It’s not that it’s harder to get traffic, it’s that you don’t understand your users!

What do users like to pay attention to? How can we get users to pay attention to our brand or products? Solving this problem is the prerequisite for obtaining traffic .

Some time ago, I often saw African children "holding signs" for some domestic Internet companies in the circle of friends . To be honest, I really admire the Chinese entrepreneurs who are working hard to make their brands enter the field of vision of users. As we enter the second half of the Internet, the demographic dividend has faded, users' time has become increasingly fragmented, and traffic has slowly gathered towards leading products. Coupled with the Internet's homogeneous and low-threshold industry competition, many small and new brands have begun to worry about why it is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain traffic? Even some large companies have gone to great lengths to implement buyout strategies for high-quality resources in order to attract traffic .

From an external perspective, it is indeed an environment full of difficulties, competition, and challenges; but is it true that focusing on users means that they don’t have enough time to pay attention to your brand? No, they are willing to spend hours watching those "boring" live broadcasts , and are even willing to pay attention to the screen-filling events in their circle of friends that have nothing to do with themselves.

It turns out that users can also be bored sometimes, but why do they turn a blind eye to your product? Is there no user demand? Not really. After all, you have already done demand research and your competitors are developing very well.

In fact, the difficulty in obtaining traffic has no direct relationship with the fading of the Internet’s demographic dividend, industry competition, and traffic channel monopoly. The essence of the traffic economy is the attention economy. Therefore, what has really become difficult is that it has become difficult to grab the user's attention. What do users like to pay attention to? How can we get users to pay attention to our brand or products? Solving this problem is the prerequisite for obtaining traffic.

1. Why do people pay attention to certain things?

When discussing this issue, let us first assume that people do not have the ability to pay attention to anything. What would that be like? Just like a vegetative person whose senses have been closed, they will turn a blind eye to the oncoming hungry wolves and ferocious beasts, have no awareness of the pathological conditions of their bodies, will not feel hunger or cold, and have no motivation to look for food. They will eventually be eliminated by nature.

Therefore, it is not difficult to find that "attention" is the result of long-term human evolution and the ability to produce certain responses to internal or external stimuli. If we are hungry, we will feel uncomfortable and will go looking for water and food; if we hear the horn of a vehicle next to us, we will be alert and avoid it. It is precisely this ability that enables humans to survive better and be preserved through natural selection.

2. The Nature of Attention

• Why do we pay attention to reviews on Dianping when choosing a restaurant?
• Why do we pay special attention to our physical condition when we are sick?
• When traveling, why do we focus on the food and scenery of a place?

Because we always tend to focus on the good side of ourselves and avoid the bad side of ourselves, the essence of attention is to seek benefits and avoid harm.

It is not difficult to understand from the perspective of biological evolution. Human ancestors migrated from the ocean to the land, from Africa to the world. Every unfamiliar environment they arrived in was like a "dark forest" full of unknown dangers. Due to the limitations of cognition, their survival also faced a variety of threats. Therefore, they had to pay attention and be vigilant to new things until they were able to judge whether they were beneficial or harmful. Through continuous learning and evolution, our ancestors had a certain understanding of the natural environment around them. However, the fear of death makes them extremely sensitive to benefits and harms. In the process of life continuation, whether it is beneficial or harmful, and the degree of benefit or harm will directly (often subconsciously) affect human behavior of seeking benefits and avoiding harms.

3. Categories of Concerns

1. Active attention - obtaining value

Active attention is the release of explicit needs. People have a clear purpose before paying attention. This kind of attention behavior is often for the purpose of obtaining value, which may be "profit-seeking" value or "harmful" value.

Every day when you walk to work in front of the subway security checkpoint, you will habitually pay attention to one question - whether you brought your subway card when you went out, and where you put it; this is a profit-seeking behavior under active attention behavior, because you need to pass through the gate smoothly to take the subway.

When going out in hot weather, girls will pay special attention to their skin problems and sun protection becomes a daily must; this is a harmful manifestation of active attention because they are afraid of getting tanned or sunburned.

There are countless similar behaviors. When you invite friends to dinner, you will pay attention to the restaurant's reviews and environment. When you go on a date, you will pay special attention to your personal image. When you are thirsty, you will look for available water sources. When it is cold, you will choose to wear thicker clothes, etc. In fact, it is internal or external stimuli that make us actively pay attention to some things and obtain value that is beneficial to ourselves.

2. Passive attention: novelty/hidden needs are stimulated

Passive attention has no clear purpose. On the one hand, it is due to the stimulation of external novelty that people keep paying attention to certain things. On the other hand, external stimulation stimulates invisible needs and people keep paying attention to things.

Why does novelty attract people's attention?

When a star cheats, it attracts our attention. When a rainbow appears in the sky, it attracts our attention. When a solar eclipse appears, it attracts our attention. When a stunning view is seen during a trip, it attracts our attention. When a puppy walks upright, it attracts our attention. When friends spread something, it attracts our attention. It is an indisputable fact that things that bring freshness attract people's attention.

