Reinventing the Millennium

Alibaba may personally end the “traditional” group buying business.

On the one hand, this news was hinted by group buying websites, and on the other hand, Alibaba's own executives also made informal statements, so it quickly spread throughout the industry.

Of course, it also attracted the attention of Mi Tuan.

Naturally, Lei Jun, the head of Mi Tuan, brought this matter to the discussion table of "Brother Yi".

The people responsible for contacting the group buying business at Yike are very high-level. YMS Vice President Qi He, Huaxia President Liu Qiangdong, and Supply Chain Vice President Li Songqing have left a deep impression on Lei Jun before.

After Yike's team offered help, Lei Jun became more aware of the importance of both "strategy and operations" and was more willing to listen to the opinions of "Brother Yi".

However, the slight difference this time is that Mr. Qi and Mr. Liu were very calm before, but now they looked obviously solemn after hearing the news about Ali.

"Alibaba's sales team is very powerful. If they really want to do this business themselves, it will definitely be a challenge above Tuanbao.com and Dangtuan.com." Liu Qiangdong gave the positioning.

"The competition for electronic payment should not be underestimated. Alibaba's Alipay is already ahead of our Yipay. It has finally gained some reputation with the help of the Spring Festival Gala. It cannot be beaten back in the interface market where electronic payment is a natural extension." Qi He's first consideration The competition is easy to pay.

"Since it involves Alibaba's Chinese supplier system, it is better to listen to the opinions of professionals. We should prepare early so that no matter when Alibaba ends, we can match the competitiveness." Li Songqing is more pragmatic.

Therefore, Geng Deheng from Lin'an was invited back and attended the meeting to provide opinions on future competition.

However, Geng Deheng participated in the discussion sitting next to Lei Jun.

Even though Mi Tuan was the weaker party in its cooperation with Yike, Geng Deheng still truly felt what Mr. Fang said was “a huge improvement in his career.”

"Alibaba's supply chain is undoubtedly very strong, with strong discipline, strong execution, and strong honed personal abilities." Geng Deheng did not hesitate to give his recognition and praise to his peers, "Moreover, this team of Ali It takes a long time to polish, and the scale is large. Once you make up your mind to compete, you will be your number one opponent."

Geng Deheng noticed that several CEOs were listening carefully and continued: "The number of employees in the Central Supply Department is estimated to be 5,000, which is more than twice our number. This number and system alone are the best in the entire group buying industry."

Yike has 2,000 employees in this area, but its own business still needs manpower support. In addition to allocating manpower, Chiyuan Rice Tuan's more important role is to recruit and train people on site, so that it can support competition in the long term.

Employing people in a different place is only a temporary move. It is better to teach people to fish than to teach them how to fish.

But when it comes to training, Alibaba's Chinese supply system is more unique. It has set up a political commissar system that is more complex than the role of HR to upload and distribute the sales team.

This system originally came from the Ma'an organization's senior management watching "The Sky of History" and "Bright Sword", and later spread to the front-line sales team, and the human resources management system evolved into the political commissar system.

Objectively speaking, Alibaba's political commissar is a business-oriented HR, responsible for human resource management and values ​​management of the business line, and works with business managers at all levels to do team organizational management, employee development, talent training and other aspects of work.

Once you understand this feature of the Zhonggong system, you can better understand its combat effectiveness.

Yike's marketing team is different. The organizational characteristics are still biased toward traditional companies. However, the rapidly growing business, complete team training, and generous stock options are all motivating the team to move forward.

However, if we look at the development of the national group buying market between the two teams, the management needs of at least hundreds of cities will undoubtedly allow Alibaba to maximize its scale advantage.

Geng Deheng combined the entire market and recent observations in Mi Tuan to objectively compare the teams of Yike and Ali, and came to the conclusion that if you want to compete with Ali, the top priority is to expand the scale of the city team.

Based on Yike's rescue plan, 800 people are gradually dispersed to 100 cities, which means 8 people, and 150 cities, which means 5 people. Even if another 200 people are transferred and transferred, they will pale in comparison with Ali.

"If this is a head-on conflict, we will be surrounded during the fight." Geng Deheng was worried.

Just as Lei Jun was about to speak, he suddenly realized that the "frontal conflict" mentioned by Mr. Geng might be literal.

