Should product copy make users excited at first sight? Yes! But you have to be careful!

Whether it is marketing , operations or copywriting , the first thing is generally to gain user attention.

That’s right, it’s to attract users, stimulate interest, and generate desire.

This is a very critical point. If this point is not correct, the subsequent efforts to build user trust, interact with users, and guide users to purchase will be in vain.

The principle is very simple. Let me give you a simpler example: if the title of an article does not attract users' attention and arouse their interest, then no matter how good your content is, people may just read it by themselves.

1. How can we arouse users’ interest?

There are certainly many methods. A very common and effective method is to increase user expectations, making users full of expectations and yearning for it.

For example, FOTILE range hoods create an expectation for consumers that smoke will not escape from all directions and there will be no dead angles in the 360° range.

OPPO phones are even more powerful. They can be charged for 5 minutes and provide 2 hours of talk time. I was a little bit looking forward to it at that time.

There is also this telescope advertisement. The effect is amazing. The animals in the distance are as clear as if they were right in front of you. Aren’t you looking forward to it?

There are actually a lot of such advertising copy, product introductions, and marketing slogans, for example:

Become a PPT master in 10 days
20 marketing experts jointly created
18 million soft light photography, illuminate your beauty. Charge for 5 minutes, talk for 2 hours. Even the smallest individuals have their own brands.
360° master-level skills, let you reshape your 18-year-old tender skin
…

All of this is to increase user expectations, attract users, and stimulate their interest in further learning.

2. Why can raising user expectations achieve such an effect?

I thought about it, why? And is raising expectations just about attracting users?

This requires talking about the expectation effect.

The expectation effect is also a psychological study, which means that our existing impressions of things will blind our vision of observing problems.

Our expectations of something will affect our attitude and experience towards it, and ultimately our decision-making.

Someone has done an experiment in which the same coffee was placed in a high-end container and an ordinary container. The result was that consumers generally felt that the coffee in the high-end container tasted better.

This is not to tell everyone to make fake things, but to say that the packaging form of a product will also affect people's perception of the quality of the product.

The packaging boxes of your mobile phones are really exquisite.

This is to increase user expectations and generate strong interest in users.

Not only that, but if you think raising anticipation is just about sparking interest, you’re wrong.

There is also an experiment which is very interesting. The research institute found two groups of people and prepared beer with vinegar added for the experiment.

The first group of participants were told in advance that vinegar was added to the beer, while the other group of researchers did not tell them anything and just asked them to taste the beer.

As a result, the first group of participants always felt that the beer was weird and not tasty.

The other group generally felt that the beer tasted good after drinking it, and after being told that vinegar was added to the beer, they gave the same answer: it was still delicious.

This is very interesting. How could there be such a big difference when adding vinegar to the same beer?

It’s because of expectations. When they are told that vinegar is added to beer, they actually have a psychological expectation, and this expectation does affect people’s behavior and even perception.

Therefore, expectations of a thing will really change consumers' subjective or even objective experience, and ultimately affect our attitude and decision towards it.

For example, I handed a bottle of ordinary water to someone to drink, and then said that it was snow mountain water from the Himalayas . After drinking it, the other person actually said, "Well, it's good, it's really refreshing."

In fact, many times, if we believe in advance that something is good, then it will generally be really good, and vice versa, the expected value may become the true value.

Therefore, improving user expectations can also invisibly influence consumers' positive judgment of the product.

For example, if you buy a very expensive pair of headphones, after using them you might say proudly in your heart: "Well, the sound is great, expensive is good, you get what you pay for!" (In fact, these headphones may only be expensive because they are small, and the sound is about the same as ordinary ones)

Well, that’s why we always say that we should do everything we can to raise user expectations, stimulate their interest, and then understand and buy.

Then someone will say, you old thief, aren’t you packaging your products, exaggerating their functions, and magnifying their value to our detriment?

Of course not, not at all. If anyone wants to understand it this way, I will be the first to object! !

