of receiving the commission, the salesperson in Guangzhou ran away and was replaced by a new one. If I didn’t check-in every day, I wouldn’t even know that I was assigned to a new salesperson. I attended an offline activity once, and I can only say that there was no experience and no sense of participation. There was no organization, coordination, or arrangement at all. It just felt like taking a photo and being told to leave. It was chaotic.Talking about the end of this, I want to mention several serious problems:
One is that the mid-range configuration has been downgraded from the promised Pirelli or Dunlop tires to Jiatong, and three solutions you may or may not like have been given. I suggest that you fulfill your promise and provide necessary compensation.
The second is the color difference of the blue car at the time of delivery, which I am not quite sure about, but I know there is such a thing.
The third is about the official app. It has been online for half a year, but the optimization is still rubbish. Even Apple cannot adapt to it. The comment section will crash and cause immediate termination, which is really embarrassing.
The most crucial issue is that you insist on not solving the problem of the top-level configuration’s glaring golden interior that seriously affects driving safety, but instead adding an unnecessary configuration to the new version. You are so captious.
Lastly, here’s a piece of advice for you: treat customers as gods, and only then can a brand keep moving forward. I’m too lazy to attach pictures from my phone. I hope you won’t go bankrupt within three years, otherwise, we won’t be able to find after-sales service.
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.