"Alibaba may not be gone for a while. Judging from their repeated search for investment opportunities, they are also hesitant to spread from online to offline." Liu Qiangdong said, "If Ali wants to do group buying, this will be a strategic move." It’s a big transformation, and they may need time to demonstrate it.”

Qi He asked with interest: "Mr. Liu, do you think if Alibaba turns around like this, will it be a good thing or a bad thing?"

Liu Qiangdong thought for a while and replied: "Alibaba has such a team foundation and no shortage of funds. If they are determined to do this and take advantage of the current chaos in the group buying market to find a way out, I think this will be a great benefit for Alibaba. "

He continued: "But if we wait until the group buying market is finalized and Alibaba comes to do it again, it will not be so easy."

The finalization of the group buying market means that companies in this track also have teams that are at least not inferior to Alibaba, otherwise it will be difficult to end such chaotic competition.

Judging from the feedback from the middle and high-level officials sent by Yike, the current group buying opponents are not very successful in the area of ​​urban management. If the Yike team can be combined with Mi Tuan’s strategy to cultivate a group of promotion teams with peace of mind, Mi Tuan’s winning rate will be very high. of.

Li Songqing saw that the topic was going sideways and reminded him, "Let's talk about Ali's fate."

The conference room returned to quiet thinking.

After a while, Liu Qiangdong said: "Whether Alibaba is going away or not, Mi Tuan has to do this. Let's assume that it will start making it next month. For now... let's speculate on other competitors first."

"I heard that Tuanbao.com has received financing from abroad." Lei Jun heard this and mentioned Tuanbao.com, which is now the number one in the market.

This news is most likely true because of the encouragement from within Tuanbao.

It is good news for startups to obtain financing, which can greatly boost morale, especially for teams like Tuanbao that do not have the support of giants.

Liu Qiangdong nodded: "Tuanbao is so aggressive. It will be even more aggressive after it gets the money. This financing is a raging fire. Once the scale of the city increases, the cost rises rapidly. If it encounters a lack of capital again, it will be in trouble." .”

The group buying market has catalyzed hundreds of projects in half a year. A very important factor is the entry of capital into the market, which is a kind of situational inflatedness.

When there is hot speculation, there will be cold. The alternation of hot and cold will make the company sick.

What can control the company's pace of expansion may be a minor illness, but what cannot be controlled may be fatal.

In Liu Qiangdong’s view, Tuanbao.com is so aggressive and reportedly refuses Alibaba’s investment, so the future situation is still very dangerous.

"We remain aggressive above the average line, and we don't have to burn money to the maximum. We are still participating in the hype." Lei Jun said this.

Miduan.com is also doing this now. When peers get cash back, they also get cash back. The cash back is not as strong as possible, forcing the front ones to go faster and forcing the back ones to burn as well. In this way, we wait for the cycle to rise and fall.

"Well, I think Tuanbao.com seems to have started poaching people with high salaries. Don't be afraid of this part. As long as the main business can support it, it's no problem to leave a few people." Liu Qiangdong pondered, "I'll apply later and let Sina If they push Tuanbao and Dangtuan more to poach people with high salaries, this will be a great stimulus to their old employees.”

Poaching people with double or triple salary is not a long-term move, and such a figure can only be poaching, and it is impossible to raise the wages of old employees together.

Outsiders are valuable, what should the old people who suffer hardships think about it?

Even if internal problems can be temporarily suppressed, this real difference in treatment cannot be repaired. If there is another alternation of hot and cold, it may collapse on its own.

External problems, internal development, the so-called bystander knows, the discussion between the three senior executives of Yike and Geng Deheng gave Lei Jun a sense of... pleasure of everyone working together.

When the discussion was over, Lei Jun finally asked: "When will Mr. Fang come back?"

"Maybe I can come back from Luzhou the day after tomorrow and develop step by step." Qi He replied.

Although Ali might end, Mr. Fang was still busy with the technical meeting of Luzhou Ice Core. It was said to be very important. He just asked about the situation on the phone.

Lei Jun nodded, calculating the time in his mind, planning to come back to see Mr. Fang in two days, just in time to finalize Geng Deheng's matters.

On April 5, Fang Zhuo returned to Shanghai from Luzhou in a normal mood.

Ice Core has major differences regarding the technology of future 28nm process technology, and the conflicting internal views put Fang Zhuo under considerable pressure.

Good news: This is not a confrontation over personnel or management. Everyone is arguing based on technical skills.

Bad news: It might as well be a conflict in personnel and management. Fang Zhuo is more confident in solving this aspect.