Please look down↓↓

3. When raising user expectations, you also have to be careful!

We package our products recklessly, exaggerate their functions, and spend huge amounts of money to promote their selling points. If the product is very good, then that’s good, as it will generate word of mouth and lead to secondary conversions .

But if there is even the slightest mistake with your product/service, users will feel bad, be angry with you, or even stop trusting the brand.

There are too many such cases. They are over-packaged and over-hyped, and end up falling quickly. Even if what you say is true, users will demand more from you due to their high expectations.

This is the hidden crisis brought about by raising expectations, so be careful.

Here's a slightly extreme example:

A man gives 10 yuan to beggars at the gate of the community every day. Later, when he got married, he only gave the beggar 5 dollars. The beggar was very unhappy and asked him why?

The man replied: Now that I have a family, my expenses have increased, so I have less money to give you.

The beggar became furious when he heard this and said: How can you use my money to support your wife and children.

You see, this is a real-life example of expectations being too high and reality not matching up.

This is also normal, because once you raise expectations, users will have too high expectations of you, and then they will be very sensitive. If you do a good job, it is expected, but if you do not do well enough, then they will complain.

At this time, your product will be very passive and it will be difficult to meet consumer expectations. As a result, there will be a sense of being disadvantaged and deceived when reality does not match expectations.

In particular, many companies should have a deep understanding that sales personnel make nonsense promises for performance and infinitely raise user expectations, and users always say "no problem, this can be achieved".

As a result, after the user experience , the service staff suffered a tragic fate. They were criticized and even scolded by consumers. As a result, the meeting ended in a bad mood and they were accused of running a "scam company".

What should I do then?

4. Find ways to lower user expectations?

What to do? This is indeed a problem.

There are many books, celebrities, and many success stories that tell us: finding ways to lower user expectations is also a winning formula.

Yes, sometimes we have to find ways to lower user expectations.

I'm not kidding, this is a really good approach.

There is nothing surprising about this. Marketing is like Tai Chi, the combination of yin and yang.

Lowering user expectations can, to a certain extent, reduce consumers' "requirements" on us, making them no longer so strict and demanding.

Similarly, it can make the product more authentic and increase its credibility. Then we meet their needs and it is easier to create a sense of surprise.

For example, the cold medicine Baijiahei does not directly say "Cure colds and eliminate worries", but instead lowers the expectation: "Use the white tablets during the day to keep away from drowsiness, and use the black tablets at night to sleep soundly."

This expectation seems more realistic and easier to achieve than "curing a cold."

Another benefit of lowering your expectations is that it makes it easier to experience a feeling of exceeding expectations.

Exceeding user expectations means gaining good user perception and receiving positive reviews, which is the best way to build word of mouth.

Aren’t we crying out every day that we want to give users an experience that exceeds their expectations?

But the question arises again?

Then I thought, if we want to give users a feeling of exceeding their expectations, do we have to lower their expectations in advance?

That may not be the case!

What do we do when we talk about marketing?

We need to bring satisfaction to users, create a sense of happiness, and make them feel very good, right?

This seems to be confusing, so let me put it in a more specific way. There is a formula in economics called the happiness formula: Happiness = utility/expected value.

This happiness formula was proposed by economist Paul Samuelson. Everyone understands the expected value, which is the psychological expectation. So what does this “utility” mean? You can understand it as the "reality" of a thing.

This formula shows that happiness is similar to satisfaction, which is actually a comparison between the actual life status and psychological expectations/anticipations.

If your boyfriend gets a bonus of 1,000 yuan, but you expect him to buy himself a 10,000 yuan LV, then 1,000 divided by 10,000 will only give you a sense of happiness of 0.1.

But if your expectation is for it to treat you to a Western meal worth 200 yuan, 1000 divided by 200, the happiness is 5.

So you see, in order to give users a feeling of exceeding their expectations, it is indeed possible to lower their expectations. But we can also maximize this practical utility.

