Decoding: How does Pinduoduo play with the addiction model?

Pinduoduo has a variety of promotion methods, which is one of the characteristics that distinguishes it from other e-commerce companies and is also one of the secrets of its success. This article mainly deciphers Pinduoduo's promotion secrets and sees how it plays with the addictive model.

1. Pinduoduo’s three promotion strategies

Pinduoduo, which was very popular a while ago, has been experiencing mixed emotions recently. Before it had time to enjoy the joy of its listing, it was drowned out by overwhelming negative news. As one of Pinduoduo's users, although I place a few orders from time to time, I am far from reaching the level of a heavy user.

What interests me about Pinduoduo is not its wide range of cheap goods, but its diverse promotional methods. This is one of the characteristics that distinguishes Pinduoduo from other e-commerce companies, and also one of the secrets of Pinduoduo's success.

Let us now decipher Pinduoduo’s promotion secrets.

1. Focus on traffic growth

The layout of the product homepage is very important. It directly reflects the operational strategy of a product and has an extremely important impact on the product's performance. The marketing space below the banner on the homepage of most e-commerce companies is either the entrance to their own products and services or the entrance to various promotional activities. In addition to the entrance to promotional activities, Pinduoduo's marketing space is also filled with various fancy promotions.

According to Pinduoduo's design, users initiate promotional activities through the entrance of the homepage marketing position to attract traffic to Pinduoduo. The attracted traffic will then initiate new activities through these promotional entrances for secondary traffic diversion , thus forming a traffic loop that can grow automatically. Other e-commerce companies choose to divert traffic to other products, services or promotions, which is a one-time way to consume traffic.

By comparing Pinduoduo's homepage operation position with other e-commerce companies, it can be inferred that Pinduoduo focuses on the self-growth of traffic and borrows the power of others to attract traffic for itself. The biggest advantage of this method is that it can reduce the cost of acquiring traffic.

2. Allow users to take advantage

Pinduoduo’s use of social networks for promotion is far more effective than other e-commerce companies. This is not only due to Pinduoduo’s social resources, but more importantly, Pinduoduo adopts rules that allow users to “take advantage.” The rewards provided by other e-commerce companies for users’ sharing behavior are not only of lower value, but also often have additional thresholds.

The three examples provided in the above picture are the invitation gifts from Meituan , Ele.me and Hema Fresh, and without exception, they all have set thresholds. Not only do you need to attract new users, but they also have to place orders to receive rewards. The logic behind this is to not allow users to "take advantage", and the cost of each promotion must be borne by the corresponding user.

The picture above shows Pinduoduo’s promotional gifts. From the rules, we can see that the value of the rewards provided by Pinduoduo is far greater than the rewards of a few dollars provided by other e-commerce companies, and new users are not required to make any consumption.

Pinduoduo’s bargaining and free things were once popular on WeChat . I believe many friends have participated in it. Its rules still reflect the logic of allowing users to “take advantage”.

The picture above is ofo’s limited-time 1 yuan monthly card grab event. The gameplay is the same as Pinduoduo’s bargaining for free items, both of which involve inviting friends to help bargain to get rewards. But the essence lies in the details. Ofo's bargaining is divided into three levels: 16 yuan, 10 yuan, and 1 yuan. It still embodies the principle of equal exchange, that is, different rewards are given according to how much the user pays. Even if the user completes the task, he still needs to pay 1 yuan.

In other words, this activity still requires users to pay an economic price in exchange for benefits, which is fundamentally different from Pinduoduo's completely free service. Although 1 yuan is not a lot of money, it still requires payment. And for users, paid products are not as good as free ones. Free products are more attractive and exciting.

Compared with other e-commerce companies, Pinduoduo's idea of ​​allowing users to "get a bargain" is actually to treat these non-consuming users as its own promotional resources. This is just like the free players and RMB players in many online games . The free players seem unable to bring profits to the game developers, but they have become an integral part of the game experience and are part of the game that developers provide to paying users .

Without a large number of free players to serve as a "foil", where does the consumption desire of RMB players come from?

Similarly, without a large number of users who "take advantage" and actively promote Pinduoduo, Pinduoduo would not be able to gain so much traffic, let alone sales. The benefits gained by these "advantaged" users are actually the expenses spent by Pinduoduo on promotion.

The essence of this promotion concept is to "pass on" the promotion costs to users. Users who receive material rewards will spontaneously promote the company, which is a win-win strategy.

3. Focus on material rewards

Getting rewards for completing tasks is a gameplay that almost every e-commerce company has, and the most common one is signing in. Each e-commerce company has different rewards for sign-in, but they are nothing more than virtual currency or points.

