Analysis of e-commerce event planning model!

When it comes to event operation, many people's first impression is a very creative event idea and an event planning that breaks the routine. It is undeniable that event planning is a vital part of event operation. Good event gameplay can greatly improve the effect of event operation and achieve business goals efficiently.

However, inspiration is unreliable and creativity is difficult to sustain. Excellent event operations do not necessarily require innovative planning experts. Mastering effective event planning methods and models, and combining them with actual business to analyze, plan and operate, will make it more likely that you will continue to do a good job in event planning and operation.

This article is the second in the "E-commerce Event Operation" series. It shares with you two efficient tools for event planning: the RSM model and the TIP model. Learn and apply them flexibly, and I hope it will be inspiring to you.

1. RSM Model: Finding Activity Ideas and Determining Activity Framework

The RSM model can help sort out the core elements of an event, find activity ideas, and determine the activity framework during event planning. The RSM model starts with the three dimensions of roles, scenarios, and motivations to think about activity planning:

1. Role: The main driver of marketing growth activities, not all participants;
2. Scene: The main situation in which the character participates in the activity, which affects the user's emotions;
3. Motivation: The reason why the character is willing to participate in the activity, which determines the user's willingness.

So why are there these three dimensions? In addition to being derived from personal learning and work experience summary, the rationality of the RSM model also comes from the 5W1H principle.

The 5W1H principle is a widely used thinking method, which evolved from the "5W analysis method" proposed by American political scientist Lasswell. 5W1H refers to who, when, where, what, why and how. Corresponding to event planning and operation, users (who) participate in specific forms of activities (what/how) in specific scenarios (when/where) for specific reasons (why).

The RSM model focuses on who (role), why (motivation), and when/where (scenario), while what and how focus more on the specific content and form of the activity. They are not the focus of attention in the early stage of looking for ideas, and are left to the TIP model to answer.

1. Role: Find the key people

In a narrow sense, roles refer to the users of a product. Most products’ growth activities are based on existing users. Stratifying users through different dimensions can help us better understand existing users and plan targeted activities.

In the e-commerce industry, a common way of stratifying users is to divide them into newly registered users, first-order users, repeat purchasing users, loyal users, silent users, and awakened users according to their life cycle, or to divide them into high-order-high-frequency users, high-order-low-frequency users, low-order-high-frequency users, and low-order-low-frequency users according to their average order value and shopping frequency. Different user groups have different characteristics, which means different activity opportunities, which is also related to our subsequent thinking scenarios and motivations.

The value of user segmentation for event planning lies in that, on the one hand, it gives priority to and utilizes users with high user value and high event potential; on the other hand, it considers different event content and forms based on users with different characteristics to improve event efficiency and benefits.

For two-sided products (such as Didi and Airbnb), the users of the products include C-end users (demand-side users) and B-end users (supply-side users). When planning activities for such products, there are more user roles that can be utilized. Activities can be planned separately based on user characteristics, or attempts can be made to connect the two types of users to produce an activity effect of 1+1>2.

The broad role includes not only product users, but also partners and external platforms.

A typical example of a partner is the common joint membership, for example, buying a JD Plus membership and getting an iQiyi membership for free is using partners to help drive conversion growth. External platforms mainly include some advertising platforms, paid brand partners, etc. These are also the drivers we can leverage when planning operational activities to help us generate growth.

2. Scenario: Influencing user emotions

A scene is not just a concept of time and space; it also includes specific situations and behavioral interactions.

The most important function of the scene is that it can affect the user's emotions and even the user's needs, thereby affecting the user's decision. People are more likely to have a big meal after getting their salary and to take a taxi on rainy days. By making good use of scenarios and letting users perform expected activities, the probability of a successful event can be greatly increased.

Scenarios can be divided into online scenarios and offline scenarios:

Online scenarios mainly refer to the user's behavioral scenarios within our products, and can be extended to include the user's behavioral scenarios on the Internet. General operational activities are still focused on behavioral scenarios within the product, and we have less influence on other online scenarios.

By focusing on the user's behavioral scenarios within the product, we can sort out the main process paths of users using the product and find key scenarios. It is also necessary to combine the user stratification mentioned in the role section. The product paths for different user groups are different, and the key scenarios are also likely to be different. In addition to the main path, we should also pay attention to the segmented paths. The user's individual needs and the starting points of the activities may also be hidden outside the main path.

Although we are planning online Internet activities, more user behavior scenarios still occur offline. Paying attention to and thinking about offline scenarios can help us better understand users and find opportunities and connection points for operating activities.

Moreover, operational activities are not limited to online activities. Offline activities can also help us achieve our operational goals. Through user research, we can better explore users' offline scenarios. You can also break away from yourself and enter the role of a user, sort out "a user's day", and find scenarios where products and activities can be combined.

