On the road to success, Nike has been dedicated

"Make invisible visible", this is Nike's digital marketing secret.

Running was a lonely thing. As the writer Murakami Murakami in that book when I talk about running, I say: it doesn't need a partner or an opponent, or a special outfit, not a particular place. As long as there is a pair of shoes suitable for running, you can go to the place of love and how long you run.

Since 2006, Nike has been trying to change that. Nike recently released a new product called the Fuel Wristband (FuelBand), priced at $149, claiming to be the biggest innovation since Nike air shoes, and 2 months later, Nike is partnering with a fast-growing private social application path for global users If you've already downloaded Nike + GPS apps, you can simply drag a small string on your smartphone to associate it with the path, which means your running data can be updated in real time to your chosen circle of friends.

The research and collaboration comes from a secret department at Nike's headquarters in Oregon State Beaverton, USA, and according to the FT, even Nike employees are not sure what the staff are doing. There was a sign on the front door: "Forbidden Area: we heard you knock, but we can't let you in." ”

It is the Nike Digital sports department (Nike Digital QSL), the entire team has 240 people, the most famous product is Nike. Since 2006, this chip, which is larger than the adult thumb lid, has been sold in major Apple stores around the world. If you put it in a Nike special running shoe, it can track your movement data including time, distance, and energy consumption, and encourage you to transfer the data to nikeplus.com, where you can get some training advice and share your income with your friends. Since then, Nike has released apps for Nike GPS and Nike training, as well as a device called Nike Sportwatch GPS and Nike basketball for specialized areas. Their function is similar to the original Nike chip: tracking, recording and sharing.

"We have such a feeling, we know that in the future customers in the process of participating in the use of this product, he will want to get a richer product experience, so we also want to give our products such a capability, through the digital to provide consumers with a richer experience, as today we show the technology, It is now visible that you have seen some of the previously invisible information. Nike brand president Charlie Denson said to the first financial weekly.

Over the past 3 years, Nike's advertising budget for traditional media has fallen by 40%, although its marketing budget reached a record 2.4 billion trillion dollars in 2011. Nike's unconventional marketing budget in 2010 amounted to $800 million trillion, and the proportion of the total marketing budget ranked first among us advertisers, according to Advertising Age, a survey firm. "Michael Jordan's fire, his shoes will fire" era has passed, behind the one reason is that its core users of young people from the television moved to the Internet. Nike is not content to influence this group of people through 4A companies, who want to have direct relationships with customers, stay in their lives, master their data, accurately grasp their needs and influence them more effectively.

In other words, Nike's development of the accessories business is not about using it to make money, although 1000 yuan to buy a FuelBand is not really cheap consumption, but Nike is more concerned about building a digital and real customer relationship, and constantly bring new customers, creating brand loyalty. A Nike store chief in Beijing told Caijing Weekly that, in the case of the Beijing market, about 40% of Nike users bought Nike-branded running shoes and continued to buy other equipment.

According to Nike's figures, about 5 million runners worldwide now log on to the Nike website and look at their performance. If you count Facebook and Twitter fans, Nike has a huge social network: it has had 200 million of people's attention in the past, and it is now easy for Nike to reach this order of magnitude every day in the American Super Bowl Bowl. Although there is no financial detail about Nike, analysts say the number of Nike members increased by 55% in 2011, while their running revenues rose by as much as 30% to 2.8 billion dollars, Nike.

The social network could include Nike-sponsored star Kobe Bryant, as well as ordinary Chinese runner Chiai and Shu.

A while ago, Chiai, 28, bought a Nike wrist strap and chip at the Sanlitun Nike store in Sanlitun, Beijing. Every time he goes out running, he sets a good distance: from agricultural University to Xidan. Data such as the speed, heat, and distance of the wrist strap are constantly updated to remind him of the difference between the set goals.

Chiai will not only upload his own movement data to Nike, he also signed up for the activities of the Nike City: People in every city will upload their running data within a specified time to see which city accumulates long distances. Nike organized similar activities in London in 2010. The Nike Grid event was launched on Facebook and participants were required to go to different locations in the city to get points. Participants in the event launched a 15-day event that was equivalent to half a circle around the Earth: 12,500 miles (equivalent to 20,200 km).

