Talk about the 7 steps of event planning

I've heard such a little story.

Xiao Zhang is a coffee fanatic. He recently quit his job and opened a coffee shop with his friends. Since he is a designer by background, he spent a lot of time on the decoration of the store. However, not many people noticed the new store when it opened.

He is confident that his coffee is much better than the nearby Starbucks , and the decoration is no worse than it, so why don't many people pay attention to it? The more I think about it, the more anxious I become. He walked up to the only customer in the store and tried to get some advice from him.

Customers commented on his coffee shop: The coffee here is very good and the decoration is also very nice.

This is a complete affirmation of the coffee shop. Xiao Zhang was even more puzzled and asked: Why don’t many people come in?

The customer said: It’s a new store, not many people have discovered it, and there’s no reason to switch from Starbucks to here, right? Besides, I didn’t know the coffee in your shop was good, right!

Xiao Zhang suddenly realized that since there was no reason to try it , he didn't know that the coffee here was delicious, and if he didn't know, naturally no one would come.

It is said that good wine needs no bush, but nowadays, no matter how good the wine is, it needs no bush. No matter how good a coffee shop is, it will just lie there quietly and no one will notice it. At this time, it needs "a hand" to pull customers in. "This hand" refers to activities, such as buy one get one free at the opening of a new store, half-price specials, corporate membership and other activities. Customers come into the store to enjoy delicious coffee and exquisite decoration, which drives subsequent consumption and word-of-mouth communication.

If we compare a coffee shop to a product, then the product is good, but you need to give users a reason to pay attention to you and use you, and you also need to let users continue to use you and even help spread the word. In this case, the "active" hand is needed to come out and give a helping hand.

Therefore, the value of " activity operation " is as follows: attracting user attention, stimulating user contribution, and strengthening user awareness.

So, here comes the question.

How to plan an event?

1. Determine the activity objectives

Why do we need to do activities? What is the purpose of the activity?

To increase users? To boost business? For brand communication?

You always have to understand why and think about what to do next after clarifying the purpose . You can't do activities just for the sake of doing them.

After clarifying the purpose, it is best to convert the "purpose" into specific and quantifiable "data" . For example, if the boss says he wants to attract new users, then this can be converted into a specific and quantifiable data: attracting 50,000 new users within 15 days.

This turns vague objectives into clear, measurable goals. Because of the specific and quantifiable attributes of the goal, our subsequent work will revolve around such attributes. What can you accomplish in 15 days? In order to reach 50,000 new users, what forms of activities are feasible?

Obviously, jobs that require more than 15 days of work are not suitable for this activity. A plan to add 50,000 new users cannot be implemented in the form of an activity to achieve 20,000 new users, because it is not appropriate.

The purpose of an activity is the starting point for planning the activity and the source of thinking . If we grasp this point well, we will not deviate from our original intention in the subsequent steps. A specific and measurable "purpose" can help us make better decisions in the next steps.

2. Activity plan planning

Determining the activity goals is like drawing a frame, and the subsequent activity planning work must be carried out within this frame. Yang looked through several online activities and found that the prototypes of these activities were mostly evolved from the following ones: lottery, guessing, check-in, subsidy, voting, and testing .

Looking at the characteristics of the activity, there are the following:

1. Free

Free means that users can participate without spending almost anything . If you can get a good deal without spending any money, everyone would want to get involved. The lower the participation threshold of an event, the larger the population it covers.

Speaking of free activities, the first thing that comes to Yang's mind is the three major mobile operators , because there are activities every day, and the key is that they are free, so "making the most of the money" is the most appropriate.

2. Simple

Simplicity means that the gameplay and process of the activity should be as convenient as possible to reduce user operating costs . From the time users see the activity to the end of the entire activity, each additional step will result in varying degrees of user loss. You cannot make an event too complicated just to show off your ability to plan an event. This will only make users close the page after viewing it.

This is Meituan ’s daily welfare activity. When you see the big turntable, you must know how to play it. You don’t need to spend time thinking about how to play the activity. And using sharing to get extra activity opportunities can be accomplished in just one simple step. Treat users as novices, and the activities are so simple that they don’t even need any instructions to know how to play.

3. Fun

The original intention of the activity is to allow users to play, and having fun is the key point . Therefore, during the activity, the gameplay must be interesting and not boring. If users find the app fun, their stay time will naturally increase, and they may even share it with their friends to play together.

The most fun and interesting activity is the knowledge quiz game that was popular on the Internet a while ago. It is not an activity designed for the operation of other products , but it has gathered the characteristics of all activities and has become a product apart from the activity itself.

4. Transparency

Transparency means that activities must be fair, just and open . There is a clear rule to make the most important things clear and understandable in the shortest words. Wherever there is profit, there will be more or less some fraud. We should take precautions to protect the interests of the majority of players. The results are made public to show that the activity is fair and there is no foul play.

Didi Chuxing’s recommended activity rules are simple and clear enough, directly presenting the information that users want to see most in the activity rules. As for the details of the rules, there is a separate page. If the user wants to know more, he will click to view it. This avoids the situation where the user closes the page silently after seeing the long text rules. Secondly, there are also special data statistics for the rewards received by users, which also helps users to actually view the benefits of the activities.

5. Accumulable

Accumulable means that the benefits of users' activities can be accumulated . The accumulative benefit is that it will prevent users from giving up halfway and can motivate them. Of course, there has to be a limit to accumulation. It can’t be without a cap, right? Otherwise, it's time to report to your boss in the office the next day.

