On November 17th, the 21st Guangzhou International Auto Show officially opened. The development of smart cars and new energy vehicles is not only a revolution in transportation, but also a change in lifestyle and mindset. With the continuous upgrading of competition in new energy vehicles, more new products and technologies will appear before the public. This year’s Guangzhou Auto Show will be themed “New Technology, New Life,” showcasing the latest technological achievements brought about by the development of smart cars, as well as the new changes it brings to consumers. In response to this, different executives have expressed their views. Jin Xin, Deputy General Manager of EXEED Marketing Center, said that EXEED’s globalization strategy is centered around achieving comprehensive brand value output through technological and cultural confidence, ultimately achieving the goal of going out, going in, and staying. EXEED also has a dedicated business unit for the EXEED brand overseas. Since its establishment in 2019, EXEED has targeted the global market. It has already entered key markets in Eastern Europe, South America, the Middle East, and the global user base for the EXEED brand has exceeded 180,000.
Interview transcript: Sina Auto: Mr. Jin, hello. In August, you attended the event at Wuhan Xingjiyuan. I think Mr. Yin mentioned a pretty ambitious goal at the time. Jin Xin: Yes. Sina Auto: 500,000, quite intimidating. Jin Xin: Yes, there is actually logic behind it. We later communicated with Mr. Yin, and he actually hopes to construct an entire brand cluster for Xingtu, including domestic and international aspects, as well as other derivatives on the entire platform. This is roughly the idea. Sina Auto: So is this considered a KPI? Jin Xin: It’s a blueprint. Sina Auto: Actually, Xingjiyuan is also considered officially listed. Jin Xin: Pre-sale. Sina Auto: Sorry, my mistake. I’ll just briefly mention it to you. On that day, Professor Chen Yao mentioned a concept called user retention, which actually focuses more on these self-media and media friends. He also mentioned a concept based on retention, with a T+2 and T+5. What does T+2 mean? It refers to the 2 months before the listing event. T+5 refers to the 5 months after the listing. How do we view the concept of retention in terms of whether the KOL who have been paying attention to us before the listing day also paid attention to the content on that day? In other words, the proportion of people who helped us with pre-heating information before the listing and continued the event on the listing day is very important. Because if you have enough content arranged in T+2 and more people helping with pre-heating, we will accumulate a good effect on the listing day. Because through some data, we will find that the number of bloggers during the pre-heating period and on the listing day is showing an exponential growth trend, roughly reaching a fusion rate of over 60%. What is the concept of T+5? T+5 refers to how many KOLs we may have on the listing day, say 100. Then in the month after the listing, how many of these 100 KOLs are still paying attention. In the second month, how many people are still paying attention to our content? We are currently in the pre-sale stage of Xingjiyuan, which I think is the concept of T. Do we have a plan or strategy for the continuous promotion of this product in the next 5 months? Jin Xin: I think Teacher Chen Yao’s idea is quite good, because in the past we have always used NPS as an indicator, including the user friendship model. Why has it been called “blind, fixed, big, and traded” for the past few years? It’s a kind of action breakdown, starting with the blind fix, some opinions leaders around this brand and product, doing a long-term, continuous communication for a period of time, even using some APP points, gifts to maintain user stickiness and participation. After the product is launched, will these early intended users, KOCs, turn into car owners, and will KOCs continue to play this role? I think Teacher Chen Yao’s proposal may take this concept to a higher level. It starts to focus on overall conversion and attention from T+2, T-2, including some media opinion leaders, to T+5. I think it’s a relatively rational concept, because in reality, you can see the market heat and marketing methods of a product after about three months, T+5 is basically enough to do almost two reviews. In this process, we can test all of our marketing actions, this set of indicators, and the underlying logic and system. I think it’s worth learning. For Xingjiyuan, we are still in the T stage, from pre-sale to official launch. We will make this time very short, I expect it to be completed in about a month, maybe within 20 days, to increase the attention from preheating to launch, and then reach a peak. In the future, it usually climbs to the peak quickly, and then comes down quickly. At this time, there should be several ways to do it. One approach is actually to keep up with media placement, and the other is to list and test drive in offline areas, so we are now doing all the basic actions in place, that is, to build a core around the user experience, including the super APP, to carry out online continuous dissemination, including some media dissemination; Offline, we will do more test drives around the product and some experiences around the channel flow field. In this, we have our own expected conversion rate, especially the conversion rate of reserved users like NPS. I expect to achieve about 30%; for some hesitant users, I also hope to complete the conversion within 3-5 months, so as to increase the overall ratio to 50%. At the same time, after our product is officially launched, the NPS referral rate for car purchase users, I also hope to achieve about 30% in about 5 months. I don’t know if I’m clear when I say this. Sina Auto: I roughly understand, but also don’t understand. This is actually a question beyond my outline. Can we discuss whether you think our current promotion is based on the lifecycle of a single car model, and whether there are other content aspects, such as focusing on safety this month, technology next month, and larger models in the third month? Jin Xin: Actually, we are doing this now. As you just said, in August, we are actually promoting intelligence and AI models, and in September, we are focusing on the overall interior and exterior design. Before that, we were actually promoting the advantages of the Star Era platform itself. In November, after the pre-sale, we immediately did another important