How to write a promotional copy that goes viral with product thinking

When we see a good product review article, we often become interested and download it for a trial; or when we read an interesting story and find out it is an event recommendation, we can’t help laughing and actively forward it to our friends ... We call these articles "product promotion articles." Good promotional articles will often dominate the screen for a period of time and become a hot topic.

Why has promotional copy become an important choice when promoting products?

I think there are two reasons: the first is user education. For users, not all products are clear at first glance, and users need guidance. Articles are a great way to guide people, such as promoting products through a Valentine’s Day gift guide or telling you the importance of stress testing through stories about server crashes. Through the article, people’s curiosity is aroused and they learn some basic knowledge about the product functions, so that in the conversion process, the threshold for these readers is lower and the difficulty is less.

Image: Promote products through Valentine’s Day gift guide

The second is communication capability. The spread of good content sometimes exceeds your imagination. Different from other promotion methods such as email, SMS and SEM , content promotion has a strong long-tail effect. By using high -traffic platforms such as Baidu and Zhihu, you can get a good position for product promotion articles in Baidu searches without spending a penny. In the figure below, WeTest's "Stress Testing Master" started to put introductions about its product functions on Baidu, Zhihu and other channels in the early stages of the product. A few months later, it achieved a better ranking than SEM.

Figure: Ranking of Stress Test Master related content on Baidu channels

What kind of article can be called a good product promotion article?

The first is undoubtedly traffic. A good cook cannot cook without rice. An article that no one reads cannot be made more interesting. The second is conversion . As a product promotion article, the core purpose is to achieve product promotion, enable more users to use the product, and generate payment. The last point, I think, is word of mouth , that is, after reading the article, users will have a positive impression of the product itself.

After determining the three goals, there must also be a set of indicators that can be quantified and measured to truly use these dimensions as evaluation indicators for product promotion articles. So what indicators can be used to quantitatively evaluate the quality of the above three dimensions? I listed the following indicators:

● Traffic: reading volume, PV, UV

● Conversion: usage conversion rate (users/UV), payment conversion rate (number of paying users /UV)

● Word of mouth: positive review rate (number of positive reviews/total number of reviews), forwarding rate

What factors and tactics are needed to create an excellent product promotion article that attracts users?

Literary talent? Sense of picture? Seriously? resonance? Empathy? contradiction? Imagination? These factors seem to be common to an excellent product promotion article. However, I think none of them are the most critical. The most important thing for a product promotion article should be logic.

The process of creating an excellent product pitch is similar to the process of designing a good product. Product design is divided into five dimensions from top to bottom: strategy layer, scope layer, structure layer, framework layer, and presentation layer; the steps of writing promotional articles are the same as product design, and will also go through a "top-down" process. Let's call it the three steps of "selling points, structure, and packaging."

1. Selling Point

An article’s consideration of selling points is similar to a product’s consideration of the strategic and scope levels. What do the strategy and scope levels mean for products? The strategic layer is the core goal of the product, and the scope is the boundary of the product function, which means the process of a product discovering user pain points, confirming product goals, and then implementing them into specific products and functions.

Take the example of “ hungry ”:

User pain point: I want to order takeout, but I don’t know which one to order

Product goal: Integrate takeaway merchants and provide online ordering services

Specific products and functions: Ele.me's product functions

For articles, the process of generating "selling points" is more like an extension of the product. When product promotion is needed, the product functions and user pain points have already been formed. What product promotion articles need to do is to deduce user scenarios (the "people", "things" and "objects" when users generate demands") through user pain points, and combine the two to form core selling points.

So continuing with the previous example, what are the user pain points of takeaway products? One is that there are many dining options, and the other most important pain point is that you don’t have to go out. The user scenario extended from this is: a person who "has food needs" (people), does not want to go out (things), and wants to get delicious food (things). With the user scenario in mind, combined with product functions, the familiar slogan of Ele.me was created: "When you are hungry, don't call mom, call Ele.me instead."

So how does a product promotion article reflect its selling points?

Mimi Meng is a very controversial public account , but it is undeniable that it is still one of the most successful marketing accounts. Mimi Meng once published a product promotion article for JD.com’s 618 shopping carnival titled “Do you know why you are poor? Because you like saving money! 》.

The "product and function" of the tweet is undoubtedly "JD 618 Shopping Carnival", and the user scenario is "people who have the need to buy". Faced with the needs of "whether to buy" and "what to buy" generated by shopping promotions, this demand can be strong or potential. For these people, they can be divided into three categories:

The first category: people who are hesitant between "buy" and "not buy", whose pain point is "budget" and who are highly price sensitive;

The second category: people who hesitate between "buying category A" and "buying category B". Their pain point lies in "demand". They have purchasing needs, but they have priorities, and not all needs need to be met;

The third category: People who hesitate between "buying brand A" and "buying brand B". Their pain point lies in "difficulty in choosing". They have made up their minds to buy items in a certain category, but are just hesitating about which brand to buy.