However, Pinduoduo's sign-in rewards are cash that can be withdrawn. Although the virtual currencies and points provided by other e-commerce companies have certain monetary value, they are far inferior to cash. In comparison, Pinduoduo can be said to be generous.

But we all understand one thing: there is no free lunch in the world. The more you get, the more you pay. Therefore, compared with other e-commerce companies, it is not easy to get cash from Pinduoduo. Other e-commerce platforms just require signing in, but Pinduoduo’s sign-in requires sharing. One can only get cash after attracting traffic to Pinduoduo.

In addition, Pinduoduo’s other gameplay is also mainly based on direct material rewards such as cash or physical objects. This shows that unlike other e-commerce companies that tend to use virtual currency for rewards, Pinduoduo prefers to give direct material rewards.

4. Conclusion

To sum up, Pinduoduo's first strategy for promotion is to focus on self-growth of traffic, while other e-commerce companies tend to direct traffic to other products, services or promotions.

The second trick is the promotional concept of allowing users to "take advantage". Other e-commerce companies basically adhere to the principle of one-to-one equal exchange and prevent users from "taking advantage" through various thresholds and restrictions.

The third trick is to focus on promotion through cash and physical objects, while other e-commerce companies mostly use marketing tools such as virtual, points or vouchers for promotion.

2. What is the addiction model?

Pinduoduo’s three axes are certainly extremely lethal, but they are only boosters in promotion and traffic diversion. What really makes the promotion work effectively is the addiction model.

The addiction model is a model proposed by Nir Eyal and Ryan Hoover in the book "Addicted: How to Make Users Develop Usage Habits" that makes users addicted to products. The model consists of five parts : external triggers, internal triggers, actions, variable rewards and investment .

Users use the product through external triggers, and while receiving rewards they also make investments. They then use the product again through internal triggers, and this cycle repeats itself, which is the addiction model.

1. External triggers: The way users first come into contact with a product, such as through search, advertising, or recommendations from friends.
2. Action: Get motivated and start using the product.
3. Variable rewards: The benefits that using the product brings to users, and the ever-changing and unpredictable rewards are more likely to arouse people's interest than knowing what rewards they will get from the beginning.
4. Investment: the resources that users invest in the product, such as time, energy, money, etc. The more users invest, the more likely they are to become dependent on the product.
5. Internal triggers: Users are satisfied with the process and use it again spontaneously (addiction).

Through the addiction model, we can understand what steps users go through when using the product, what factors make users dependent on the product, and design the product based on these factors. It can be said that the addiction model is an important basis for us to analyze and design products.

3. How does Pinduoduo play with the addiction model?

Earlier we introduced Pinduoduo’s three promotion methods and the addiction model. Now we will analyze Pinduoduo’s promotion in combination with the addiction model.

• External triggers: The first blow that came to us was Pinduoduo’s promotion and sharing. The promotional link shared to us by others through WeChat is actually an external trigger that exposes us to Pinduoduo's promotional information. But this does not mean that we will participate in it. Other e-commerce companies are also using similar social promotions, which can be said to be commonplace.
• Action: Perhaps we may still have doubts at this time, but when we learn that we don’t need to pay any fees for these things, we surrender completely. This is Pinduoduo’s second trick.
• Variable rewards: At this time, Pinduoduo's third trick comes again - monetary or physical rewards. When we see that we can get the desired goods or money by participating in Pinduoduo's promotion activities, we can't control our greed.
• Investment: After being hit by these three axes, most people will obediently participate in Pinduoduo's promotion feast. For a time, all kinds of sharing links for helping to cut down and grab are spread wildly through WeChat. Although there is no need to pay any fees, we also invest costs such as connections, time and energy when participating in the event. And the more we invest, the less willing we are to give up, because once we give up, all previous efforts will be wasted, and we will be unwilling to accept that.
• Internal trigger: After some effort, we finally get the product we want, and this feeling of "getting a bargain" is very enjoyable. After that, whenever we have shopping needs, we will remember this feeling, prompting us to join Pinduoduo's promotion carnival again.

Summarize

The addictive model + three axes are the key to Pinduoduo's successful promotion. The addictive model is the foundation of the entire promotion activity. Only the promotion that conforms to the user's psychology is a viable promotion. The three axes strengthen the addictive model from three aspects: focus, concept, and model to stimulate users' enthusiasm for participation.

With the combined effect of the addiction model and the three-pronged approach, Pinduoduo has achieved remarkable results in promotion.