There are so many online advertising channels, how do you choose the platform that suits you?

Preface: Some of the friends who read this article may find it difficult to understand, but I don’t want to reduce the “dryness” of the article because we are only growing when we feel difficulties. I hope you can gain something from it.

Summary

• What are the categories of common online distribution channels ?
• With so many online channels, how can we quickly select the most suitable channels for delivery?
• What kind of launch strategy should be chosen at different product stages?
• Actual case: IPhone X launch stage selection distribution channel display

My friend Xiao A asked me, are search engines and information streams the only channels for online advertising ? If all companies only had these options for advertising , wouldn’t the competition be fierce? Isn't it difficult to snatch a sheep from a pack of wolves? The questions of friends can be summarized into the following two questions:

1. How to choose the distribution channel?
2. How to achieve results after selecting the distribution channel? 1

If you want to know how to choose a channel, you must first know what channels there are. There are thousands of advertising channels, and I will not list them all here. Regardless of how the delivery channels increase or decrease, they can basically be divided into three types:

Brand type : Brand advertising has the direct purpose of establishing product brand image and increasing brand market share. It is a method of highlighting and communicating the brand's position in the minds of consumers. In search engines, they often appear in the form of product specials or direct numbers.

Display ads: Display ads are image ads that are charged per thousand impressions and can be placed in feeds and blog pages. This type of advertising is usually called CPM advertising in the industry, such as WeChat Moments MP, Guangdiantong , etc.

Performance-based advertising: In a performance-based advertising system, advertisers only need to pay for measurable results. The information flows of search engines and OCPC development trends are both considered performance-based advertising.

PS: Regarding the introduction of omni-media advertising channels, we will later publish an article specifically introducing the current mainstream advertising channels and features. You can learn a little bit about this here, mainly for understanding the following text.

User research

Whether it is choosing a channel or making an effect

The first important thing is to understand the users! Understand your users! Understand your users!

No 1. What is user research?

Baidu Encyclopedia defines it this way:

User research refers to obtaining suggestions and opinions from respondents through various means, summarizing them, and studying the overall characteristics of the matter. The purpose of user research is to provide relevant data basis for production.

No 2. Why do we need to conduct user research?

I have a friend named Xiao A who asked me a few days ago: " Why did my promotional activities last so long and with such great efforts fail to bring the expected increase in users?"

After analyzing my friend Xiao A's account, I found that Xiao A's products are all customized and many of the products are imported from overseas. It can be said that the target consumer group should be considered upper-middle-class customers.

When launching the smart fingerprint lock product, the target group is as follows: no age limit, no region limit, no historical search habit limit, only limitation based on interest tags. The only remaining interest tags are limited to the following:

Judging from the user portrait analysis , it is very likely that the wrong promotion was offered to the wrong person at the wrong time and in the wrong place.

If Xiao A has a certain understanding of the product's user portrait when launching the product, then will the targeting be more accurate?

The process of describing accurate user portraits is to solve the problem of converting data into commercial value. It can be said to be mining gold and silver from massive data.

In the era of mobile Internet , users spend nearly 4 to 5 hours a day searching on their mobile phones, and the Internet provides tens of millions of social networking sites and forums for information browsing.

We want to find out which cities the users are distributed in, which websites they browse on a daily basis, what information they pay attention to, etc.

These are all important clues to guide us to accurately choose the delivery channels.

Based on the numerous user behavior fragments collected, the user's attribute characteristics, social background, interests and preferences can be restored, and even potential attributes such as inner needs, personality traits, and social groups can be revealed.

Understand users' various consumption behaviors and needs, accurately characterize the characteristics of the population, and aggregate user characteristics in different dimensions for specific business scenarios.

The originally cold data can be restored into a vivid user image, thereby guiding the analysis of consumption scenarios and the selection of delivery channels.

No 3. How to conduct user research?

There are two types: rich companies and poor companies.

Rich companies either have their own independent research teams or simply pay to purchase the survey results from professional companies. The focus is still on companies that have no money.

At this time, our marketing staff also have to undertake user research work.

Here I share some common methods and websites for collecting user information:

1. Brainstorm within the department first
2. Prepare interview outlines and conduct face-to-face user interviews
3. Go to major mainstream communities and industry vertical forums to collect user opinions and organize needs
4. Observe what types of popular articles are available in our industry recently and what the comments below are saying
5. Highly rated questions and answers and user comments on Zhihu
6. Commonly used websites for collecting big data :

• iAnalysys

• iResearch Data

• Baidu Index

• WeChat Index

Finally, by summarizing the survey information, we will get a portrait result similar to the figure below.