Since it has been explained that the essence of attention is "seeking advantages and disregarding disadvantages", what does this have to do with "freshness"? Why does novelty also attract people's attention?

As mentioned earlier, humans face survival challenges of varying degrees whenever they arrive in a new environment during the process of evolution, and must remain highly concerned and vigilant about unknown environments and things. In fact, traces of this psychological change can still be found in humans today. For example, when we come to a completely unfamiliar environment alone, we will feel uneasy and fearful, and every move around us will attract our attention.

The difference is that compared to our ancestors with limited knowledge, our current living environment is so good that we don’t have to worry about survival every day. The reason why we still pay attention to some new things is not because we lack knowledge and cannot judge the benefits and harms of things to us, but because long-term evolution has enabled us to retain this ability (paying attention to new things). Although this ability is not of much help to human survival now, it still exists; just like puppies have a strong sense of smell in order to better find prey and not starve to death. Today, this ability is completely unnecessary for the survival of puppies, because they have been domesticated. When they are thirsty, the owner adds water, and when they are hungry, the owner adds food. However, they will still react once they smell the fragrance of bones.

However, in real life, we will find that even when faced with the same new thing, some people will pay close attention to it, while others will remain indifferent. For example, King of Glory released a new announcement that "all users will be banned from playing for one week during the school season." I believe that people who play this game will definitely pay attention to the discussion, but it has no effect on those aunties who dance in the square. In addition, different people who play the same game pay different attention to it. Here we can extend two other conclusions:

1. People tend to focus on things that are relevant to them;
2. There are both commonalities and differences between individuals.

Why does the stimulation of invisible needs attract people's attention?

We feel hungry when we smell the aroma of roast duck in the air. We always have the urge to play again after losing a game. During the Chinese Valentine's Day , more and more people post photos on their Moments. Even if it is awkward to meet a goddess on the street, we have to take a second look at her. Invisible needs are dormant explicit needs, which will be activated when stimulated by specific external conditions, thereby maintaining attention on things.

When the conditions of external stimulation are reasonable enough, the moment when the invisible demand is activated is conversion ; the "reasonable" here is relative, because the stimulation conditions are related to the demand. If the demand is not particularly strong and the decision-making cost is very high, then the external stimulation cost required to complete the conversion will be very high; on the contrary, if the demand is relatively strong and the decision-making cost is relatively low, then the external stimulation cost required to complete the conversion will not need to be so high. But no matter what the invisible needs are, stimulating conditions that can resonate with the audience are more likely to produce conversions; due to limited space, in-depth thinking about "conversion" will be introduced in detail in future articles.

When external stimuli are not sufficient to generate conversions, invisible needs will be activated and become explicit needs. At this time, users will seek other solutions from the outside world. You can refer to the introduction of the active attention part above, and I will not repeat it here.

4. Application of “Attention Ability”

1. Actively follow the application

Active attention has a certain purpose, and the usage scenarios of most Internet products fall into the category of active attention;

Since the purpose of users' active attention is to obtain value, the products or services we provide must not only meet the value required by users, but also enable users to better obtain this value.

Case 1: App store homepage

When you open the app store, you find that the homepage is the featured recommendation page. Here you can ask yourself a question: Will you really read the content here? I believe that most users stay on this page for no more than 2 seconds before clicking directly into the search page; because we have a clear purpose before opening the app, and it is a scenario that we actively pay attention to, so we can just search and download what we need.

From the perspective of product structure, the premium recommendation page is indeed quite important. Firstly, with a large user base, the recommendation page can help a small number of users whose purposes are not yet clear to find good applications. Secondly, it is conducive to promoting the enthusiasm of developers. However, from an overall perspective, placing the recommendation page on the homepage is not a good idea. After all, the core value of the App Store is to provide users with search services for a large number of applications rather than recommendation services. Therefore, making the search page the homepage or adding a search function to the recommendation page will better meet the value required by users.

Case 2: Merchants in Meituan

Meituan is a common tool we use to find delicious food. Every time we open the app, our purpose is basically clear. For example, if we want to eat hot pot, we can just search directly. Now a new worry is in front of us because there are too many search results. Even if they can meet the demand for hot pot, we do not trust unknown things, so we need to compare. Reviews, food, environment, distance, etc. are all factors that influence our decision. For example, although the Chongqing Fish Hot Pot is the closest to me, I will not go to this restaurant because most of the factors I consider in my decision-making process are very unfriendly;

To make users believe that we can provide them with value that meets their expectations, we need to find the relevant decision-making factors and work hard on them.

Case 3: ofo's password lock

In the early days, ofo's mechanical password locks were always at a disadvantage in the battle of shared bicycles because there were too many operation links and the user experience was too poor;

The entire usage process requires the completion of 6 processes. Functional failures or experience problems in any link will cause users to give up using the product and increase negative word-of-mouth about the product.

