In the past three years, China's outdoor sports market has seen explosive growth. Diverse outdoor consumption scenarios including cycling, running, swimming, hiking, climbing, and camping are driving outdoor activities from the professional circle to mass consumption, providing new market opportunities for outdoor sports brands.
However, behind the prosperity of the category, there are still many hidden challenges. International brands represented by The North Face are accelerating new product iterations to seize the domestic outdoor market, while domestic emerging brands are capturing the mind of the sinking market with extreme cost-effectiveness.
Image source: Norseland official WeChat
Among a plethora of outdoor brands, NORTHLAND has successfully 'broken through' the competition by accurately grasping the rising market trends, thanks to its high-quality products, services, and the application of clothing big data. According to Zhiyi Big Data,In the fourth quarter of 2024, Norsilan's single-platform product sales exceeded 45 million, with a quarter-on-quarter growth of 218%.。
Looking back on the path of cooperation,Nuo Shi Lan officially joined hands with Zhi Yi Technology in 2023 to carry out close cooperation through products such as Zhi Yi, Zhi Kuan, and Dou Yi.Today, let's talk about the breakthrough journey of Norseland & Zhi Yi in the outdoor track.
Differentiated layout: new growth points
With more and more brands entering the outdoor industry, there has been a significant trend of price polarization in the outdoor industry in recent years.
Taking the outdoor category with the widest and most representative audience, the functional jacket as an example, most international brands (such as North Face, Columbia, etc.) focus on the high-end market, with prices concentrated above 1000 yuan, emphasizing professional fabrics like GORE-TEX PRO to define their consumers through technology and professional scenarios.
On the other side, a large number of private label products are occupying the market below 400 yuan. These private labels mostly use PU coated fabrics, with a waterproof index of only 3000-5000mm, showing a significant functional difference compared to mid-to-high-end products. In the face of diverse needs for sun protection, waterproofing, and breathability in outdoor scenarios, the low-priced private label products have consistently high rates of negative reviews.
According to the price range analysis of red and blue oceans by Zhiyi Big Data, in the past two years, the categories with the highest proportion of new launches in the outdoor jacket category are concentrated in three price ranges: above 1500 yuan, 1000-1500 yuan, and 100-200 yuan. Among them,The new products at low prices have shown a more significant increase year-on-year and month-on-month, with competition being particularly fierce.
Zhi Yi Data: Price range red and blue ocean analysis for outdoor - jacket category
Through insights from big data, NuSkin sharpens its awareness that although the outdoor category is sweeping into a broader mass market, blindly entering the low-price segment and competing with private label products will only lead to an unhealthy price war. Moreover, in the long run, it will lack help in shaping the brand and enhancing the business.
In the high-end market for outdoor jackets and down jackets, although Norsewear has already captured a certain market share, overall the market shares of various brands are stabilizing. The costs for product functionality and technological innovation are also continuously rising, making it increasingly difficult to achieve new breakthrough growth.
On the contrary, among a range of price tiers,The mid-range market, which places a greater emphasis on cost-performance ratio, has experienced a certain degree of supply vacuum.Consumers in this segment have the dual characteristics of demanding product quality and being sensitive to price. Although their needs seem more extensive and harder to satisfy, the size of this group is quite large, making it a typical blue ocean market.
Based on the ongoing insights report on sports and outdoor trends provided by ZhiYi Technology's subsidiary ZhiKuan, the opportunities in the sports and outdoor market in recent years have increasingly concentrated on the age group of young and middle-aged individuals between 18 and 39 years old.This group has a certain purchasing power, and the usage scenarios of the products consider both commuting and outdoor situations. The core factors influencing purchasing decisions focus on functionality and fashion.
Image source: Zhikuan - 2025 Spring/Summer Sports Outdoor Trend Insight Report
Using intelligent insights from big data, Norseland conducted market research on competitors within this price range, established the logic of differentiated competition, and quickly launched a series of products priced between 300 and 700 yuan, including but not limited to research and development advantage products such as jackets, down jackets, soft shell jackets and pants, and casual outdoor clothing.By positioning with differentiated price ranges, we not only avoid the intense competition in the high price segment but also crush the mid-tier market with strong professional performance, seizing new growth points through both price and quality.