Or you can increase user expectations, as long as the utility/expected value ratio is high enough.

However, if you think about it carefully, if you raise user expectations, you may not be able to meet their high expectations, create a sense of happiness, or even backfire; if you lower user expectations, you may lose appeal to users and fail to arouse their interest.

What do you think we should do?

5. Adhere to the principle of consistency in commitment

This brings up the "commitment consistency principle" which is often mentioned in marketing, psychology, and management.

Once we make a commitment or statement, internal and external positions can easily force us to take corresponding actions.

For example, if you ask someone to borrow money, if you start by asking, "Do you have any spare money recently?"

It is estimated that this money cannot be borrowed. Most people will say: "It's not good recently. Business is not good. I just lost money last month. I am almost broke...balabala." Anyway, they have no money.

But if you ask him, "How's business lately?" he replies, "Not bad!"

Then you can follow up with: "I need 3,000 yuan recently, can you lend it to me?"

At this time, the possibility of borrowing money is greatly increased. Why?

Because he had just said that his business was good, saying that he had no money to lend at this time would undoubtedly be a slap in the face. It would only be a question of how much to borrow from then on.

And this is the principle of commitment consistency.

It is also frequently used in marketing and product copywriting, because we often need to "promise" consumers a lot of things:

Our products are used by many celebrities, our technology comes from Germany, our water is real mountain spring water, etc., which also improves user expectations.

But we make a lot of "promises", but consumers don't believe them. They always doubt our promises. This is a key issue that needs to be addressed.

Therefore, we need to be consistent with our promises, and "consistency" means making consumers believe that the "promise" mentioned above is true and credible, which means that we can improve user expectations while truly meeting them.

For example, Nongfu Spring’s promotional points in recent years have been its good water source and good water quality: “We don’t produce water, we are just nature’s porters”, “Every drop of Nongfu Spring has a high-quality water source”, “Nongfu Spring all comes from deep mountain spring water”, “Nongfu Spring never uses city tap water”.

This is what is called "commitment", so how do they achieve consistency in their commitments?

Nongfu Spring did not vigorously promote the quality of its products, but instead made a series of employee micro- films . I believe everyone should still remember the stories of the green mountains and clear waters and every ordinary employee, which not only touched people's hearts but also were widely disseminated among the public.

The 2-3 minute micro-film has a rich storyline. Whether it is the beautiful scenery of Changbai Mountain, the peaks and ridges of Wuling Mountain, or the scenery of the Tibetan Plateau, every picture and story reproduces the nature and grandeur of Nongfu Spring’s water source, as well as the sincere dedication of its employees.

Following the camera, we saw how the young water quality inspectors went deep into the water source of Nongfu Spring Wuling Mountain;

I saw that in order to protect cultural relics, Nongfu Spring's transporters carried boxes of mineral water to the Potala Palace entirely by manpower; I saw that Nongfu Spring employees have been unremittingly protecting water sources for more than ten years.

It is in these little moments that advertising conveys the brand’s philosophy and core values ​​to every consumer.

At the same time, isn’t this equivalent to telling everyone invisibly: “Every one of my employees has been conscientiously doing what I promised. This is our philosophy. There are pictures, truth, and touching stories.”

This is really the perfect application of commitment and consistency. Admire and learn!

For example, in order to dispel consumers' doubts before purchase, many businesses often display zero-risk guarantees, classic success stories, customer reviews, feedback from big names, expert endorsements, authoritative reports, on-site experiences, etc., all of which are based on "consistent commitments."

In addition, the principle of consistency in commitments should not only be reflected before purchase, but also in products and services after purchase. The product functions and service quality should be consistent with the commitments.

This is the long-term strategy to meet and even exceed user expectations - the principle of consistent commitment.

6. My suggestions are:

Finally, I have a few suggestions on whether to raise or lower user expectations.

