Top 10 Marketing Case Studies of 2021

2021 is coming to an end.

This year can be said to be a year of constant turmoil in the hot searches. There were big melons falling, internet celebrity brands falling, brainwashing waves surging, domestic product sentiments exploding, and the sudden explosion of the metaverse...

Based on reports and insights throughout the year, Marketing Frontline will now take you through a review of the top marketing cases of 2021:

1. Synthetic Watermelon: Short-lived Viral Spread

At the beginning of 2021, a series of big melons fell from the sky, including Zheng Shuang abandoning a surrogate child, Hua Chenyu and Zhang Bichen admitting to having a child out of wedlock... These laid the first footnote for the year of melons.

Under the rain of melons, another big watermelon suddenly appeared on the hot search. A small game called "Synthesize Big Watermelon" suddenly dominated the screen. For a while, if you haven't played "Synthesize Big Watermelon", you will feel out of date?

Marketing inspiration:

The essence of the screen-sweeping "Synthetic Watermelon" is the combination of the viral properties and the addictive mechanism of the Candy Crush game. The first is that the watermelon in the atmosphere of eating watermelon has its own "stalk";

The second is that the game has a very low cognitive cost, allowing everyone to quickly get started;

The third is the addictiveness of the game mechanics, with the immediate feedback of the synthesis and the popping sound of the balloons triggering the action;

Fourth, the goal of the big watermelon and the sunk cost of the synthetic fruit make people persist;

The fifth is a series of behaviors such as showing off scores and complaining, which form secondary dissemination, trigger the distribution of social currency, and encourage the public to follow suit.

The addictive mechanism, coupled with the triggering of secondary dissemination of social currency, made a viral spread possible, but this fierce screen-sweeping was like a gale, which left little trace after it passed. Therefore, for marketing, the so-called viral spread must be marked in advance, otherwise it will just be a bubble.

2. Sanxingdui’s awakening shocked the world: cross-border marketing of “national treasure internet celebrities”

It has been sleeping for thousands of years and secretly glowing, and when it wakes up, it shocks the world. When talking about the national treasures of Sanxingdui that have been all over the screen this year, their names must be mentioned.

First, it did not sleep for thousands of years, and then it opened several blind boxes of national treasures in one breath, revealing new beautiful golden masks, bronze sacred trees, ivory, large-mouthed vases, silk relics..., which aroused the admiration of the whole nation.

Then it started a crazy cross-border and dissemination, from emoticons to blind boxes, music, ice cream, cosmetics, moon cakes...

One can’t help but sigh: once the national treasure becomes popular, no one can resist it!

Marketing inspiration:

The reason why Sanxingdui has become so popular this year, in addition to the promotion of official media, is more importantly because Sanxingdui has set off a cross-border national trend.

These cross-border projects are not uncommon. In the past two years, the Forbidden City and Dunhuang have set off trends. The popularity of Sanxingdui comes from the overall marketing strategy of these cross-border projects:

First of all, Sanxingdui quickly subverted the image of a "national treasure" through social currencies such as emoticons and jokes that can spread quickly, making it interesting for young people.

Then, by playing rap, releasing blind boxes and other forms of youth fashion, it narrowed the distance with the current young people and became an IP that plays with them;

Then, Sanxingdui ice cream was used to lead the holiday check-in craze and establish its status as a trendy IP.

Finally, through regular cross-border cultural and creative products such as cosmetics and mooncakes, the IP influence is continuously released and the IP potential is accumulated.

3. “Blind Ticket Box” Marketing

The impact of the epidemic has dealt a heavy blow to the aviation industry. In order to save themselves, major platforms and airlines have also begun to work hard on marketing. Last year, free flight became a huge hit. This year, major platforms used the popular blind box marketing as a model to come up with new low-priced "air ticket blind box" tactics, bringing this year's blind box marketing to a carnival peak.

Marketing inspiration:

The essence of blind box marketing is the repackaging of limited-time flash sales.

The reason why it is so attractive is that, on the one hand, the super low price makes people excited, and on the other hand, the limited hunger marketing and random rewards of blind boxes make people fascinating.

When users' expectations match the blind box surprises provided by the brand, blind boxes can indeed help the brand to achieve self-propagation.

