Download The Small and Medium-sized Enterprise Brand Communication

ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
The Small and Medium-sized Enterprise Brand Communication
Based on the Influenza Virus Propagation Model
HAO Pengfei, LIU Donglei
School of Business, Agricultural University of Hebei, Baoding, China, 071001
Abstract: China's large enterprises has been realized the brand value. But some of China's SMEs do not
realize it is important. Although some realize the important that building the brand, lack of funds and
talents, which hinder its brand communication and promotion. Therefore, brand communications for
small and medium enterprises should explore an effective low-cost way. The paper compared brand
communications for SMEs and spread of pandemic virus. Based on the spread of pandemic virus model,
it propose that the small and medium enterprises can make use of popular mode for the brand
communication.
Keywords: small and medium enterprises, Brand, pandemic virus
1
Introduction
Brand has become the most important vocabulary in the terms of economic management. Sometimes the
brand value surpasses itself for the enterprise or the country. June 28, 2010 in Beijing, the World Brand
Lab (World Brand Lab) issued by China's Top 500 Brands in 2010 data, China Mobile (129.071 billion
yuan), National Grid (126.328 billion yuan), Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (126.019 billion
yuan), CCTV (1135.83 billion), China Life Insurance (85.368 billion yuan), etc. have become the
world-class brands.
Scholars at home and abroad have done extensive research. One of the research field is the concept of
brand communication, it has undergone five major changes, USP stage, stage of brand image, brand
personality stage, stage of brand positioning, brand recognition stage. In the 90's "brand equity" concept
put forward, and with the development, the researchers focused on the brand of the "brand assets"
value-added. And the last few years the concept of strategic management of the brand came into being.
However, China's SMEs to brand awareness have fall behind. Brand Management Consulting Co., Ltd.
on Maidi ShangHai latest survey shows that SMEs in brand management is not optimistic. Only 44.4%
of the SMEs realize that the brand is very important. Second, most SMEs do not set up special
departments for brand management, only 40.7% of SMEs have a special department for brand
management. Only 37% of the SMEs have developed a brand strategy, 10% of SMEs to set up a
dedicated brand manager positions. And only 16% of the SMEs are doing brand tracking. Therefore,
SMEs have to face the problem how to doing brand communications.
2
Brand Communication Mode for the SMEs of China
It has a sophisticated means and methods for the brand communication at the current. Early American
scholars Lasswell gave the 5w mode for commnication. He believes that any such communication
process can be broken down into five parts, namely: (1) ‘who’ (who) - the main transmission, (2)
‘say’(says What) - dissemination of content, (3) ‘by What channel ’(in Which Channel) – Media, (4)
‘to whom’ (toWhom) - Communication object, (5) ‘what kind of effect’ (with What effect) dissemination of results. According to the theory, as a branch of communication ‘brand communication’,
in fact, the propagation process of concrete, the propagation process can be summarized as: ‘brand
owner’ through ‘the media’ to its ‘target audience’ (consumers) pass ‘brand message’ (communication
content), "brand owners" of course, spread the brand message should be concerned about whether the
purpose is expected to achieve after the (communication effects). Enterprises should demonstrate the
210
ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
inherent quality products to consumers. But the products can not speak, it is necessary to enhance
communication with consumers, which advertising is the most effective way. The world's leading
advertising expert Rosser Reeves (1961), published <The Reality of Advertising>, it raised in the unique
selling proposition (USP-Unique Selling Proposition) theory. David Ogilvy, according to their
advertising and brand building , put forward the image theory. Brand building must first decide what
kind of image of the brand, image is the personality. In 1972, AlRies & Jack.Trout in the <Psychological
ad strategy - brand positioning>, proposed a new theory - positioning theory. Positioning theory is mean
that the brand is established a favorable association in the minds of consumers. In an other word, the
consumers remember the brand and like it. At present, some scholars propose an integrated marketing
communication model, relying on advertising, sales promotion, public relations, personal selling and
direct marketing. However, all the ways like advertising, positioning, integrated marketing
communication is significant obstacles for small and medium enterprises.
First, it lack financial support for brand communication to SMEs because of small assets and limited
financing channels. Classification of SMEs in China, mainly based on the number of enterprise
employees, sales, total assets and other indicators, combined with industry characteristic. Such as
industry, SMEs must meet the following conditions: the number of employees is low 2,000 people and
sales less 300 million Yuan, or total assets less 400 million Yuan. The special details see Table 1.