Image source: Norsewear Tmall official flagship mid-range price hot-selling product representative
From the full-year data of 2024 (source: Zhiyi), Norsan's sales in the price range of 300-700 increased by over 50% month-on-month, demonstrating ongoing growth potential.
Content marketing: Data empowering influencer collaboration
In addition to adjustments in product planning,Norslan's content marketing has also become an important engine driving significant sales growth.Especially on interest e-commerce platforms represented by Douyin, Nuo Shilan had already reached a cooperation with Zhiyi Technology in 2023, leveraging Douyin products to empower the Douyin ecological operation and using data intelligence to reconstruct the interest e-commerce growth model.
With the help of Douyi's big data analysis function, it is possible toA comprehensive overview analysis of the overall data, trends, and distribution of various subcategories of outdoor products.By filtering single-dimensional data such as live broadcasts, product promotions, and product cards, we assist brands in selecting more suitable sales formats. Additionally, by filtering different attributes, price ranges, brands, and sales channels (store broadcasting or influencer broadcasting), we can timely optimize product selection and sales strategies.
Taking the outdoor sales of the down jacket category, which accounts for over 30% of Douyin's sales, as an example, brands can leverage Douyin.Quickly view hot-selling products, influencers, and brands, benchmark against direct competitors, and monitor their operational dynamics., thereby quickly formulating differentiated marketing strategies.
Image Source: Popular sales products in the outdoor jacket category on Douyin for a certain month.
In terms of influencer marketing, traditional collaborations with influencers rely on manual selection, facing pain points such as the lack of transparency in sales data. At the same time, due to the booming outdoor market, the prices for collaboration with many niche outdoor influencers have skyrocketed. Effective selection and matching have become a significant headache for many brands, including Nuoseran.
Douyi products have proposed targeted solutions for this. In Douyi's Influencer Database, brands can quickly filter for the desired influencers based on diverse tags. For example, if a brand needs to focus on content marketing activities related to women's outdoor casual clothing, they can specify the category, select the influencer's gender and MCN, and choose to prioritize performance-based sales in the way of bringing goods.
Image source: Douyi - Influencer Database
For interested influencers, they can quickly profile their fans using the fan analysis feature and compare it with the fan profile of the brand's store broadcast to accurately target the audience. They can also directly use Douyin to check the other party's recent sales data and video data, analyzing the topic distribution and tone of their content works to see if it aligns with the brand.
Under numerous intelligent screening indicators, brands can spend less time and investment to find influencers who are more cost-effective and align better with their marketing needs.At the same time, there is also objective data monitoring of its sales performance, providing a clear and traceable basis for the iterative strategy of influencer collaboration.
Image source: a certain influencer - recent sales data analysis
By using the Douyin Works Library feature, you can always stay updated on the trending outdoor content on the Douyin platform, break down the data of popular content, analyze the public's points of interest in the comments, and obtain the 'traffic keys' for viral content.
Image source: Douyin - Content library - Popular outdoor theme content
In September 2024, around the upcoming "National Day travel" outdoor scenes of climbing, camping, and hiking, combined with the consumer trend of three-in-one jackets, Northridge closely follows this content trend and collaborates with outdoor influencers like "Sister Q and Lao 6" and "Young Master Fei" to produce video content showcasing their series of products including jackets and sun protection clothing, resulting in multiple viral videos.
Summary
Looking back at the collaboration between Norslan and Zhiyi, we are increasingly finding that.The competition in the clothing industry has clearly entered the age of 'digital infrastructure'.Data intelligence not only brings the immediacy of market response to clothing brands but also represents a paradigm upgrade for decision-making processes.
In the future, Zhiyi will continue to delve into the field of clothing big data, helping more companies achieve digital efficiency and collaborating with various brands to build a new ecosystem for the clothing industry.