For these three groups of people, the user scenarios are different. This article by "Mimeng" mainly promotes products for the first group of people.

So how does Mimi Meng package her selling points?

Mimi Meng found a clever entry point: "What will happen if you make a purchase decision?" The article gives some examples: when you choose to buy a breakfast, you save the energy spent on making breakfast; when you choose to buy a car , you save the time spent commuting to work; and with the remaining time and energy, you can use it to appreciate yourself and exchange it for more money. Therefore, the core selling point of the “JD 618 Shopping Carnival” is: shopping can save energy and time, and energy and time can be exchanged for more money.

From the above examples, we can see that the main method of "extracting selling points" in product promotion articles is: confirm the specific functions of the promoted product - describe the corresponding user scenarios (people, things, objects) - the effects that can be achieved after using the product functions.

2. Structure

An article's consideration of structure is similar to a product's consideration of the structural layer and frame layer. What do the structural layer and frame layer mean to the product? They are the pattern and sequence of how product features are presented, as well as the content of information architecture and interaction design. The structure is the skeleton of the article and the order in which the stories are connected.

There is a line in the song "Onion" that goes "If you're willing to peel off my heart layer by layer." The structure of a promotional article is just like that. We need to show our core selling points bit by bit in a reasonable and logical way.

In this article, Mimi Meng inserted a video telling four short stories. The narrative logic adopted by the four stories is the same. They all tell a story background, then show the problems that arise, and then analyze the problems to come up with solutions.

Take the first story as an example:

The article begins with several sad stories: the protagonist's company is far away from home, and the commute takes two hours every day, which means he spends one and a half months on the road every year; there is another person whose computer is getting slower and slower, but he is reluctant to change it, which leads to the fact that his work efficiency has not improved... Through this story, the author raises a problem - in order to save money, many people waste a lot of time.

After presenting the problem, start analyzing what caused people to make such a decision? This is because people regard money as more important than time. The article begins to try to reverse this line of thinking - money can save time, time can help you appreciate in value, and appreciation can help you get more money. Through this logic, the article finally combines the solution with the core selling point. Spending money can save time, save energy, enhance personal value, and thus achieve greater benefits.

3. Packaging

An article's considerations for packaging are similar to a product's considerations for its presentation layer. The presentation layer means the visual expression of the product. From the promotion perspective, packaging refers to the optimization of the article's expression skills, writing style, format, title , etc.

There are so many things to consider in terms of writing skills, writing style, format, title, etc. that it is difficult to describe them all in one article. Here are just three tips :

● Amplify the reader’s feelings

● Reduce the user's understanding cost

● Grab the reader’s attention

1. Amplify the reader’s feelings

There are two tricks to amplify readers' feelings: "digitalization" and "scenario-based".

Let’s talk about “digitalization” first. Compared with simple presentation, digital display can make users empathize more. How does Mimi Meng’s product promotional text use “digitalization” to package the images?

In order to show the "difficult process of developing the lens", Mi Meng used the copywriting "33mm lens will have a good imaging effect" to emphasize the precision and difficulty;

In order to show that "the company is far from home and it is not easy to get to work", the article calculated the specific time spent on commuting, which makes people feel that a lot of time is indeed wasted:

In order to show that "being enthusiastic about sweepstakes activities leads to loss of valuable time", the article calculated the difference in value between spending the same amount of time participating in marketing activities and studying the business seriously:

We found that Apple's press conferences are also good at using this method to amplify the audience's feelings. When Cook introduced the iPhone as "very popular", "very popular" and "very secure", he listed these figures: 1 billion units sold, 140 billion downloads, 1/50,000 error rate for Touch ID, 1/1,000,000 error rate for Face ID...

The second trick is “scenario-based”. Through scene description, users can experience the described content more immersively.

Still taking the above three scenes as an example, how does Mimi Meng package these pictures through "scenario-based" approach?

In the part titled "Developing the lens, a difficult process", the article describes how Xiao Li used beer bottle bases, flashlight glass, and window glass to make the lens. The props involved also included electric saws, protective glasses, magnifying glasses, shoelaces, hardware instruments, design drawings, etc. These scenes show the difficulty of the process.

In the section "The company is far from home, and it's not easy to get to work", the article describes the mixed smell of sweat, body odor, and strong perfume in the bus, as well as the bumps, congestion, and noise:

In the part about "being keen on lucky draws and wasting precious time", the article describes a scenario where a WeChat message is sent to each friend to explain the rules of the activity.

