How to plan a hot-selling content promotion that will sweep the screen?

Most content operators expect explosive content , but the ways of triggering it vary. It is not easy to produce healthy and popular content, but this does not mean that content operations can only be carried out in the usual way.

I envy others every day because their content has such a large number of readers, such a high conversion rate, and such a high level of attention, but envy alone cannot change anything.

• Why are “kicking the bottle cap” and “showing off wealth by throwing your body” so popular in China from the United States?
• Why have Green Bean Frog, Hairline Xiao Wu, and Yang Chaoyue become popular emoticons on the Internet?
• Why is it that the “koi” that symbolizes good luck is reposted by countless netizens without getting tired of it?
• ………

What are the common characteristics of these contents that can form fission-like dissemination? How can we catalyze content that spreads explosively?

In today’s article, I will try to dissect the hot-selling products from the perspective of communication, and extract the core elements that can trigger the explosive content.

1. Storytelling

Someone once conducted a sociological/anthropological experiment like this.

The researchers bought cheap items from thrift stores and garage sales, asked a writer to write a short story based on the items, and then auctioned the items on eBay.

The item originally cost $128.74, but was finally sold for $3,612.51, a 2,700% increase in price.

This is because the power of storytelling enhances the emotional value of these items, making users willing to buy them even if they have to pay more.

Aristotle said:

We cannot influence others through intelligence, but we can influence others through emotions.

When we solve problems, we can use logic and rationality. However, when we want to influence others and make them agree with us, logic alone is not enough.

We need stories because only stories can achieve empathy, build connections between people, and make them stand on your side.

Baidu’s paid ranking has been around for a long time, but it was not until the Wei Zexi incident that it caused a huge public opinion storm. Why? Because Wei Zexi's story makes you empathize, it is better than any cold data.

If you can embed story elements into your brand, product, or promotional content, it will be easier to penetrate into the minds of users and gain word-of-mouth transmission. The story told here is to create story-telling content that is full of details, has a sense of camera, and can mobilize users' emotions.

The story of Romeo and Juliet is deeply rooted in people's hearts. And what is the biggest feature of this story? "Abuse!" In our jargon, it means "conflict."

Imagine if Romeo and Juliet didn't like each other from the beginning and something happened to them separately, would this tragedy still be so appealing? No, because it is not a conflict.

So, conflict = desire + obstacle. The love between the two is a desire, while the feud between the two families is an obstacle. Obstacles without desires, or desires without obstacles, cannot constitute a real conflict.

What else does a story need besides conflict? A good story needs to include three basic elements and two additional elements:

Good story - basic elements (conflict + action + resolution) - (desire + obstacle)

Good story - additional elements - (emotion + presentation)

In terms of writing techniques, I would like to share 4 small suggestions with you:

① Be good at mobilizing sensory experience.

Just like the copy at the beginning, "Alaskan cod" and "Tibetan mountain eagle" are very concrete and can stimulate people's vision; while "the air that cannot be smelled with perfume" stimulates people's sense of smell.

②Be sure to be concise.

If your story is too long-winded, people will not have the patience to listen to it, not to mention that unimportant details will interfere with people's understanding of the main storyline.

③Be good at using metaphors.

Each metaphor is a "mini-story" that transforms a complex situation into a familiar scene.

④Avoid being straightforward.

A smooth development is unlikely to become a good story. Only when there are setbacks and twists and turns can people listen to it with interest. If your story has no twist, then I advise you to change it quickly.

2. Create memes

Meme refers to thoughts, behaviors or styles spread among people in the same cultural atmosphere.

As a popular Internet cultural gene that is replicated and spread in a derivative way, memes were originally created with anonymous authors and low entertainment value. Cartoon characters such as the Green Bean Frog and Tuzki, which were once popular on the Internet, and their derivative works can be regarded as the embryonic form of the domestic Internet meme phenomenon.

British scientist Richard Dawkins said

The role that memes play in language, concepts, beliefs, and behaviors is similar to the role that genes play in biological evolution.

