3 steps to teach you how to run a successful marketing campaign

In July 2015, about 300 Spartan warriors suddenly appeared on the streets of Sanlitun in Beijing , holding rock salads and parading on the streets, which went viral on everyone's WeChat Moments and even made the headlines in foreign media newspapers.

Although this incident has become extremely popular, few people know who the brand behind it is. At most, they know that it is a salad maker. Was this marketing event successful? It was very successful because from a communication perspective, the fact that the Spartan warriors bravely entered Sanlitun was almost known to everyone, but what was the actual effect? But almost none.

These activities have good communication effects. Do they have any effect on the marketing we do? It’s not actually an equal relationship. We may spend a lot of money and cause a lot of traffic to spread, but there is almost no actual effect.

1. The first step of correct marketing: find the value point of the product to the user

How to judge whether a marketing event is good or bad: As long as the marketing can find the connection point between the product and the user, it is a good marketing.

So, how do we find the intersection between products and users?

As the former marketing director of Maimai , I would like to share with you Maimai’s marketing strategy. In the early days of Maimai, we thought that our products and features would be used by many people, so we added a lot of sharing links to the product to make it convenient for users to share with their friends. This is what all new products will do.

But we soon discovered that people’s awareness of the product was very low, and many people even had trouble pronouncing its name correctly. Later we thought that since users could not understand the purpose of the product, we had to give it a concept , and the simplest way was to find a comparison. At first we planned to look for LinkedIn, but we encountered another problem. Most people only knew LinkedIn and the name, but still didn’t know what LinkedIn did.

Later we thought, since no one knows about LinkedIn, then everyone must know about WeChat . So we found the similarities between Maimai and WeChat and came up with the slogan "Use WeChat for life, use Maimai for work" to let everyone know that it is the work version of WeChat. Now when users see Maimai, they know roughly what it does. This is a critical early step .

It doesn’t matter who you are, it’s more important who your users think you are.

Many people who make products are particularly good salespeople. When advertising, they are willing to talk about what is good about their product and list a lot of advantages. In fact, users don’t pay attention to these advantages. In the minds of users, these things are worthless, because as a product manufacturer, you may feel that you may have done something outstanding in some aspects. But these are not what users really care about.

Users won’t say what they really want. You need to be a person with judgment and understand what users really need, rather than just answering a question when the user asks it.

2. The second step of correct marketing: turning value into spreadable content

1. Strengthen the scene

"I won't accept any gifts this year, the only gift I'll accept is Melatonin." This advertising slogan has been used by the health product Melatonin for more than 20 years, and consumers have been hearing it for 20 years. Melatonin has been strengthening its gift-giving scenarios, and consumers will think of it first when giving gifts during the Chinese New Year .

This is a typical example of content production centered around value points, using the means of strengthening scenarios.

The scenario is divided into four parts: time, space, user and behavior. The purpose is to allow users to naturally think of this product at a certain time, in a certain space, or at a certain event.

Although this thing sounds simple, it is actually very difficult to do. It is equivalent to planting a remote-controlled bomb in the user's mind. When the user thinks of your product, it will drive him to choose to use your product.

In terms of the scenario, it may be in a relatively monopolistic market, because I need to quickly occupy this market, then occupy the minds of users, and establish sufficient differentiation from competitors. Once users remember a product, it is very difficult for them to remember a second product .

If you think your product is highly innovative, I suggest you prioritize scenarios, or you can create an opportunity for a more segmented scenario that has great commercial value.

2. Strengthen selling points

Selling points are closely related to human nature, or rather, the weaknesses of human nature, which are parasitic on human greed, laziness and jealousy .

Almost all e-commerce companies offer low prices and discounts, because any other slogans will not work. Low prices are the most effective and have the greatest impact on users. For example, annualized return can help you get greater returns, and investing the same amount of money must be more effective. For example, Daily Youxian offers 80 yuan off for purchases over 99 yuan, which is the most impressive.

"Charge for five minutes, talk for two hours", "20 million soft-light dual cameras", "too beautiful to be true" , etc. All domestic smartphones are competing in the same scenario. At the beginning, Xiaomi proposed cost-effectiveness , but later found that the prices in the domestic market were the same , so there was no cost-effectiveness to speak of.

So mobile phones began to look for their own characteristics and use these characteristics to influence users. For example, the Nut phone is “too pretty to be real”, which essentially means that the phone looks good. "Charge for five minutes, talk for two hours" emphasizes its fast charging function. By strengthening my own selling points to influence users , I can accurately cut a piece of cake that belongs to my product in a relatively competitive market. This is a way to influence users through the market.

3. Strengthen symbols

What is the difference between Coca-Cola and Pepsi ? Some people say that Pepsi is slightly sweeter than Coke, but most people can't taste the difference. In fact, the biggest difference between them is the color, one is blue and the other is red . Whether it is inviting spokespersons or brand advertising, they are all strengthening their color characteristics. In the beverage industry, the products themselves do not have many characteristics and need to rely on symbols to enhance their competitiveness.

The same is true for the most popular shared bicycles , which use colors to distinguish their symbols and expand the influence of the symbols. The best proof is that “ofo shared bicycle” was later renamed “ ofo small yellow car ” .

Symbols are related to people's feelings. Such as vision, hearing, smell, and feeling. We perceive things slowly through our five senses. Symbols shorten the user's perception path and allow users to remember my product at once.

Symbols are the smallest spread currency and are easiest for users to remember. If you turn a scene or selling point into a symbol, it will be easier to spread and remember . But it all comes down to judging where you stand and choosing the right way to influence your users.

3. The third step of correct marketing: find the target channel to spread the message to users

A while ago, Maimai cooperated with Mobike , Didi Bus and other apps, and posted a lot of heart-wrenching anti-chicken soup words targeting office workers on Mobike . The humorous approach was very popular among office workers. Maimai is positioned as a work version of WeChat. Most of the users who use Mobike and Didi Bus every day are also office workers. The target users are the same, and the marketing effect is doubled .

The problem with marketing is to influence the users I want with the right things. These three steps constitute a relatively complete marketing process.

Focusing on the features of my products, I influence the users I want, and then gradually increase our visibility in a certain field. Through this power, I slowly expand my influence and then influence more users. This approach is relatively common, has the highest success rate, and is a relatively correct marketing method.