However, it should be noted that if the blind boxes provided by the brand fail to meet user expectations, those users who like to "complain" will also create a negative effect as the brand expects. Therefore, blind box marketing has become a popular marketing method at present. Brands use this method to build reputation and attract traffic rather than sell products.

4. Xiaomi spent 2 million yuan to change its logo - a marketing campaign to promote "freeloading"

Xiaomi's new LOGO at the beginning of this year sparked heated discussions, not because of the weird design, but because it was rumored to have taken three years and cost 2 million yuan, but in the end the design was in vain, with the right angles simply becoming rounded? ? ?

For a while, the whole network mocked Xiaomi, saying that they spent 2 million yuan to improve something useless and were being charged an IQ tax...

Marketing revelation: Do you think Lei Jun really got away with it for free? When you thought you had seen through the scam and reminded Lei Jun to call the police; when you mocked Xiaomi for being charged an IQ tax and desperately produced jokes; when you happily watched the show and liked, commented and forwarded it; when countless media outlets could not help but write about this topic; Xiaomi had already been on the hot search list enough with this topic, and it had also driven the spread of the topic of Xiaomi's new mobile phone and car manufacturing.

This is not Lei Jun being taken advantage of for free, it is clearly us who are being taken advantage of for free. This is a marketing campaign triggered by "taking advantage of for free".

In fact, regardless of whether Lei Jun truly agrees with Kenya Hara’s new logo design, the short-term marketing value of this wave alone is more than 2 million yuan! 2 million yuan was enough to buy the design concept + the endorsement of a master + the hot topic. The logo design was basically given for free. Lei Jun has taken event marketing to the extreme!

5. Mixue Bingcheng Tianlan - a theme song "bloodbathed" the entire network

"You love me, I love you, Mixue Bingcheng is so sweet~" In 2021, there should be no one who has not been "brainwashed" by this magical theme song of Mixue Bingcheng, right?

An addictive theme song of Mixue Bingcheng, which broke out of Bilibili and successfully "swept" all major platforms, was heard on major video platforms in the second half of the year.

Marketing Inspiration: The reason why Mixue Bingcheng’s theme song in 2021 was able to "swamp" the entire network is not only because of the magic and melody of the theme song itself. The key lies in the underlying logic of communication: playing with memes.

There are two stages in total: the first stage was driven by the rule of individual characters and the secondary creation of the UP master of Station B, which made the magical theme song even more bizarre and caused widespread dissemination;

In the second stage, we successfully broke the circle through social death marketing. The rumor that "sing the theme song in the store can get a free meal" came from somewhere, so video creators on short video platforms such as Tik Tok went to check in and perform "social death scenes", which is similar to the previous "social death" collaboration between KFC and the mobile game Genshin Impact, "Meet in another world, enjoy delicious food" to exchange prizes.

The exciting "social death" not only attracted a large number of netizens to watch and like, but also made many people start to follow suit and shoot, instantly detonating traffic. When combined with the popularity of the theme song of Bilibili, do you think it would not "wash the entire network"?

The popularity of Mixue Bingcheng is by no means inexplicable. Behind it is the interlocking of different content dissemination strategies of the two major platforms, Bilibili and Douyin!

6. Erke Hongxing's donations are a big hit - setting off a wild consumption trend of domestic products

The Henan flood that affected countless Chinese people made all Chinese people understand: When the critical moment comes, we will know that only truly patriotic companies will go all out to help the Chinese people!

As a result, a large number of conscientious companies led by Hongxing Erke became popular, and the public rushed into the live broadcast room with "wild consumption" in return!

Marketing inspiration:

But then again, there were many companies that donated money to the Henan flood, so why did Erke become the most popular?

There are three major marketing logics behind it:

1. Anti-business irrationality

As many netizens said, the reason they were moved was that Erke had not been doing very well in recent years, and as a physical enterprise, it was not easy to make money. However, when the country was in trouble, it stepped forward without hesitation and donated 50 million yuan at once.

You know, according to the 2020 financial report, although Erke's revenue was 2.8 billion, its net profit was -220 million. This all-out behavior is obviously somewhat anti-commercial and irrational, and this irrationality is in sharp contrast to the indifference of international big brands, forming a huge contrast;

Moreover, Chinese people believe in "returning a favor" . Since you are so generous, we netizens should also treat you generously. So there was a series of membership subscriptions, hot searches, and influx into the live broadcast room. This is a common emotional response!