In the afternoon when he arrived in Shanghai, Fang Zhuo called Geng Deheng and had a long chat with him. One of the key points was the scale of front-line work.

It is right to fight, which is the foundation of Geng Deheng and his colleagues.

But how to pay attention to the scale and propriety of fighting? Only those who can grasp this can move forward and go further.

After meeting Geng Deheng, he met Lei Jun again.

The first thing Lei Jun did was talk about Mr. Geng, whom he admired very much.

"I have talked with Mr. Geng and I hope he can take up the position of vice president of sales and comprehensively build Mi Tuan's urban team." Lei Jun was very formal.

"This is a challenge for him. I hope he and Mi Tuan can make progress together." Fang Zhuo did not plan to talk more about "former employees" in front of Mr. Lei, nor did he immediately talk about Ali Tiejun, but instead extracted a report from Yike's front-line feedback .

He handed the document forward and said, "Mr. Lei, Yi Ke has made some observations about the front line of the rice regiment these days. I think it is worth your reading."

Lei Jun was a little surprised, took the document and read it carefully.

It is obvious that Yike's first-line feedback is not written by one person. There are many descriptions of business in different cities, as well as different tones and writing styles.

but……

Really top-notch.

"I think there is a problem with this group buying coupon that many customers have complained about. The coupon is wasted when it expires. The last time I saw a person buy 2 birthday cake coupons for 100 yuan, he said that he had I used one for my birthday and originally wanted to give the second one to a friend, but I didn’t use it and it was wasted later.”

"Mi Tuan's service was a bit slow. More than one customer had objections to the merchant. He called Mi Tuan's customer service for a long time but couldn't get through. Then I watched him uninstall Mi Tuan on his phone."

Lei Jun looked at it carefully, his expression became solemn.

After a while, he raised his head and said, "Mr. Fang, can I take this document back to read?"

Fang Zhuo nodded: "No problem."

Then, he took out another document and handed it forward: "Here's another one, it's about a merchant. You can take it back with you and read it."

Lei Jun: "..."

Yike is very particular about providing feedback from users and merchants separately.

He took the second copy and found that there was President Fang's comment on it - users first, merchants second. It is necessary to improve both the user experience and the merchant experience. In fact, the latter was not paid enough attention to.

This feedback is a little thinner.

The top item is the settlement between merchants and Mi Tuan. This is the chat content that frontline staff hear most frequently from merchants.

"The feedback from frontline workers is relatively real. This is something Mi Tuan needs to pay attention to. Mi Tuan is an intermediate platform and must serve both ends well. This can be regarded as self-improvement."

"If you want to be the leader in the industry, apart from the size of the city, I think that in this chaotic competitive stage, proposing a set of effective industry standards is very inspiring."

Fang Zhuo said thoughtfully.

Lei Jun asked sincerely: "Mr. Fang, do you have any suggestions?"

Fang Zhuo shook his head: "I haven't thought about it recently. It's just the process and real convenience. For example, we can set up an automatic payment system with merchants. This is better than human governance. These are all things that require you, Mr. Lei." Much thought.”

Lei Jun was looking at the second document just now, and what he was really thinking about was the personnel who would interface with the merchants...

He nodded and planned to go back to brainstorm ideas and then personally visit the front lines to listen to the real voices of the merchants. This might give a more intuitive feeling than reading documents.

Lei Jun talked about his thoughts for a few words, but still asked about Ali matters that concerned him very much, and wanted to know Mr. Fang's thoughts on this.

"This competition from Alibaba." Fang Zhuo thought and pondered, "Its team is obvious to all. There is no need to doubt its ability. We have to compete head-on with them..."

It takes a lot of work to compete head-to-head with them.

but……

Fang Zhuo habitually puts problems on another level.

Is it okay not to compete head-on?

Alibaba's Chinese supply team is indeed very powerful, but the ending of this team was not happy.

Didn’t Wei Zhe, the president of Alibaba, just resign sadly?

Fang Zhuo remembered this.

His thoughts were running, and when he saw Lei Jun's eyes, he smiled: "Mr. Lei, I just came back from Luzhou. This matter is not easy to handle. I will study it."

Lei Jun looked at the "Heng Lung Hero" under "Heng Lung Hero", and suddenly felt a sense of peace in his heart. Mr. Fang had to study it, and he would be able to come up with something no matter what.