，
，
Table 1 the small and medium-sized enterprise division standard
Sales volume (ten thousand
Profession
Staff population (human)
Yuan)
Total assets (ten
thousand Yuan)
Being lower than
4000
Being lower than
4000
Industry
Being lower than 2000
Being lower than 30000
Architecture industry
Being lower than 3000
Being lower than 30000
Wholesale and retail sales
Being lower than 500
Being lower than 15000
-
Being lower than 3000
Being lower than 30000
-
Being lower than 800
Being lower than 15000
-
Transportation and postal
service industry
Lodging and food and
beverage industry
It can be seen that the overall size of SMEs is small, and does not have ability to competition with large
enterprise. For example, all the top 500 Chinese private enterprises’ profits less than the sum of two
central enterprises such as China Mobile and PetroChina Company Limited. It shows that the size and
competitiveness of SMEs is weak. At the same time, financing ability is limited at present. All the SMEs
financing channels is limited to government support, bank loans, public finance, venture capital,
property rights trading market, a collection of bonds, small loan companies, rural banks and rural
finance small and medium sized financial institutions, credit union, etc. But all the financing
organizations require some mortgage. What the SMEs developed projects or products is prospects, but
the lack of collateral assets. And the traditional industry business, it is difficult to obtain government
support.
Second, SMEs lack the professionals of brand management and communication. Due to historical
conditions, the start is late for China's SMEs. And the professional management staff have not received
systematic education, lack of skills of management. In management, it lack of the institutionalization,
standardization and procedures. And the reward and punishment system is opaque. So it is difficult to
arouse staff’s enthusiasm and creativity. And it is difficult to attract talent to joins the organization.
Some SMEs are Family firm, in management they trust their relatives. And they chooses the talented
person only by the standards of honest and faithful, do not focus on ability. So the staff is difficult to
development and being promoted. At the same time the pay and benefits, compared with large
211
ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
enterprises, is a certain gap. So the brain drain phenomenon is obvious.
Therefore, to small and medium enterprises in the current, capital and talent become the bottleneck for
brand communications. It is necessary to choose, low-cost and meet the current needs of brand
development, ways and modes. The epidemic spread of the virus quickly, and mutual communication is
simple, small and medium enterprises can make use of popular mode of transmission of the virus for the
brand communication.
3
Pandemic Virus Propagation Model
Virus is a kind of non-cell morphology between forms of life and non-life material. Individual is small,
and most of them can be seen by the electron microscope. They only have one type of nucleic acid, or
DNA or RNA. Scientists have long believed that the epidemic could eventually form a particular
transmission. In some incubation period is very short, highly infectious cases, the number of infections
is usually a small number of popular early, and reached a peak point after point in the index rate of
disease would disappear.
By the infectious disease's statistical data carries on processing and the analysis, it found that , in general,
every time the number of people involved the infectious disease is a constant in a given region or nation.
How to explain this phenomenon? After a long research, scientists given viral infection model.
Assumptions: (1) Each patient in unit of time infects the population is a constant K0.
(2) Recording i (t ) expresses the “t” time patient number, without regard to patient
recovery situation, and assuming that the patient does not die during infection. In the initial moment, the
number of patients i (0) = 0
Model: Consider initially patients is 0 , increase in ∆t time number of patients
i (t + ∆ t ) − i(t ) = k 0 i (t ) ∆ t
On both ends of the divided type ∆t, and that ∆t → 0, obtain the following model,
i
i
i (t + ∆ t ) − i(t ) = k 0 i (t ) ∆ t
(1)
i (0) = i0
Solution: (1) the formula separation variable, the integral and leads the starting value, obtains the
solution is
i(t ) = i0 e k 0t
(2)
Analysis: Infectious disease's dissemination is increases according to the exponential function, this
results explained infectious disease's spreading process and infectious disease's proliferation rule.
Number
of
infected
persons
Diffusion time
Figure 1 the spread of the pandemic virus
T1-T2 The healthy persons and the infected person contact few, Viral quantity is very small, Total
infected person quantity are few
T2-T3 The healthy persons and the infected person contact increase, The viral quantity increases, The
infected person to increase greatly
212
ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
T3 The virus propagation rate reaches the maximum value
T3-T4 The healthy individual reduces gradually, the virus propagation rate reduces gradually, terminates
until this diffusion process
4 SME Brand Communications and the Spread of Epidemic Transmission of the
Virus Analogy
SME brand communications process and the spread of pandemic virus spread process is very fitting.
Such as: early in the SME, brand awareness is very low, the amount of information is very small. And
few people know about the brand. With the development of enterprises, some of the consumer use their
products or experience the services. When the consumers know its brand personality and features, they
will deliver information to more people. So the brand awareness further enhance in consumer. Brand
impact and visibility gradually stabilized, it reached the maximum. Then gradually reduce the potential
use of brand, communication diffusion rate decreases until the diffusion process to terminate.
Brand communications process, which depend the core consumer who like the brand's personality,
gradually spread out. More and more consumer know the brand, and more people are affected. This
process is similar to the spread of infectious diseases. Experiences as consumers are as those infected
persons, healthy individuals as potential customers. Infected persons contacts with the health, the health
are infected. The more infected persons, the more virus are increasing. The disease has accelerated the
spread of infection. Until the health of individuals depleted, the diffusion rate will be moderated. It
summarizes the SME brand communications and the spread of epidemic transmission as table 2.
