Tips for building a private domain traffic pool!

Private domain traffic is now a "battlefield". No matter what company it is, it is building its own private domain traffic. But from a practical point of view, not much is actually achieved! What are the problems here? This article will analyze from three aspects and share with you.

Building private domain traffic is no longer a new topic! More and more companies have joined in, eager to achieve business growth through private domain traffic operations. But from a practical point of view, not much is actually achieved!

For the vast majority of companies, the so-called building of private domain traffic is actually just operating communities. Let’s not talk about the effect first! Simply equating private domain with community is a fatal mistake! Even though we realize that private domain is not equal to community, the process of building private domain traffic still inevitably seems a bit powerless and confused! I don’t know how to exert my strength, nor how to plan…

Although I believe most people know that the official definition of private domain traffic is: it is a concept relative to public domain traffic. Simply put, it refers to channels that can directly reach users at any time and frequency without paying, such as self-media, user groups, WeChat accounts, etc., which is the circle that KOC (key opinion consumers) can radiate.

However, will understanding this official definition help companies build private domain traffic? The so-called official definition is nothing more than a relatively authoritative explanation given by people who know the subject to people who don’t. If an enterprise only grasps this point, it will not be of any substantial help in building its private domain traffic.

If companies want to successfully build their own private domain traffic, we should first observe and analyze it from a broader perspective.

First of all, it is the market environment. We all know that the entire market situation is constantly changing, including user populations and age groups, user hierarchy structures, and user needs. If a company continues to do marketing according to its original mindset, it will definitely not work.

Therefore, due to the ever-changing market environment, we are required to think about problems from the perspective of paying more attention to users, and the granularity of our marketing must also become more detailed. On the other hand, when carrying out operational activities, you can have a better grasp of the possible results of each action in the entire process, and analyze the data generated in the marketing process, so as to know where the problem lies and how to make adjustments next.

This is an objective requirement under the objective market environment, where companies must always maintain innovation in their marketing models. The key to the success of any marketing model is to find high-quality, low-cost traffic and customers. This is the key! If we look at it, whether it is the rise of traditional e-commerce or the popularity of short video live streaming e-commerce, successful companies in most industries have basically grasped this core point. The most typical one is: Pinduoduo!

So we can draw a simple logic: if a company wants to succeed, it must continuously innovate its marketing model, and the core of marketing success is the continuous reduction of the cost of acquiring high-quality customers!

Then let's look back. Private traffic pool refers to a traffic pool that an enterprise can operate and manage independently, without paying, and can directly reach users at any time and frequency. In other words, once an enterprise successfully builds a private traffic pool, it can continue to acquire high-quality customers.

Therefore, building a private traffic pool is something that enterprises must do, and it is also something of strategic significance. It is the core that determines whether a company’s marketing can ultimately be successful.

1. Characteristics of Enterprise Private Domain Traffic Pool

So how should companies build private traffic pools? In order to build it successfully, we first need to clarify what characteristics the private domain traffic pool should have, so as to ensure that there will be no deviation in direction during the construction process.

Enterprises building private traffic pools should have at least the following characteristics:

1. Ability to achieve two-way communication with users

In other words, the carrier we choose can support two-way contact and communication between you and users. This is the most basic requirement.

2. Conform to user habits

We say that traffic should not be regarded as a piece of data, but as a vivid and lively individual. Then they will naturally come to your traffic pool for some reason, either for the content you provide, or for a certain convenience you provide. But no matter which one it is, it should not violate its daily usage habits.

3. Help us retain users, record and manage customer information

In this carrier, the user's entire reading habits and various behavioral actions can be effectively recorded and managed in a digital way.

4. User Relationship Management

The operation and management of private traffic pools is not about traffic or numerical values, but about existence in the form of users, with vivid and lively users. What enterprises should ultimately achieve through user management and operations is the sublimation of user relationships, the transformation from customers to users and then to fans. Therefore, the private traffic pool built by the enterprise should be able to help achieve user relationship management and transformation.

