How to operate a brand?

If a merchant platform wants to gain popularity, it is very important to do a good job in brand operation . On the one hand, effective brand operation helps to strengthen the user or consumer's impression of the brand; on the other hand, brand building helps to drive the value growth of the enterprise.

There is a saying circulating among Internet companies: "Operation that does not want to do branding is not a good operation." The purpose of operation is not only for users, nor is it only for profits, but to a greater extent for building a brand. The superb skill of a product operator lies in turning an unknown product into a well-known brand.

1. The brand operation war starts with establishing the "three views"

Brand is the core embodiment of excellent product quality. It is a spiritual symbol, identification mark and value concept. The process of cultivating and creating a brand is a process of continuous innovation. Only by having the power of innovation can we be invincible in the fierce competition and thus have a stronger competitive advantage.

Brand operation refers to the use of the brand's intangible capital by corporate brand operators to effectively leverage the expansion function of a strong brand on the basis of building a strong brand, thereby promoting brand management, making brand assets tangible, and achieving long-term growth and value increase for the company.

The so-called "three views" of a brand refer to brand strategic positioning, brand image, and brand culture. If companies and brand operators want to build a strong brand, they must first establish the "three views" of the brand.

So, how to establish the "three views" of a brand? Next, we will analyze it in detail through the successful brand operation case of "Three Squirrels". The brand positioning promotion of Three Squirrels is shown in the figure below.

Three Squirrels Co., Ltd. was founded by "Squirrel Dad" Zhang Liaoyuan in 2012. With the corporate mission of "making food owners all over the world happy" and "promoting the progress of the food industry through digitalization and promoting diversified development of brands through IP", the company is constantly committed to product innovation and strengthening the core capabilities of "making goods + creating experience". Through "flavor", "umami" and "fun", it has built a unique "squirrel flavor", and established a three-dimensional channel layout with one main body, two wings and three sides to get close to consumers in all aspects.

In the next ten years, the company will focus on the new positioning of "manufacturing-based multi-format retailer of private-label products" and, driven by digitalization, will reconstruct the supply chain and organization to bring high-quality, low-priced, fresh, rich and convenient happy snacks to its owners, move towards a 100 billion-dollar squirrel business, and help realize the beautiful vision of "living for 100 years; entering the Fortune Global 500; and serving the vast majority of families in the world."

The fact that Three Squirrels has become a new brand in the Internet field is inseparable from the credit of its operations.

1. Brand strategic positioning

Strategic positioning refers to an aggressive quasi-market positioning. In simple terms, if an enterprise wants to open up the market, it first needs a core positioning - the overall center, which is the strategic positioning. Strategic positioning is a top-down process.

The core concept of strategic positioning is to follow differentiation. Only when a brand is accurately positioned can it stand out from the competition, leave a deep impression on users, and be distinguished from other brands.

Three Squirrels has done a good job in this regard. The brand strategy of Three Squirrels is " a multi-format retailer with its own brand manufacturing business ". Although Three Squirrels is a snack manufacturer and retailer, its core positioning is not to just sell products like traditional e-commerce companies, but to provide its own brand snacks while developing its own IP industry. When purchasing snacks at Three Squirrels, users can find the "feeling of fashion".

Brand strategic positioning is divided into four steps:

1. Analyze the entire external environment and determine the value of competitors and opponents;
2. Exploit competitors’ weaknesses to establish a brand’s advantageous position;
3. Find reliable evidence;
4. Integrate resources and implant the brand into users’ minds.

2. Brand Image

Brand image refers to the individual characteristics of a brand in the public mind and in the market, reflecting the public, especially users' evaluation and cognition of the brand.

Brand image and brand are inseparable. Brand image is the performance characteristic of the brand and can reflect the strength and essence of the brand. Brand image is an intangible asset with unique personality.

The most important factor in establishing a brand image is the user's association with the brand. In other words, when users mention certain needs, they will think of a certain brand, thus linking the brand image with many things, thereby driving the establishment and development of the image.

To establish a unique brand image, we should combine the psychological needs of users and take comprehensive considerations from aspects such as brand packaging, function, culture, and service.

3. Brand culture

Brand culture refers to the cultural accumulation that a brand needs to form during its operation, which represents the brand’s own world view and values.

In other words, it is the mainstream opinion held by the brand after it is personified. To put it simply, it means that users can resonate and identify with the brand spiritually, have lasting faith in the brand concept, and form strong brand loyalty.

Enterprises can strengthen their brand competitiveness through brand culture, effectively carry out the social functions of the enterprise, meet users' cultural needs beyond material needs, and achieve the commercial purpose of promotion.

For example, Three Squirrels’ brand mission of “promoting the progress of the food industry through digitalization and promoting diversified development of brands through IP” and the licensing cooperation of animation IP allow users to access the brand through more channels, and guide the brand to become a fashion trend, attracting more families to become potential fans. This nurturing brand culture is one of the important reasons for the success of Three Squirrels.