The Shu of Wuhan is Nike Sportwatch GPS. She runs three to four times a week, half an hour each time. Sportwatch must also be used in conjunction with the chip, according to Shu before the frequency of use, her left foot insole underneath the Nike chip life expectancy of about one year. Because she later took part in the Han Street night run at the Nike Run Club, the time was shortened.

With Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, the number of cities involved in night running activities, and Shu together to participate in Wuhan night running activities are not much. Despite the impact of the campaign on the users of such Nike products, Nike invited Wuhan star Li Na for its first night run in the summer of 2011, when nearly 600 of the running friends attended the event. But in this year's event, the number of night-running participants stabilized at forty or fifty, with the majority of companies aged 25 to 30.

Shu not how to see the use of Nike Sportswatch GPS similar. About 10 people in the whole night-running team used Nike products, but most of them were professionally related to sports, such as gym coaches and sports instructors, who were close to professional running mates. But there are a lot of people who have Nike GPS on their iphones. Shu and run friends compare who runs the longest distance, consumes the most calories, "Sometimes it will also discuss the measurement of the accuracy of the distance, the distance is not the correct problem." "The results will eventually get to the Nike community and she will" look at her rankings, but not so much, "Shu told the first financial weekly.

If you share Nike data on Facebook, you'll know another social feature of Nike GPS: Nike launches the Nike GPS cheer Me on plugin, connects it to the Facebook account, and your running status updates to your account in real time, Friends can comment and click on a "Clap" button. Amazingly, you can hear the applause of your friends in the music when you run. As runners continue to upload their own running routes, Nike also has a database of the best running routes in major cities.

As Nike releases the fuel wristband: everything is measurable (modifiable Counts). Although from a technical standpoint, the fuel wristband has not become stronger it's just a black-gray wrist strap with 20 miniature LEDs, connected by Bluetooth to the iphone, with a chip called a three-axis accelerator that automatically matches a variety of motion according to your actions. Things have become interesting from here, and the fuel wristband is not just a sports accessory that measures running or basketball, it measures all the "sports": washing dishes, climbing stairs, playing Xbox Kinect and clubbing. This means that you can always wear this thing, and the LED lights flashing from red to green means you are consuming more and more calories.

Nike doesn't like calories, which is called "Fuel value" (nikefuel). "We want to create a universal unit of energy so you can always realize how active you are in doing sports," he said. Nike User Experience director Ricky Engelberg, in an interview with the Fast Company, said: "NikeFuel provides a standardized unit of measurement, that is, the same activity always gets the same score regardless of the body structure." ”

The fuel wristband erases the gap between the Nike product lines and provides a measure of the user's performance. Previously Nike chips and Nike GPS could only measure running data, while Nike basketball could record your bounce record, Nike Training's app had a separate operating interface. The fuel wristband solves this problem with a simple interactive approach: Different color LED lights and uniform fuel values. On Nike's Web site, you can see the total amount of Nike user fuel worth rolling for 24 hours.

"Our users include both 17-year-old basketball kids and 60-year-old women," he said. Nike and Nike FuelBand to meet people's daily movement needs. Nike Footwear Research and Development director Tony Bignell told the first financial weekly.

The fuel wristband does extend the boundaries of motion to the universal health sector: since doing everything can calculate the energy consumed, you will not be able to focus on how much fuel you consume every day. While this does not fundamentally change the basis of social networking: for people who are not so gregarious, you used to run a lap and then update your running distance and time on the path, and you're updating a fuel value.

June 29, Nike will release and Nike training and Nike basketball application matching footwear products. This is the company's original intention. Chiai may pay attention to the news, he said to go out for a run, stop to rest when the communication is equipment, "what track more accurate, and what more dazzling shoes." "But in London's Nike, many people say that Nike is often the most attractive to entry-level users, and once they become professional, consumers will turn to a smaller sports brand that doesn't matter, and Nike has always considered itself a fashion company."