APP promotion, attracting new users and activating their activity丨3 ways of thinking to awaken old users!

The Internet's demographic dividend is gradually disappearing. Today, the cost of attracting new users is getting higher and higher, while the quality and activity of users are declining. It seems to be easier to retain and awaken old users than to attract new ones, but what do old users think? How can we make them active again? This time, we will not talk about the basic execution methods, but start with the way of thinking.

If you are an operator who has been in the industry for a certain number of years, you may have noticed a phenomenon - the cost of acquiring customers is getting higher and higher. From 2012 to the present, the period of rapid development of the Internet has gradually passed, the fighting on the battlefield is nearing its end, and the traffic entrances have been divided up by the leading companies, which means that it is becoming increasingly difficult to acquire new users.

Products are highly homogenized, difficult to monetize, and market requirements are becoming increasingly high. Users no longer use new apps just because of a small discount, and the frequency of opening them is gradually decreasing. Both advertisers and investors will not only look at the number of users, but will focus on activity, retention, and ROI.

Since the cost of acquiring customers is gradually increasing, it is better to focus on old users who are already dormant. For applications such as tools, social networking, sports, reading, and e-commerce, users only log in once every few weeks or even once every one or two months. In fact, there is a lot of room for improvement. And these users are the “old users” who are in a “dormant state” in our target.

Compared with new users, dormant users have the following advantages:

1. The cost of education is very low, or basically zero;
2. The awakening cost is much lower than the new customer acquisition cost;
3. Triggering old users to become active again through appropriate methods is far more effective than attracting new users.

Many companies have realized the necessity of awakening users - in fact, this has long been a part of refined user operations. But how to wake up?

The first attempt to wake up old users

Most of the methods are to send login prize draws, double points, vouchers, subsidies, etc. via SMS or PUSH, for example:

• "Congratulations, the current gold coins can be exchanged for a 200 yuan discount coupon for every 2,000 yuan spent..."
• "Members enjoy privileges and earn a ton of points. This week is X Member Day..."
• "X anniversary celebration, all items are up to 50% off..."
• "Your wallet has received a 12% discount coupon..."
• "Dear user, you have successfully deposited 1,000 yuan of silver..."

Normally this doesn't work, so what's the solution?

• If funds permit, change to a bigger prize;
• At the same cost, we can change to a more attractive bait according to the preferences of different groups of people;
• Change it to a lucky draw event and use the anchoring psychology to awaken users;
• Cooperate with other companies to exchange more gifts.

But in any case, the above methods can be summed up in one word - " material incentives ". However, if you continue to "give concessions", old users may still be in a dormant state and remain indifferent to the "huge material temptation". In fact, we ourselves are already annoyed by the bombardment of such text messages.

Are there any other ideas to solve this problem?

To make dormant old users active, you need to know what they think. So when it comes to user wake-up, let’s analyze it from a psychological perspective.

Why didn't the first attempt work?

In psychology, humans have a mechanism called the "psychological immune system." That is, when we are under great pressure or pain, the psychological immune system will work rapidly, making us more adaptable to pain and pressure such as injuries, broken hearts, and layoffs than expected.

Relatively speaking – we are also more receptive to the “good things” that keep appearing.

This is also why it is becoming increasingly difficult to awaken old users with "material incentives". As the frequency of stimulation increases, users feel tired and the pleasurable rewards received by the brain also drop sharply.

what to do?

Here are three ideas, I hope they can inspire you.

Everyone has the desire to express their self-image

"Self-disclosure" in psychology refers to the fact that when an individual interacts with others, he or she will always voluntarily show his or her behavior and express his or her thoughts in front of others.

Applying this psychology to actual products, we will find that users have a wide range of potential needs for " self-impression disclosure ", such as:

• Possessing beauty features - the desire to reveal one's appearance
• Possess sharing function - reveal your interesting desire
• Have a course check-in function - show your desire for knowledge

In addition, what other "self-impressions" do users need to reveal?

Generally speaking, all positive qualities can be included - humor, talent, taste, ambition, intelligence, persistence, social contribution, etc.

We can use the idea of ​​"self-impression disclosure" to reconsider how to awaken old users:

1. Are there any features in the product that are associated with a positive “self-image” of the user?
2. How can these characteristics be revealed and used to attract users?
3. How can it be transformed into an executable plan?

"Straight Man Test" - A simple self-image disclosure arousal case

As shown in the example above, if you are an operator of a beauty or shopping app, instead of pushing "special offers" tirelessly, wouldn't it be more appropriate to push a more interesting "straight male test questions" activity?

Social Unity - Capturing the User's In-Group Preferences

In social psychology, an ingroup is a group in which a person regularly participates, lives, works, or performs other activities. Members of a group feel that they have a close relationship with the group and a strong sense of belonging to the group.

Simply put, each user belongs to a different group, and they will feel more secure and honored with people in the same group, and will be more likely to trust and return to the group .

In actual operations, there are many such cases, for example:

• Various clubs in the game product - if other clubs rank higher than yours, would you want to come back and try your luck right away?
• Threshold setting in community activities - the community is going to hold an offline sharing session for programmers only. As a programmer, would you like to participate?
• Information production in travel apps - if someone asks you about visiting a certain scenic spot, would you want to say a few words if you live nearby?​

The topic pushed by a job search app corresponds to the "fresh graduates" group attributes awakened by users

Similarly, here is a set of corresponding ideas for you to rethink:

1. Which group do your users belong to? What are their group attributes?
2. Can this attribute be combined with a certain function of the product?
3. Can the combined approach form a landing plan?

Awakening the empathy of dormant users

In social psychology, it is found that humans have a psychological state called " altruistic behavior ", which mainly refers to the conscious and voluntary behavior of individuals that is beneficial to others but has no obvious benefit to themselves.

Whether it is because of showing off or compassion, helping others is human nature and instinct, and guilt, emergencies, and situations similar to oneself can easily awaken users' "empathy."

For example, the H5 "Children's Gallery" that was popular before——

The ideas provided are as follows:

1. Is there a suitable public welfare strategy that can be combined with the product?
2. Is this public welfare strategy against public morality? Will there be a situation where we take excessive advantage of human nature?
3. How to implement this strategy successfully? What is the plan?

Summarize

Analyzing dormant users from a psychological perspective is just a simple way to understand users in a different way. Any operational means and strategies must be based on a deep understanding and thinking of users and products, otherwise all previous efforts will be wasted.

Perhaps you have seen too many strategies, copywriting, pictures, and channel analysis on how to awaken users, but this time, we will not talk about any execution-level content, but only talk about ideas. Once you broaden your thinking, more methods will surely follow.

Related reading:

1. APP promotion and operation: How to maximize the effect of your activities?

2. APP promotion planning: 60,000 paying users increased within 7 days of beta testing!

3. APP promotion activities: How to plan a screen-sweeping event?

4. A complete list of APP promotion methods in 2019, take it and don’t thank me!

5. How to carry out APP promotion and marketing? What are the common methods?

6. APP promotion case: How to go from 0 to millions of users?

Author: Fulu Network

Source: Fulu Network