5. Support more technology development to meet and adapt to the continuous innovation of corporate marketing models

6. Enterprises can operate and manage themselves

The above six parts are what we must consider clearly when choosing specific carriers when building a private domain traffic pool. It is precisely because of this that, at present, the vast majority of companies choose to build their private traffic pools within the WeChat ecosystem. For example: subscription accounts, mini programs, WeChat groups, etc. However, if a company has certain strength, it will consider deploying in APP.

2. Carrier selection for enterprise private traffic pool

When choosing a specific traffic carrier, companies should make choices based on actual conditions and different stages of demand. At the same time, we can consider classifying the private domain traffic pool into the main traffic pool and the auxiliary traffic pool. Let's take a look at them one by one:

The first is the service account: it can be said to be suitable for most enterprises, and it can also meet the six characteristics of the private domain traffic pool;

The opposite of a service account is a subscription account. In the beginning, many companies chose subscription accounts as the carrier. However, with the passing of traffic dividends, coupled with the fact that subscription accounts have higher content production costs and lower opening rates than service accounts, it is actually not recommended to choose subscription accounts as the carrier of private traffic pools. Of course, for some personal studios, or as an auxiliary source of main traffic, subscription accounts are still an option.

The second is APP : This is generally suitable for platform-based companies, such as Didi and Meituan, which are Internet marketing companies.

Because these types of companies have certain strengths themselves, their overall strategy is centered on efficiently acquiring users. Then, by choosing APP as the company's private traffic pool, you can avoid the policy risks that may be brought about by building it on a third-party platform.

Next are WeChat groups and mini-programs: We all know that the most common mini-programs can be roughly divided into four types: content, community, activities, and e-commerce. But no matter which type it is, the biggest advantage of the mini program is not in itself, but in the ecological interconnection and fission between it and the WeChat group, and the benefits it may bring in the future. I don’t know if you have ever heard this sentence: Mini programs that do not aim to improve the quality of community services and the efficiency of service dissemination are all hooligans!

First, for communities, mini programs can improve the service quality of the entire community and enhance the collaboration between community users, thus making the community more powerful.

Secondly, for mini programs, communities are their core source of traffic and an important means to achieve a closed service loop and improve user retention.

Therefore, from the perspective of building a company’s private traffic pool, if the WeChat group is regarded as the main traffic pool, then the mini program must be the auxiliary traffic pool that goes with it.

Of course, when companies choose WeChat groups as their main traffic pool, they must not fall into the state of operating the group just for the sake of operating it. The key is to operate the users in the community.

Finally, there is the personal WeChat account: when building a private traffic pool, many companies ignore this carrier. In fact, choosing a personal account as the main traffic pool is very suitable for products/services that are low-frequency but high-priced and high-net-worth.

Personal accounts can create personalized personal IP through content output in the circle of friends, which is beneficial for enterprises to manage user relationships. Ultimately, it will effectively increase user repurchase and cross-selling.

3. Key steps for enterprises to build private traffic pools

After understanding the characteristics of the private domain traffic pool and determining the specific carrier to receive the traffic, we need to formally start building the private domain traffic pool. It can be roughly divided into the following three steps:

Step 1: Clarify the marketing model design from a strategic level

If an enterprise wants to build private domain traffic, it should first clarify the marketing model from a strategic level to avoid doing it just for the sake of doing it. At the same time, you can also realize which link the private domain traffic you have built occupies in the entire marketing process? What a responsibility!

The design of the marketing model can be roughly divided into two things:

First thing: focus on clear growth goals. In other words, the company must be clear about what your growth goal is? Growth in the number of users? An increase in sales? Or it could be the expansion of brand influence!

The second thing: clarify the company’s marketing scenarios. You should know that the same product may have different usage scenarios, and the same target user may also come into contact with and use enterprise products in different scenarios. For each marketing scenario, the flow of traffic and the entire process of attracting new customers, retention, conversion, repeat purchases, and word-of-mouth recommendations are different. Therefore, it is necessary to comprehensively sort out all possible scenarios and make a reasonable design for different scenario processes, with the aim of converting users and traffic.