Didi Hitch’s New Year’s Day cross-city event is a typical example of accumulation. With the help of sharing and dissemination, users’ rewards continue to accumulate. Of course, there is a limit to the amount that can be accumulated. The "cumulative" activity model is mostly used to give users a superposition of rewards to help spread the campaign. It is a win-win model where users get more rewards and the campaign gets greater exposure.

6. Cashable

Redeemable means that the rewards of the activity are redeemable . Moreover, it is necessary to promptly deliver to users and tell them that this is true. This can increase users' enthusiasm in a timely manner and promote the spread of activities among users. After all, when you win a prize, everyone wants to show off.

The activity plan has been designed, and the next step is to build the activity model. Here we need to think of ourselves as that novice user and go through the entire process several times from seeing the event to the end of the event. If we find any problems, we should make timely improvements, add what should be added, and delete what can be deleted. Only when the entire activity model can be smoothly implemented and finalized can you communicate with others about the next steps.

You know, changing requirements is a very frustrating thing, and the friendship between colleagues may be ruined because of it.

After completing the above steps, you should start preparing resources based on your activity plan.

Activity resources are divided into two types: internal and external . The company’s internal resources include the human resources involved in the event (such as copywriting , design, technology, etc.), the event’s prize resources, and the company’s internal publicity and promotion resources. The company’s external resources mainly include external publicity and promotion resources, as well as online and offline promotion resources.

A friend of Yang who works in operations once complained that he was most afraid of organizing events. Because it is a startup company, there are only a few people and basically all resources are self-sufficient. I wrote the copy, did the graphics and designs myself, looked for resources myself, and even bought the prizes for events myself at the mall. The only thing I didn't type was the code.

After the activity plan is formulated, you must also consider the problems that may arise during the activity and prepare alternative plans corresponding to the problems, commonly known as Plan B. This way, if something goes wrong during the activity, you won't lose your composure.

The risk issues are roughly as follows:

• In terms of technology, the activity launch time is delayed or bugs occur after launch;
• In terms of promotion, resources were not in place on time and the activities were not warmed up enough;
• As for users, users did not buy into the main selling points of the event;
• External environment: other hot spots emerge and user attention shifts;
• In terms of law, there are legal issues in the activities, such as anti-pornography and consumer rights;
• Cheating loopholes, users find loopholes in the rules, fake orders, flooding the market, etc.

After the previous steps, the activity is launched online. At this time, we have to quickly pull up a stool and sit in front of the computer to monitor the effect of the activity at any time. Check whether the activity is carried out as planned, whether the expected goals are achieved, whether there is any user feedback in the process, etc. Make a decision on whether to make adjustments based on the information collected. If adjustments are necessary, act quickly.

Among them , the two main monitoring points are data and feedback :

Data , data generated during the activity and related to the activity objectives, is the data as expected? If an abnormality occurs, understand the cause, consider whether adjustments are needed, and use alternative plans.

For example, the activity H5 is launched, and the click rate of the activity is very high, but the number of users reaching the second page drops sharply. Through data observation, we concluded that the promotion of the event was very effective and covered a large number of people, but the users stayed for a very short time before jumping out. At this time, you have to go back and look at what went wrong on the event homepage, whether it was because the text was not clear enough or there were other technical problems.

There will be users dropping out at every stage, but we need to fully study why they drop out and how to optimize to reduce the dropout rate. This is the value of data.

Feedback , pay close attention to all platforms where user feedback appears, such as user groups, Tieba , Weibo, Moments , etc. These feedbacks can be used as a reference for optimizing the next activity. Perhaps a user’s unique point of view will inspire you!

For example, the picture below is a feedback collection form for an activity. Users have reported page crashes and experience issues, so this problem is worth our careful consideration and improvement.

Users who can give suggestions are true love!

The end of an event does not mean the end of the work of event operation. There is still a crucial step - review.

If you don’t review, you won’t know why the event was successful or why it didn’t meet your expectations. The purpose of reviewing is to summarize experience and to understand which aspects can be further optimized so that the next event can be done better.

The review of the activity is divided into the following three aspects:

Review the goals , based on what kind of background conditions, in order to achieve what kind of goals, and what kind of effect the activity ultimately achieved.

For example, the product has passed the "cold treatment" stage and is now in urgent need of increasing the number of users. The goal was to increase the original 10,000 users to 50,000 users within 15 working days. The activity eventually achieved 70,000 users, exceeding the set target of 20,000 users.

Analyze the activities in detail . Did any unexpected events occur during the process of achieving the goals? Why did the unexpected events occur? What impact do these surprises have on the results? Can it be further optimized?

For example, make a detailed analysis of the beginning, process, and end of an activity. Based on the activity goal of increasing the number of users, we adopted a lottery activity model where sharing could gain additional activity opportunities. During the activity, we encountered emergencies such as a sudden increase in the number of users and server crashes. Try to pull out as many meaningful things as possible from the entire activity and analyze them in detail.

Experience summary : summarize the key points of the successful and failed parts of the activity, and provide solutions for further optimization or solutions. Of course, after reviewing, remember to write an analysis report and save it as a document. It is a report on work done to yourself and a sharing of experience to others.

The author of this article @Yang compiled and published by (Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting!

Product promotion services: APP promotion services, advertising platform, Longyou Games