Now that we know the user’s preferences, the places they frequent, and the websites they browse most, we finally come to the stage of choosing the delivery channels. But each netizen has different demands for products.

Some don’t know about this product, and some are still considering it and waiting. Users are at different stages and choose different channels and marketing methods.

Therefore, we also need to understand the consumer purchasing decision process.

Consumer purchasing decision refers to the process by which consumers carefully evaluate the attributes of a product, brand or service and choose and purchase products that meet a specific need.

It is a systematic decision-making process, including the determination of needs, the formation of purchasing motivation, the selection and implementation of purchasing plans, and post-purchase evaluation.

No 1. Discover products and create demand

With the upgrading of Internet consumption, advertisers have changed from passively waiting for consumers to actively use search engines such as Baidu to search, to taking the initiative and delivering precise ads based on user portraits. This change is a boon for new and less well-known products. Therefore, in the early stage of product launch, we must have a precise understanding of the online and offline residences of consumers, so as to achieve precise delivery, accurate reach, and awaken demand. What is needed more at this stage is product exposure.

Some users convert directly at this stage, and some users will further search and compare after they have a desire to buy, which requires the use of search engines to search

No 2 , collect information, want to buy

When users receive promotional information about new products and become interested in purchasing, they will further collect information related to the product. Maybe it's a user review, maybe it's a news article.

No 3. Evaluation plan, default comparison

When making a purchasing decision, you will also compare the product with similar products on the market in terms of function, price, cost-effectiveness, etc.

No. 4. Decision to purchase, conversion process

Because your copy directly hits the user's pain points, users click on your ad and enter the website. I saw that I could get the quote by simply filling in the apartment information, so I filled in the information quickly.

No 5. Post-purchase behavior, continued repurchase

Old customers need to repurchase. After planning an event, you can redirect old customers to expose them again to stimulate their demand, and repeat the above process to achieve the goal of continuous repurchase.

Of the five purchase decision processes mentioned above, 2 and 3 are usually carried out simultaneously during the advertising process. For the corresponding specific channel selection, please refer to the table below.

After talking about user research and purchasing process, how should we implement it in actual operation? Let me explain this with an example:

Assume that the portrait of Apple users after the survey is as follows:

The gender of iPhone users is almost balanced, with students aged 19 to 24 and office workers aged 25 to 34 being the main users.

The communication software frequently used by users is WeChat , students often go to Weibo, white-collar workers often go to Zhihu, the e-commerce platforms browsed are JD.com and Taobao , and the video software frequently used is iQiyi , etc.

(PS: User research must be very detailed and rigorous. The above data is purely an example and is not the final survey result)

No 1. Discover products and stimulate demand

The iPhone X needs a lot of exposure and warm-up before it goes on the market. Combine user portraits and purchase decision-making processes. In terms of delivery channels, can we try the following channels:

Offline: subway and bus advertisements, universities, and CBD elevators

Online: Use online channels such as WeChat Moments , Weibo, iQiyi home screen, and Tencent News information flow to promote products.

No 2. Collect information and want to buy

After users see the ad, some die-hard fans convert directly in the first stage. Some users who are on the sidelines develop needs and collect information online, such as evaluation reports and post-purchase reviews, to decide whether to buy. At this time, it is particularly important to build reputation on Weibo, Moments, Zhihu influencers, and major technology forums.

No 3. Evaluate the cost-effectiveness and compare with the default solution

After generating the desire to buy, users conduct searches, and the official website + platform stores occupy all the traffic .

No. 4. Decide to buy and enter the conversion process

The official website/distribution platform copywriting settings and conversion process settings stimulate conversion.

No. 5. Post-purchase behavior and word-of-mouth communication

Word-of-mouth marketing among purchased users guides users to spontaneously comment, forward, and post photos, thus stimulating more potential audiences.

Summary: The distribution channels for iPhone X at each stage are as follows

There are hundreds of advertising channels. When choosing a channel, we should be guided by results rather than traffic. Good advertising effects are based on "showing to the right people", so the choice of channels must be based on sufficient user research, otherwise there will be an embarrassing situation of having traffic but no conversion.

User research is rigorous and complex, and one article is not enough to explain it. Friends who are interested in in-depth research can reply to "user research" in the background to obtain guidance documents.

I have so much experience to share on how to achieve results through various channels, but due to limited space, I will post it next time. I hope the above content is helpful to you.

Author: Xiangxi Tuantuan , authorized to publish by Qinggua Media .

Source: Feiyue Operation Diary (ID: feiyue2333 )