Let me first state my opinion. I suggest raising user expectations, and then adhering to the principle of consistent commitments and providing an extremely high actual experience. Create a sense of satisfaction, happiness, and surprise.

However, there are a few points to note.

1) The actual purpose of lowering user expectations

Lowering user expectations does not mean not packaging products, not promoting selling points, or not making promises to consumers.

Rather, it means not to brag or boast too much. Its actual purpose is to make the expected value positioning more vertical and precise and narrow the range.

It is not about being big and beautiful, but being small and precise. Cut out irrelevant items and focus on meeting user expectations, which is actually also improving user expectations.

For example, for shampoo, Head & Shoulders focuses on giving users the expectation of "anti-dandruff", Rejoice gives users the expectation of "smooth hair", and Pantene gives users the expectation of "nourishing hair".

2) Focus on the core needs of users

Many companies will continue to spend a lot of money to highlight various advantages and selling points to create their strong demand.

This is not wrong in itself, but the premise is that user needs are numerous and scattered. Is the expected value you create what users care about most?

When raising user expectations, there are at least two points you need to pay attention to:

First, what you promise must be the interest-related points that consumers have demand for, leaving aside those points where there is no demand or weak demand; second, what you promise must revolve around the main needs of consumers and focus on the core needs of users.

How to do it?

One of the best ways is to calm down and carefully identify one question about your service or product - "what kind of scenario does your product exist in, what form does it take, and what specific needs of which users does it meet?"

Once you determine this, you can greatly improve your happiness index when you set your expected value.

3) Make sure you have the ability to do it

Raising user expectations does not mean fooling consumers. If you want to continue doing it, you have to be consistent with your promises.

Therefore, don’t rely on luck or be complacent. Make sure you have the ability to fulfill what you promised.

Some people who do marketing spend all day thinking about differentiating the selling points between products. As a result, they become obsessed with it and make up all kinds of awesome differentiated selling points to impress people.

As a result, the selling point is there, which is very attractive to users and is differentiated enough, and it also forms a competitive barrier that competing products simply cannot do.

But, he can't even do it himself, don't you think that's amazing?

In the end, they were caught up in endless public relations crises, and some were even directly closed down.

4) Commitment is perceptible and measurable

I have been talking about consistency in promises before, but whether they are consistent or not is not up to you, but up to the consumers.

No matter how much you do, if consumers cannot perceive it, then in their eyes it is inconsistent with the promise, there is no doubt about that.

Therefore, when raising user expectations, you must make the things you promise perceptible and measurable, preferably something that consumers can see, touch, and feel.

It can be visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile, or taste.

For example, the Xiaomi scale promises high accuracy, which is perceptible. “100 grams, you can feel it even by drinking a glass of water.” You will know it once you try it.

In addition, in terms of perception and measurement, we need to focus on the core value of the product and try to add more positive experiences that are "beyond consumers' expectations". This is very important and is related to how happy your users are.

As long as you want it, there will always be one.

5) Start with product/service improvement

I don’t want to talk about this, but I have to say it, so I’ll just briefly mention it.

I have always believed that marketing operations do not create something out of nothing. Instead, they should be a magnifying glass that can shape products/services better.

Products/services are the key core, this is an iron rule, don’t put the cart before the horse.

Many people like to put all their hopes on marketing operations and beautiful packaging, but a magnifying glass is still a magnifying glass. It exposes all product/service defects, and the eyes of the public are still sharp in the end.

Okay, that’s all for now.

In short, should the product copy make users excited at first sight?

Yes! But you have to be careful! Don't be moved and then just start scolding.

The core purpose of brand communication methods such as advertising, packaging, and promotion is to shape consumers' positive expectations of products and services.

On the one hand, it is a promise and a guarantee to consumers to stimulate their interest.

On the other hand, it is also the establishment of brand, reputation and trust. Every such brand communication is an accumulation of the brand.

Therefore, since we have made a promise, we must ensure that we can fulfill it and do it well, exceeding consumers' expectations.