Like the well-known Annoying Dog, Fake Smile Boy, Yang Chaoyue, Eyebrow Boy, Show Off the Wealth, Ice Bucket Challenge, Kicking the Bottle Cap... these popular online celebrity emoticon packages or activities that are widely circulated on domestic and foreign social platforms all belong to the category of Meme, which is somewhat similar to the Chinese word "梗". It may be a picture, an expression or a video.

In China, the B-station ghost area can be said to be a meme incubator. The "memes" of Zhuge Kongming, Yuan Shou, Lei Jun, Wu Yifan, Liu Xiao Ling Tong, Cai Xukun and others have been continuously processed and interpreted by the smart netizens on B station and have been spread continuously.

For us, if we can give the content the attributes of a Meme, it will undoubtedly be easier to spread virally. Memes that have a longer life cycle in the social chain all have two characteristics.

• Unconventional or exaggerated elements. For example, the impressive eyebrows of the eyebrow boy and Yang Chaoyue’s baby voice “burn my calories” can easily attract the attention of users and stimulate their impulse to spontaneously process and evolve.
• Variability. They are like a universal "template" that leaves netizens with space to "copy" in various ways.

For example, the recently popular "kicking the bottle cap" has retained the "opening cap" template by netizens, and derived it into tractor version, roundhouse kick version, fast and furious version and other fancy opening versions, which are widely used in various life scenes. Only when the content is "variable" can it achieve exponential diffusion and dissemination.

3. Super threshold

Threshold, simply put, is the critical value.

Last year, the NetEase Dada team produced many H5s that swept the WeChat Moments, including the representative one "She died after struggling for 48 hours and no one knew."

This is a public welfare H5 about animal protection. It uses an anthropomorphic approach to make more young people feel the importance of animal protection, and has triggered discussions and sharing among countless users.

In just 3 hours, due to the large number of users sharing, the daily sharing threshold of about 1 million times was reached in the circle of friends (data from the omnipotent uncle).

Currently, whether the screen swiping exceeds the WeChat sharing threshold has become one of the core indicators to measure whether marketing is successful or not.

NetEase’s 2018 music listening report, Jung’s psychological test… Being screen-swiped once may be luck, but being screen-swiped multiple times must be the result of methodology.

Why is NetEase’s H5 always so popular? A very important reason is that its products (H5) far exceed the user's psychological expectation threshold, that is, the psychological critical value.

Let's take a closer look. There are two main factors:

1. Insight into human nature

All addictive products are essentially designed to satisfy human nature. Only by satisfying the user's human nature can the user be unable to stop and thus trigger word-of-mouth communication.

NetEase’s continuous H5 screen-sweeping deeply meets user needs among the seven deadly sins of human nature. The seven deadly sins come from Catholic doctrine and refer to human sins such as gluttony, lust, greed, anger, laziness, envy and arrogance .

Therefore, Internet products will always look for needs that are in line with human nature, and maximize profits by continuously strengthening and satisfying users' "human needs."

We can see that Luckin Coffee, which took advantage of "greed", used free gifts to become the representative of the new middle-class coffee, Ctrip, which took advantage of "lust", used the seven young and handsome boys of Lehua Entertainment for marketing, Wang Sicong, which took advantage of "anger", criticized internet celebrities for causing miscarriages in pregnant women, which became a hot topic, and Ele.me and Mobike, which took advantage of "laziness", captured hundreds of millions of users.

2. Exceeding expectations

Exceeding expectations is the fundamental reason why H5 marketing activities are so popular. The H5 marketing of "She Died After Struggling for 48 Hours" innovatively brings users into the scene of doomsday crisis from a first-person perspective, while highlighting the plot with visual scrolling animation and black and white tones, making the fire special effects, blood-red special effects, and sound and picture effects more impactful, forming a strong visual contrast.

The surprise and excitement brought by this super-threshold level will not only allow the product to quickly penetrate into the user's mind, but also cause the user to pass the product on to people around them as a "new thing" with social value, thereby achieving self-propagation.

Dopamine

Dopamine is a neurotransmitter, a chemical that helps cells transmit impulses. This brain secretion is related to human desire and feelings, and it conveys messages of excitement and happiness. In addition, dopamine is also involved in various addictive behaviors.