There is also a similar application at the Apple conference. When introducing the waterproof function of iPhone7, the screen of the phone falling into water was directly shown; when introducing the Mario Run game that supports one-handed operation, the screen of playing the game while holding the handle on the subway and eating an apple was shown; and when introducing the Face ID function of iPhoneX, countless people created a joke called "unlock with one glance"...

2. Reduce the user's understanding cost

One of the ways to reduce the cost of user understanding is "analogy".

When promoting product features, it is not easy for people to form an intuitive and vivid understanding of the product. The purpose of analogy is to use something that readers are more familiar with to illustrate the product to be promoted.

For example, when introducing that the area of ​​an aircraft carrier is tens of thousands of square meters, people have no concept of "tens of thousands of square meters". If it is compared to the size of 4-5 football fields, readers will better understand it. For another example, when introducing that the area of ​​Philadelphia in the United States is 1.3 million square kilometers, for European readers it can be introduced as "the area is equal to the sum of Paris and Berlin", and for Chinese readers it can be introduced as "the area is equal to the sum of Changzhou and Nanjing".

When I was in charge of promoting the Stress Test Master product, in order to help users better understand the working principle of the server, I compared the user's "activity page" to a "restaurant", "concurrency" to "several tables of guests ordering food together", and "response time" to "the time it takes for a restaurant to serve food"...

3. Attract users’ attention

This part discusses two issues: hot marketing and good titles.

Let’s talk about “hotspot marketing” first. When it comes to product promotion, the benefits of sticking to hot spots are self-evident, but there is a lot of knowledge involved in how to stick to them. Hotspot marketing is generally divided into three steps: discovering hotspots, analyzing hotspots, and adapting to hotspots.

a. Find hot spots

There are two types of hot spots. One is sudden, such as hot news about a celebrity, an emergency, or a hit event; the other is planned, such as a planned event, a popular exhibition, the launch of a blockbuster game or movie , etc. We cannot control sudden hot spots, but we need to plan ahead for planned hot spots.

There are many ways and channels to plan. You can usually learn about hot events and topics that may be used through the "Baidu Search Ranking", "Weibo Hot Search" and "This Day in History" in Baidu.

b. Analyze hot spots

After selecting the hot spots and topics to stick to, you need to effectively combine the core selling points of the product with the hot spots. How to combine? We need to split the hotspot attributes and analyze the hotspots based on "Who", "What", "Where", "Why" and "How". Take the 2016 hot topic "Pokeman Go" as an example:

Who: Who created Pokeman Go? Nintendo. Then any related activities or news of Nintendo or even Japanese game companies can be attached;

What: What is “Pokeman Go”? It is a mobile game with AR technology. Then AR mobile games and even VR mobile games can be attached;

Where: Where is Pokeman Go? Japanese IP. Then the game content related to Japanese IP can also be spread as a hot spot.

c. Fit hot spots

After finding the entry point for the core selling points and hot spots, you need to produce appropriate content to match them.

Content that fits the hot spots can be roughly divided into three categories:

Type 1: Problem Solving

The first category is to provide appropriate solutions to current hot issues through some professional content. For example, after the launch of iPhoneX, the "bangs" design brought many adaptation problems. The "Mobile Manager iPhoneX Adaptation Summary" launched by WeTest for Mobile Manager can attract the attention of many users, because this is exactly the topic that users are most concerned about at the moment.

Type 2: Supplementary content

The second type is to provide some supplementary content promotion for hot events, such as detailed descriptions of the inside story of some hot events, which will be very attractive to users. Amid the Pokeman Go craze, WeTest launched an article titled "Pokeman Go cannot be played in China? Tencent AR experts teach you how to do it yourself! 》introduced some production methods and processes of AR games to users, deciphered the principles and practices of AR games for everyone, and attracted the attention and forwarding of many readers.

Type 3: It’s about me

The third type is to tell users that their product was involved in a hot event after it occurs, and provide some inside information, which is very easy to attract users' attention. For example, after WeTest launched the "Military Uniform Photo H5" event on Tiantian Pitu, it introduced the stress testing solution behind the event and told users about the important preparations behind a hit event, which satisfied users' desire to explore secrets.
Now let’s talk about “good title”.

In order to allow users to click on the article as soon as possible, the title is very important. How to come up with a good title is worth writing a special article. There are many similar articles at present, so I will not go into details here.

Finally, let’s review the three key points in writing product promotion articles: “selling points”, “structure” and “packaging”.

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

Product promotion services: APP promotion services Advertising platform Longyou Century