3. Motivation: Determine user intention

Scenarios can help us find the right trigger points for operational activities and reduce users’ behavioral resistance, while motivation can directly enhance users’ behavioral motivation.

Generally, users' motivations are divided into internal motivations and external motivations. The effectiveness of activities can be greatly improved through the rational use or design of motivations.

Internal motivation refers to the subjective desire to do something, which is directly driven by personal psychology.

To understand and discover the internal motivations of users, we need to have a further understanding of user psychology. The internal motivations of different types of users are often different, so we need to conduct specific analysis based on product and user characteristics. Honor and showing off/hobbies/social relationships/reciprocity and altruism are relatively common internal motivations.

External motivation refers to the feeling that you have to do something, mainly various rewards.

In order to get free eggs, grandpas and grandmas lined up at the sales office; in order to get shopping discounts, men and women who like to shop online played the complicated Double Eleven activities. Without eggs there would be no queues, and without discounts there would be no mutual aid in raising cats. This is extrinsic motivation.

Focusing on the activity level, external motivation can be divided into internal rewards and external rewards.

Internal rewards are rewards related to the company/product, such as Taobao coupons are internal rewards. The advantage of internal rewards is that they can be strongly related to the product, and can even be used only within the product, which can strengthen the brand and retain users.

External rewards are rewards that are not related to the company/product, such as the most common cash and some general gifts. They have nothing to do with the product itself, but users need and like them. They are also common in growth activities.

The selection of rewards is relatively flexible. It does not mean that internal rewards and external rewards are necessarily superior or inferior. Different products and different users still have different preferences for rewards.

2. TIP model: determine the activity form and refine the activity content

After solving the problem of activity ideas and framework, we can further solve the problem of what/how, that is, determine the further form of the operation activities and refine the specific parts of the activities. This is where the TIP model comes to help you.

The TIP model designs the specific form and content of activities from three perspectives: tools, interaction, and packaging:

• Marketing Tools: Tools/hooks used by activities to connect activities and users;
• Interaction: How users interact with activities and where marketing tools are placed;
• Content Packaging: Further packaging design of tools and interactions.

1. Marketing Tools

Common marketing tools include red envelopes/privileges/coupons/virtual rights/physical gifts, which are more incentives that users can perceive. They are presented directly to users during operational activities to guide users to engage in key high-value behaviors during the activities.

When selecting marketing tools in design activities, pay attention to selecting designs based on operational goals and user characteristics, and design acquisition and use rules based on these marketing tools to guide user behavior.

2. Interactive scenes

Interactive scenarios are the ways users play in activities, and common ones include group buying/support/bargaining/flash sales/lottery/gifts.

Some features of effective interactive scenarios can be combined when planning and designing, but not all of them need to be present:

• Threshold: Users are required to take critical and high-value actions;
• Feedback: Ability to provide timely feedback on user behavior;
• Interesting: interesting, conducive to user participation and promotion;
• There is probability: it can enhance the user's participation motivation and cycle.

3. Content packaging

Content packaging can start from the perspectives of crowd/region/festival/scene/value/scarcity, etc., to make the operation activities more ceremonial and spreadable, and increase the attractiveness of the activities.

Content packaging can be based on user groups, related to users, and increase attention and participation; it can also be based on time/scenarios, amplifying event highlights and reducing understanding costs; or it can shape the story background, give meaning to the event, and form communication potential.

3. Summary: RSM model and TIP model

The RSM model means that when planning operational activities, we should think from three perspectives: users, scenarios, and motivations. First, we should find key users, then look for suitable trigger scenarios based on user characteristics, and finally combine the design of motivations to gradually find suitable activity ideas, establish a framework for operational activities, and improve the reliability of activity ideas to a certain extent.

The TIP model plans and designs marketing tools, interactive scenarios, and content packaging in sequence. Marketing tools are placed in interactive scenarios, and interactive scenarios are placed under content packaging, making users' perception of the event more complete and attractive.

In actual event planning, we first use the RSM model to determine the event ideas, form an event framework, and answer the questions of Who/Where/When/Why. Then, we further fill in the event ideas and framework formed by RSM, and use the TIP model to improve the event gameplay, determine the form and content, and answer the questions of What/How.

In addition, in addition to using the RSM model and TIP model to think about event planning, we also need to understand the specific design and planning logic of various types of activities such as attracting new customers/conversions/promotions, as well as the common gameplay of various types of e-commerce operation activities, so that we do not need to start from 0 in event planning, but start from 60 and work our way up to 100. I will continue to share more e-commerce operation activities with you next time.

Author: Wu Yijiu

Source: Growth Corsair