Generally speaking, when consumers purchase a product, they are actually purchasing the functions and performance of the product. For example, cars have the function of transportation, refrigerators have the function of keeping food fresh, and air conditioners have the function of regulating temperature... We call them "functional products"

Although it is indispensable, because of its "urgent need" attribute, people do not have too many preferences for it, and consume it more out of need.

The opposite of functional products are "dopamine products", which do not require frequent optimization and improvement, are naturally "addictive" in design, and do not meet the rigid needs of users.

"Love", "smoking", "games", "gambling", etc. are all the result of related people and things prompting the brain to produce a large amount of dopamine, making addicts feel happy and excited.

In fact, in order to maintain the vitality of their products, many brands are using "dopamine" to attract users.

Just like when Steve Jobs released the first iPhone in 2007, he used a completely new way to introduce this new product to users.

In his speech he said:

Apple launched three revolutionary new products: the first was the touch-screen wide-screen iPod, the second was a revolutionary mobile phone, and the third was a breakthrough Internet communication device.

Then he repeated the three products again, "iPod, mobile phone, and Internet communication equipment", and then said, "Did you hear it? These aren't three different devices, this is one complete product and we named it the iPhone!

As soon as these words were spoken, the audience burst into thunderous applause that lasted for a long time.

See, with just a few simple tweaks to your wording, you can surprise and impress your users. Without any elaborate props or exaggerated performances, Jobs successfully created the "wow moment".

Regarding dopamine, we have also introduced it in our previous article "Unveiling the Secret of Dopamine: Why does McDonald's often launch new burgers, but snacks rarely change? 》

superstitious

In 2018, the word "koi" became completely popular. It has become a symbol of luck.

Whether it's Yang Chaoyue, the Alipay "China Koi" grand prize, Wang Sicong's lucky draw, or the post that went viral on WeChat Moments, "In front of this woman who has been winning all her life, Yang Chaoyue is really not a koi," they all made netizens want to "get some good luck," and thus went viral.

(1) Psychological illusions stimulate self-efficacy

The superstitious behavior of "Forward this koi and you will have good luck" actually carries some blessing meaning, which can give people a "psychological illusion", strengthen people's originally low sense of control and self-confidence, and activate people's "self-efficacy".

Many athletes and entrepreneurs follow certain superstitious rituals on important occasions, such as sleeping in their opponent's shorts the night before a game, or checking the lunar calendar for important events...

Psychologists have found that these seemingly unreasonable little habits can indeed enhance the energy of athletes or give people a psychological hint to help them perform more stably on the field or in business.

(2) Low cost makes communication simple

Whether it is forwarding koi or a superstitious hobby, their operation costs are very low. It only takes 2 seconds to forward a Weibo or WeChat article.

Comparing with the spread of koi, it perfectly meets the requirements of the three steps in the above picture. It gives people the assertion that "good luck will come as long as you forward it". It can be repeated continuously in people's information dissemination and can also be quickly transmitted to people around them.

In marketing activities, if you can plan some simple and easy-to-operate small blessing rituals, it may give users more motivation to participate.

Summarize:

Today, we learned the key factors to create explosive content:

(1) Storytelling: Stories can influence others and build a sense of identity.

(2) Creating memes: Internet cultural genes with “memes” can help spread the message.

(3) Super threshold: The surprise and excitement brought by exceeding expectations can allow the product to quickly penetrate into the user's mind.

(4) Dopamine: Creating “wow moments” can stimulate user conversion and cognition.

(5) Superstition: Simple small rituals of blessing can activate users’ psychological efficacy.

Related reading:

1. How to plan a hit event?

2. How to create a perfect hit event?

3. Tips for shooting and promoting TikTok videos that have generated tens of millions of hits!

4. For online operation and promotion, can the hit H5 that goes viral be replicated?

5. 8 tips for creating a popular account through short video operation!

6. How to plan a hit promotion event that will go viral?

Author: Operation Xiaokaxiu

Source: Operation Xiaokaxiu