Ceramic tile consumption
Latin America: 1,724 million/m2
USA and Canada: 327 million/m2
European Union: 1,393 million/m2
(source: MECS/Acimac 2021).
Latin America is a strategic region in the production and consumption of ceramic tile.
The import volume in this region was 1,942 million dollars and the main importers were Chile, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Peru and Colombia.
(source: trademap.org)
Brazil is the third largest producer of ceramics in the world and is the locomotive of the region, with more than 60 factories and a production of 1,048 million m2 in 2021 (217 million m2 corresponds to the porcelain tile segment)
Brazil exports more than 130 million m2, its main destination being its Latin American neighbors. (source: Anfacer.org.br)
threats
Chinese factories begin to settle in the region.
cost of gas and other alternatives.
Me too product. Copying is a religion in the ceramic industry, which transforms products into commodities.
too many scattered resources on social media.
Opportunities
Determine the potential of each area and each distributor, before setting sales targets.
Support the catalog with adequate physical stock.
Monitoring of the SKUs exhibited and with stock in the distributors.
Debug the SKUs, to increase customer service.
SKU marketing.
Focus on your own websites.
Brazil: porcelain tile evolution
Porcelain tile participation grows steadily. The production graph is expressed in m2. If we had the information in dollars, porcelain tile would occupy a larger space because it far exceeds the price of ceramic.
TOP searched keywords
The client searches for porcelanato on the web, even if they do not buy on the web.
In Google.com/trends, you can analyze the evolution of interest in different words. In January 2004, searches in Brazil were led by “ceramica”, while today it is “porcelanato”.
In the Internet age, marketing must be focused on the generic name of the product (porcelain tile), because the customer does not look for a brand (the knowledge and recognition of brands is very low)
The company that owns more than one brand in the region must divide resources instead of concentrate.
The Hotels.com domain is so universal that it requires no explanation. Expedia (annual revenue for 2022 was $11.667B) acquired the hotels.com domain to dominate in the hyper-competitive world of international tourism. Expedia owns Travelocity, Orbitz, CarRentals.com, etc. but with Hotels.com it leverages a strategic and unique (exclusive) domain.
Through Hotels.com, accommodation is sold in hotels, inns, apartments, and other services that are not owned by them (one SKU for each different room).
A company that manufactures ceramics can send customers to buy through a link, to its distributors, even if it has 20 different brands in each country, as long as the product is called porcelanato and has good visibility on the web.
SKU marketing is not new, it is done every time a link is posted on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc. But the final cost ends up being enormous, and it is invested in a domain that is not its own.
Dominate internet traffic!
Marketing on each SKU, with your own domain!
author: Julio Sol