In the era of scenarios, many businesses are aware of the importance of user experience . Before learning to drive, the driving school will arrange staff to take you around the venue, the staff of the shopping mall will invite you to try new products for free, and many online paid courses will have several free trial classes... However, if we actively pay attention to the scenarios, users are more likely to find faults through discovery, comparison, etc. If we only consider outputting core value and do not pay attention to the details in the experience process, it will accelerate the death of the product or service.

The details in these experience processes are also the added value of the product. They serve together around the core value of the product. These added values ​​can both add points to the product and subtract points from it. It is like the core value of a train is to transport passengers, but for the same price you would rather take an ordinary train than a green-skinned train because the former is faster, so speed becomes a plus for the ordinary train and a minus for the green-skinned train.

summary:

1. Proactively focus on providing users with the value they need directly under the scenario;
2. Analyze the main influencing factors in the user decision-making process and optimize them;
3. Continue to explore and enhance the additional value of products or services.

2. Passive attention applications

Passive attention has no clear purpose and generally appears in fragmented scenarios. It has great application value in marketing and communication.

Case 1: NetEase Cloud Music subway advertisement

Walking into the subway and seeing advertisements everywhere is a passive process in itself. What attracts people's attention is the novelty.

(1) Freshness in content presentation

The subway ads are different from previous promotional ads in that NetEase Cloud Music has almost no introduction to the content of the event; when watching the ads, you even forget that it is an ad. The content of the ads has been moved from the Internet to reality and is so simple that it only has text. It is an innovation that abandons the traditional old-fashioned model and pursues freshness in content form. In fact, NetEase Cloud Music is not an isolated case nor the first to create freshness through the form of content presentation. Last year, the AR red envelope marketing war between QQ and Alipay was also an innovation in content form.

(2) Freshness of content

Although the copy is short, this may be the most heartbreaking subway advertisement, and it is heartbreaking in more than one way. Each piece of content is fresh, rather than an arrangement of posters with the same template. When you pay attention to these contents, you will not feel aesthetic fatigue, on the contrary, you may be immersed in a certain emotional world.

Case 2: Kuaishou ’s Growth

GIF Kuaishou had been unknown since its birth in March 2011, so in 2012 it transformed from a pure tool application into a short video community, and then the number of users and usage time increased significantly;

In June 2015, the number of users reached 100 million;

In February 2016, the number of users reached 300 million;

In February 2017, the number of active users reached 100 million;

Among short video applications, Toutiao Video, which far surpassed the second place, firmly sat at the top of the list and became the fourth mobile application in China's traffic ranking after WeChat , QQ, and Sina Weibo .

The core reason why Kuaishou can become a powerful tool for attracting traffic is the fresh content continuously produced by users. Users can get satisfaction by watching all kinds of things in the world without leaving home in a low-cost way; weird, perverted, funny... video content full of freshness gives the product stronger attention and dissemination power.

Case 3: 1 yuan charity children’s paintings

Seeing this activity when browsing the Moments is also a passive behavior. There are many charity activities, why do so many people pay attention to this activity? Because when you browse your Moments, you find that several friends are sharing, which is rare in normal times and it itself is a kind of freshness.

Looking at all kinds of people through the circle of friends, similar activities that have exploded in the circle of friends have one thing in common. When you find that more than 5 unrelated friends are sharing the same activity, it is almost certain that this activity has exploded or is about to explode in the market. If an activity wants to attract more attention, it must first find a trigger point and also create potential for communication. The more people spread the message, the greater the potential energy of the activity. This is why many activities invite KOLs to spread the message during the cold start . Here we only explain that the consistency of user behavior will create a sense of freshness and attract the attention of other users. The specific introduction to communication will be shared in the next article.

Case 4: Selfies in the Chinese Valentine’s Day Moments

If you pay close attention, you will find that more people are sharing selfies on WeChat Moments around the Chinese Valentine's Day (assuming that there are a certain number of single people among your friends). People who are usually hard to see sharing selfies are actually sharing photos during this time period. If you pay even more careful attention, you will find that some people's photos suddenly disappear after the Chinese Valentine's Day.

Each of us has the need to communicate. Everyone pays special attention to this time point because the invisible need for communication is activated, and the process of posting photos is the conversion behavior after activation. In fact, this invisible demand will be activated under normal circumstances and we will also post photos or have other social tendencies. During the Chinese Valentine's Day, more people are willing to share photos than usual, but the demand tendency is relatively obvious in a specific environment.

Supplement: In addition to life, the conversion of hidden needs after activation is also widespread in business environments. A common example is: when shopping in a mall, we always buy more or less goods, but rarely buy additional goods when shopping online; because the stimulation conditions generated in different scenarios are different, when we are in a mall with a wide range of displays, some hidden needs in our hearts are more easily activated and converted.

summary:

1. Freshness can arouse users' attention. In addition to the content itself and the way it is presented, the consistency of user behavior can also create freshness.
2. Finding reasonable stimulus conditions to stimulate invisible needs often makes it easier to generate conversions.

5. Summary in one picture