2. The real story behind the silent donation

In addition to this spirit of giving everything that infected netizens, more importantly, under this behavior, netizens dug out the entrepreneurial story of the brand’s boss: when Hongxing Erke started its business, it also experienced the factory shoes being soaked by floods overnight.

This undoubtedly provides a reasonable basis for Erke's silent donation. Not only did it completely eliminate the suspicion of intentional manipulation, but it also added a touching story to the behavior: "The boss of Erke has been caught in the rain himself, so this time he wanted to hold an umbrella for others."

How can this real behavior that comes from experience not be moving?

3. Stick to the bottom line and exchange conscience for sincerity

In addition, what is admirable is that after the explosion, the reactions and behaviors of Hongxing Erke’s boss and anchor are sincere enough.

When netizens were upset for Hongxing Erke and were frantically cheering for it to become a hot topic, the CEO of Hongxing Erke said that he would leave the publicity resources to the disaster area;

When netizens flocked into the live broadcast room and wanted to buy ERKE products crazily, the host lady in the live broadcast room did not rush in, but advised everyone to consume rationally and not to give gifts indiscriminately.

When the boss learned that Hongxing Erke became popular due to the donation, he rushed to the live broadcast room in the early morning. He did not take the opportunity to promote the brand, but first reported the donation situation, then expressed his willingness to do a good job in products and services to thank netizens for their care, and still persuaded everyone to consume rationally...

In addition to Hongxing Erke's own behavior, what is more important behind this sudden explosion is that in recent years, this generation of young people, with the powerful rise of our country, have awakened to "cultural confidence" and patriotism;

From the rise of various new domestic brands, Anta's firm attitude in the Xinjiang cotton incident, to the popularity of Erke during the Henan flood, more and more young Chinese people are beginning to love domestic products and take Chinese brands seriously. The Chinese people should support Chinese brands. The flame has already been ignited and will be even more intense in the future. A new era for domestic brands has arrived!

7. Hanshu’s textbook PR: Using melons to go viral

This year, Wu Yifan’s huge scandal shocked the entire Internet.

What no one expected was that in this collapse, there was a brand that was not criticized because of the melon. Instead, it took advantage of the traffic and became really popular, making a fortune! !

Not only did the related topic have hundreds of millions of views, but millions of people also rushed to Hansu's live broadcast room on Douyin.

Marketing inspiration:

The reason why Hansu was able to turn crisis into traffic is that it played a textbook-level "PR" of receiving, transforming and sending.

First, use the public relations rules to quickly terminate the contract and catch the public opinion;

Then resolve it with real interaction in the live broadcast room;

Finally, this wave of traffic generated by stars was successfully converted into brand potential energy and released by playing memes in the live broadcast room.

8. Top Streamer He Tongxue - Slow down and prove the value of content

There are many internet celebrities who are short-lived, but Mr. He is unique.

When internet celebrity became a derogatory term, He Tongxue, who just graduated at the age of 22, used two appearances to clear the name of the top stars.

One was at the beginning of the year because of a one-on-one interview with Apple CEO Cook; the other was at the end of the year because of a 7-minute video with less than a minute of advertising broadcast, which caused the market value of the product's listed company to soar by 546 million yuan.

Especially the second time he went viral, he used cool content to prove the value of content to everyone.

Marketing inspiration:

In this era of short videos and live broadcasts, everything is accelerating, attracting fans, traffic, monetization, and patterned editing methods. Everyone is rushing to catch up with the trend, making content a fast-moving consumer product on an assembly line. As a result, every now and then a new internet celebrity becomes popular, then falls from the crest of the wave and eventually disappears in the tide of Internet information.

Faced with an era of crazy acceleration, He chose a different path: slow down.

As Mr. He mentioned in the video, it takes him two weeks to write the manuscript for a video, and at least two weeks to shoot. A shot has to be shot dozens of times. If one spot is not hit, everything has to be restored and started over again. Some special scenes even take several days to shoot because they require special props.

In addition to pursuing meticulous content, Mr. He is also more serious about the form of many of the content than ordinary people.