round of communication on safety, basically dismantling the core selling points of the product. When it is launched, we will do a relatively complete, scene-based product interpretation. This is our rhythm. In the car market, product strength detonates brand strength, driving the brand upwards has become a new trend. The core of leading the product trend and the big trend of the brand is the key to the development of the car company. As a high-end brand in the layout of the star market, the main cornerstone of the brand advancement, the current situation is that product strength is leading brand strength. The situation is that product strength and brand strength have not yet fully resonated, and brand strength needs to be rapidly improved. As Star Market is still a young brand, its brand influence is relatively weak, which to a certain extent restricts the effectiveness of Star Market’s product strength. Therefore, this requires everyone, including our media friends, to protect and help Star Market brand grow rapidly. Only when the brand strength and product strength of Star Market resonate with each other, can Star Market truly achieve success and become the true king of the “high-end auto market.” Sina Auto: I understand that Chery actually has another main feature. When people talk about Chery, its overseas sales are very good, probably the best in China. Jin Xin: Yes. Sina Auto: How is Star Market planned overseas? Jin Xin: Star Market’s globalization strategy is based on achieving the comprehensive output of brand value through technological confidence and cultural confidence, ultimately achieving the purpose of going out, coming in, and staying. Since its establishment in 2019, Star Market has entered the global market and has already entered key markets in Eastern Europe, South America, and the Middle East. The global users of Star Market brand have exceeded 180,000. In terms of synergy, during the National Day, we participated in the Geneva Motor Show, which was a joint effort between Star Market domestic and overseas. We took the Star Market Star Era ES and ET models over, and also launched the regional Yao Guang model at the same time. In terms of division of labor, I think we have achieved the maximum possible sharing. In the wave of the new technological revolution, Xingtu will use a global perspective to create its products for the global market with international high-quality standards, allowing “Made in China” to be marketed globally. We will use continuous technological evolution and value enhancement to lead China’s high-end automobile brands to continue to rise and step onto the world stage. Sina Auto: Mr. Jin, this will be our final question. Nowadays, cars are becoming increasingly digital, more and more like a third space for mobile phones, or an extension of our bodies. If mobile phones extend our hands, cars might become an extension of our feet. In this state, what changes do you expect this car to bring to people’s lives after the integration of AI into our products? Jin Xin: This is a profound question. At Xingtu, we have developed the LION AI large model, which includes a part of iFLYTEK’s large model, mainly in the areas of speech recognition and multi-modal. But we have constructed the overall large model. Before the iFLYTEK conference on August 17th, I did not have a deep understanding of this, but during that conference, I had exchanges with many doctors, including our internal experts in intelligence, as well as many experts from iFLYTEK, which was very inspiring for the future development of cars. Just as you mentioned, hands and feet, mobile phones and cars, I feel that AI may become a shadow or a partner in the future. I’ll give you a small example, just take myself for instance. My daughter is in elementary school, and if she had LION AI at this stage, LION AI would also be at the stage of a child. As communication increases, LION AI may initially recite Tang poems and learn English, just simple conversations. However, as the understanding deepens, it will understand the child better than the father or mother; in the future, when the car hardware is replaced, this companion will accompany the child, helping her with advice and analysis when she is in her teens and going to college, or when she has to start dating. This is just a small example that makes me understand LION AI differently. It understands you, it knows what it sees, and its multi-modal generation may be more concrete. Perhaps the biggest revolution in the future is that you will have a friend who understands you better than your parents. In short, the rise of the new energy vehicle market has opened up unprecedented opportunities for the high-end development of our independent brands. In this market, our independent brand car companies are leaders in technological innovation. We have the advantage of leading technology and are advocates and initiators of new technological changes, focusing on the high-end market where we have a technological advantage. Sina Auto: I find this terrifying. If I become friends with my car and then have to change it, if I switch to another brand, I might lose a friend. Jin Xin: Yes, that’s possible. I remember one time a foreign media interviewed Musk and asked about the topic of AI replacing humans. Musk didn’t answer for almost fifty seconds or a minute. He thinks it’s possible, but that wasn’t his original intention when promoting AI. I believe as long as it is a useful tool that provides us with more valuable help, it is valuable. Sina Auto: That’s good. The scenario you just mentioned, because I’ve been thinking about how AI can empower cars. The way you just said it, I’m looking forward to what the future will bring. Jin Xin: Just like I have been using Apple for many years, my whole family uses Apple. I’m not saying that Huawei is not good, I also used Huawei for a while, but I switched back to Apple. I feel that whether it’s the iPhone 11 or the iPhone 15 update, my reliance and stickiness to it is very high, and it has influenced my whole family, because I believe it understands my habits very well. Sina Auto: Same here, I am also like that. Jin Xin: The new energy era has given China the opportunity to catch up in the high-end self-owned sector. Huawei is actually constructing this kind of advantage in this aspect. I believe that in the future, it may use this form to build an ecosystem, which is very powerful and somewhat scary. Only by building an ecosystem can it truly stick to you. Sina Auto: Alright, we’ll end our conversation here today. Thank you.