Table 2 SME brand communications analog transmission of the virus spread
Premise: When the pandemic virus long cure cycle or propagation rapidly
SMEs in the early brand communications
Pandemic virus infection
Consumers or who experience
Potential users
Potential users to communicate with those who
experience
Increasing numbers of brand awareness
Accelerating pace of brand communications
Diffusion rate down to a certain point, then the
exponential rate of decrease
Infected person
the health of individuals
Healthy individuals constant contact with infected persons
More and more infected
Accelerating rate of epidemic spread of the virus
Diffusion rate down to a certain point, then the exponential
rate of decrease
5 Brand Communications for SMEs Based on Pandemic Virus Propagation
Model
Based on the small and medium-sized enterprise brand dissemination and the popular viral
dissemination model's analogy, it may reduce the brand dissemination cost and overcome the weakness
of talented person deficient. If the small and medium-sized enterprise can use pandemic virus
dissemination pattern, which can help the SMEs overcome the obstacles of brand communication. It
need pay attention to several aspects of brand communication when use popular virus dissemination
model.
5.1 SMEs how to choose the consumer in initial brand communication
View from the pandemic virus propagation model, the first prerequisite for pandemic virus is a virus
infection. Brand communications for small and medium enterprises, it needs to have the initial period
brand experience, moreover these experience have infect other people's ability. And the SMEs can
depend some of the certain events or certain situation on effect consumer brand awareness and
213
ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
experience. Generally the small and medium-sized enterprise management's scope is this locality or the
region market, the product or the service has certain unique selling point, therefore needs affect this
locality or the region public figure starts to carry on the brand communication. Next, carries on the
brand experience with the aid of this locality and the region market's individual event. For example,
Jinjiang Hotel of Baoding city, with the opportunity of building the China Power Valley of Baoding city,
are building an environment friendly and low carbon hotel. At the hotel exterior, it established solar
electrical energy generation equipment, which can sets up unique brand.
5.2 Choose the low cost channel for brand communication
Epidemic virus infection on the number of susceptible people is the key factor in the spread of pandemic
virus. The consumers which effect the potential people is the key of brand communication. But Internet's
popularization and the technical progress, might let the consumer use the electronic media to carry on
the wide-ranging exchange and the communication. Network provide free exchange of space to
consumers better than a reality. SMEs should make full use of chat rooms, instant messaging, blog,
product review sites and virtual communities to spread the brand. For example a caltech student
established website Buddyzoo.com, this website application society network analysis method supply the
following information: who have the same interest with you, consults own good friend, the estimate
with other people's between distance, and so on. The website user may also see their prestige rank. The
small and medium-sized enterprise may draw support from such platform carry on the brand
communication.
5.3 Grasp the core value, and constantly adjust the brand extension
Epidemic spread of the virus to a certain extent, it will reduce its infectivity, and then gradually
disappear. It is well known, the influenza virus has been at the active condition, threatens the human
health, its basic reason is adjusts the immune body through the unceasing variation, but it affects to the
humanity the core gene actually does not have the change. Small and medium-sized enterprise, which
doing brand communication, should grasp own brand’s core value. Regardless of product outward
appearance, product type substandard in form. But the internal idea, the internal brand's connotation
should continue. For example, the brand, BMW, Mercedes, Volvo, never change the core value although
the products changed many times. Therefore only the core value is invariable, can have the long-term
inheritance brand, and have the extension brand charm. But the brand extension must change, it can be
popular. Otherwise the brand influence would weak gradually. Perspective from the virus host, it should
give the virus opportunity to duplication. And perspective to brand, it is necessary to add the features of
products or services , or rise the technology level. That can cause the consumer to find the new point,
then expand the scope of brand communications.
6
Conclusion
China's SMEs lack of emphasis on brand communication. There are two reasons, on the one hand, it is
the ideas. On the other hand, it is the important reason of the lack of funds and talents. Those reasons
prevent the spread of its brand. According to popular features of the virus spread, it may discover that
the virus's propagation mode can be used as a reference for SMEs brand communication. Therefore, so
long as the small and medium-sized enterprise can find own brand the unique characteristic, it can seize
the target customer. At the same time to seize the key figures and important events, you can quickly
increase brand awareness. At the same time, in order to attraction customer for the long-term, the small
and medium-sized enterprise must inherit the brand the core value. It can change and adjust the brand
extension through constant technical innovation, product innovation. So the China's SMEs can continue
to create popular, create a strong brand.
214
ORIENT ACADEMIC FORUM
References
[1]. Bristor,Julia M.Enhanced explanations of word of mouth communications: The power of
relationships[J].Research in consumer behavior,1990,(4):51-83.
[2]. Li Wei. On Mathematical Model of the Spread of SARS Virus. Journal of Bijie Teachers College,
2004,22(2): 46 52(in Chinese)
[3]. YANG Xue, Qian Ming Hui. The Influence of Online Reputation on Consumer’s Decision,
Contemporary Economy & Management, 2006,28(3):27~31(in Chinese)
[4]. Xu Yanmei, Li Fei, Hao Pengfei Pandemic virus transmission model and the diffusion of
technological innovation, China High Technology Enterprises, 2008,2:65~67(in Chinese)
～
215