For example, in his graduation video "I Graduated" in July this year, he made an enlarged version of the 3D Lidar scanner so that the scanner could identify the stars in the night sky. Sitting in the fishing chair night after night, photographing star trails until sunrise. He collected the stars and arranged them into countless words of "Happy Graduation" in the night sky.

This unique seriousness is transformed into the romance of science students through the pictures and overflows the screen.

He used his actions to justify the true meaning of an "Internet celebrity": an ordinary person who shines in life through passion, seriousness and persistence.

9. Liu Yexi becomes popular - the metaverse marketing boom is coming

In 2021, the "Metaverse" suddenly became popular, and Internet giants from all over the world focused on it and announced their plans to develop the Metaverse. Not only foreign giants such as Facebook and Microsoft, but also domestic giants such as Tencent and ByteDance have entered related fields. Facebook has even stated that it will transform into a metaverse company within five years.

At the end of the year, the sudden emergence of the Douyin Metaverse beauty blogger "blew up" the entire Douyin with just one video, and completely made the Metaverse popular.

Marketing inspiration:

At first glance, the metaverse sounds very powerful, futuristic, and revolutionary, but the popular "metaverse" is a typical old wine in a new bottle. It is not a science fiction that suddenly appeared. It is not mysterious. We have already talked about it. The so-called metaverse is actually composed of important elements that are not unfamiliar to us: virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), avatar (virtual character)...

The reason why it became so popular this time is not because a new era is really coming, but because the collective "announcement" of the giants has made the world and capital full of expectations for the "metaverse".

As the mobile Internet story draws to a close, the giants need new stories and layouts to open the curtain of a new era and continuously improve the expected value in the eyes of the public and capital.

Although the true "metaverse" trend is still a long way off due to technological limitations, this wave of collective layout has actually brought the dividends of "metaverse marketing" and marked the marketing trend of the next era in advance.

10. Zhang Tongxue's popularity: a sign of the benefits of rural content

There are no cool special effects, no awesome skills, and no attractive looks...it's just a record of rural life. But the number of fans increased by 10 million in just over a month! The inexplicable popularity of “Teacher Zhang” on Douyin attracted onlookers.

Marketing inspiration:

Faced with the inexplicable explosion, everyone wants to explore its traffic secrets. In summary, there are three main analyses on the Internet:

First, some people say that his filming is professional. A video has hundreds of shots, so he must have a team. Recently, Zhang revealed his own filming process. He doesn’t have a team, but he is indeed professional.

Second, some people say that this is because rural life has aroused the curiosity of city dwellers;

Third, the central media commented that this was because they used professional technology to record the real rural life in China, and the contrast of the video effects brought a unique charm to attract viewers;

But in my opinion, these are only part of the factors that led to his popularity. The real key is actually the strategy of the giant TikTok, and Zhang is just a beneficiary of the giant’s strategy!

Under the main theme of common prosperity, "three rural issues" are the top priority of the work of the Party and the country. As a video platform, it is natural to provide assistance. Therefore, under Douyin's usual benchmarking strategy (giving key support to a case that can be used as a benchmark, using the benchmark effect to gain the attention of others, guiding new creators to join, and guiding the mass clustering effect), Zhang was selected.

Platforms control traffic and politics determines the direction of the trend. Zhang’s success cannot be replicated, but his popularity is actually a signal, heralding the arrival of the content dividend of real rural areas.

11. Conclusion

These top ten marketing events are just the tip of the iceberg and a microcosm. Looking back at 2021, this year is destined to be extraordinary, with all kinds of big melons and heavy hot searches, but there seems to be no main theme.

This year has been filled with turmoil, and it seems that only the word "chaos" can describe it. But when I was writing to the end, a sentence suddenly occurred to me: All changes will be preceded by chaos.

This seemingly unplanned year is actually a harbinger of a new era:

Celebrities, influencers, influencer brands… the old marketing bubble is bursting;

Domestic products, local products, and new waves... new Chinese dividends are stirring;

After the Internet dividends dried up, the giants turned their attention to the Metaverse...

A new era is opening, new opportunities are quietly approaching, the marketing world in 2022 will be even more exciting, let us wait and see! ! !

Author: Liu Xingchen

Official account: Marketing Frontline