Finally, different marketing scenarios need to be combined with different channels in order to derive different marketing stories and specific fission marketing strategies.

Step 2: Determine the operation path of the private domain traffic pool from a tactical perspective

The construction of a private traffic pool is not just about determining a main traffic pool or a specific traffic carrier. In other words, we cannot look at it from a single point, but should look at it from the perspective of the entire process of traffic operation. For example, the operation path of the private traffic pool can be determined through user paths.

The user path can be roughly divided into: new customer acquisition, retention, conversion, repeat purchase, and brand promotion.

The operation of private traffic pool is different from community operation. The entire user path of the latter is basically completed in a relatively clear carrier, such as WeChat group. Because the private traffic pool involves the main traffic pool and the auxiliary traffic pool, the carriers that carry the traffic are different, so different nodes in the user path require different carriers. For example: using official accounts as a secondary traffic pool is mainly used to attract new users; WeChat communities are used as the main traffic pool to achieve user activity and retention; and mini programs are used to achieve user conversion, etc.

When choosing specific traffic carriers and marketing tools, we mainly consider whether the company's marketing strategy and operational strategy can be integrated with the product, and use this point as an important criterion for selection.

The ultimate goal of private domain traffic operation is to drive corporate performance growth through traffic operation. At this time, it is necessary to emphasize user relationship management and brand influence.

Especially in the management of user relationships, we must know the core of private domain traffic: that is, to aggregate the traffic obtained in different ways from different channels in the form of users into a carrier that can be managed independently and has strong controllability for effective management and operation, so as to achieve better monetization and other commercial value. Therefore, maintaining user relationships is the foundation for companies to improve their performance and establish brand influence.

Step 3: Develop an effective implementation plan from the execution level

Once the marketing model and user path are clear, we need to have a specific and feasible implementation plan. The focus of this step is to cut the above model into different modules, and then fill in specific business for each part.

For example: different copywriting and stories can be compiled according to different scenarios; how to sort out and integrate specific channel choices! Based on this, we can develop fission marketing plans for different target users and different usage scenarios.

For example, based on the user's overall operation path, how should we fill and plan our content library? Different path nodes can be used to plan different topics, event operations, etc.

In the final branding stage, because the core is user relationship management, we can develop user stratification and grading systems, user growth, incentive systems, etc.

The above are the three steps for the entire enterprise to build private domain traffic. Of course, in actual work, these three steps are not enough. We also need the fourth and fifth steps:

Step 4: Keep testing and adjusting

Is the overall operation of the private traffic pool that was built with great difficulty smooth? Are the selected primary and secondary flow cells appropriate? Can the core task of traffic flow be effectively solved and achieved? And so on. All these problems require us to make effective adjustments and optimizations through continuous testing in actual work.

Step 5: Form SOP and implement marketing automation process

Finally, the entire private domain traffic operation process that has been verified in practice will be formed into an SOP! This can improve operational efficiency and reduce costs. And for every action in the whole process, you can have a better grasp of the possible results; on the other hand, you can continuously expand the company's private domain traffic and achieve economies of scale.

IV. Conclusion

If not all companies are suitable for community operations, then I personally think that every company should build a private traffic pool. Because this is not a matter of tactics or gameplay, but involves corporate strategy. In the current marketing environment, the success or failure of building a private traffic pool is a gap that determines whether an enterprise can survive in the increasingly fierce market competition. Although we cannot say that you will be invincible if you cross this barrier, but if you don’t cross this barrier, you will only be eliminated.

Of course, the construction of an enterprise's private traffic pool involves too many scopes to be fully summarized in one article. So I can only give a brief talk to get you started. Dear readers, if you feel that you have gained something, I will be very comforted; if you feel that it is not good enough and have better ideas, you are also welcome to comment and exchange ideas.

Author: Pi Ye Operation

Source: Pai Ye Operation (pyyunying)