Three squirrels cartoon

The steps to create a brand culture are as follows:

1. Integrate brand cultural resources (such as corporate name, brand trademark);
2. Establish a cultural system (considering factors such as brand personality, cultural values, and user groups);
3. Create a cultural management system (including internal and external cultural management); finally, optimize brand culture.

2. Target user interests: segment brand categories and attack each one

In a broad sense, user interests refer to what brands users use in what locations, scenarios, and times.

The "interest" here does not only refer to the user's subjective preferences, but also includes the user's passive needs (for example, if you are tired of walking and want to take a break, then rest is the interest point at the moment).

After finding the user's interests, brand operators can magnify them and then operate the brand based on the user's interests.

How to find points that arouse users' interest? The operation of Weibo has set an example for brand operators.

The reason why Weibo has become one of the users' favorite social networking sites is that it can present things that users are interested in to users, meet their individual needs, and form a social brand. In addition, the efforts made by Weibo operators cannot be ignored.

1. Analyze user behavior and find entry points

Analyzing user behavior is one of the most effective ways to find user interests.

For example, user search - at what time and on what platform, and what the search content is. This is a complete event and also a definition of user behavior. Usually, after we have such events, we can observe the user's behavior in connection.

For example, when a user enters the Weibo website for the first time, he is a new user and he may register. In this case, the act of registration is an event. When he registers, he needs to fill in personal information. After that, he may search for many things. All of these are user behavior events.

Only by analyzing user behavior can we create user portraits, understand the truth behind why users browse, click, and buy products on the website, and understand what users are interested in, which is of great help in branding.

The main way to analyze user behavior is to focus on churn, especially for websites with high conversion requirements, where the user churn rate is low. Like many O2O brands, users receive a lot of subsidies at the beginning, but once the subsidies stop, all users leave. Such a brand or business model is not perfect.

2. Build a user interest model

After analyzing user behavior and understanding what users are interested in, we also need to build a user interest model. When users visit a website page or use a product, the actions they take largely represent their interests and hobbies.

The user interest model mainly includes the following points: collecting user behavior information, extracting user interest information, and displaying user interest information.

1) Collect user behavior information

This is the premise for establishing a user interest model. Through technical means, the entire process can be recorded in the background and user behavior information can be extracted from these operation behaviors.

2) Extract user interest information

Weibo and WeChat are both social software, but each user uses them for different purposes. Some use them to develop potential users and opportunities, some to obtain news and hot events, and some to strengthen connections.

The reason for these results is that different users have different interests, which leads to different user behaviors. Therefore, brand operators must be able to extract information that users are interested in from their behavioral information.

It is recommended to start from two aspects: the content visited by users and their browsing behavior.

3) Display user’s interest information

After brand operators extract user interest information based on user behavior information, they need to describe the user interest information in an appropriate manner in order to make the user interest information more intuitive. Mainly based on the theme display, it displays the user's interest information based on the theme category concept set.

Weibo has built a relatively complete user interest model, and the mined personal interest data has been applied in more than a dozen applications. The interest description of each Weibo user includes three aspects: user interest tags, user interest words and user interest categories.

• User interest tags mainly refer to semantic tags that users may be interested in, derived from the social relationships of Weibo users;
• User interest words refer to mining users’ potential interests through the content attributes of microblogs posted or forwarded by users;
• User interest classification refers to mapping various user data into the classification system in a defined three-level classification system. For example, a user may have obvious interests in sports, entertainment, and celebrities.

In summary, user interest tags and user interest words describe user interests in a fine-grained manner because they can be specifically corresponded to the entity tag level, while user interest classification is coarse-grained.

After establishing the user interest model, brand operators can understand user behavior and interests and lay the foundation for brand operations. Because they understand the interests of users, brand operators can subdivide brand categories and defeat them one by one, allowing the brand to grow from small to large and from narrow to wide.

3. Create a hit: Make the brand a household name

The term "hot-selling item" originated from e-commerce, and mainly refers to a single product or a category of products with particularly high sales volume, which gains traffic by creating a star product, and then generates more purchase conversions. Therefore, we conclude that the ability to operate a hit product directly determines the ability to attract traffic.

Those articles we often read with more than 100,000 clicks (hot articles) are actually equivalent to hot products. A hit article can bring in a large number of fans, which is why everyone is keen on writing hit articles.

Brand operation without the intention of building a brand is unsuccessful and incomplete. In brand operation, creating popular products is a necessary step. Creating a hit product is actually equivalent to creating a brand, because the emergence of a hit product will often make your brand go online and become a household name.

For example, the emergence of the iPhone 4 mobile phone (a hot-selling product) made the Apple brand a household name for almost everyone. This is the power of a hit product.

So if you want to build a brand, you need a hit product! Let’s take “Three Dads” (brand) as an example to introduce how it operates its popular products.

"Three Dads" is a brand of purifiers suitable for pregnant women and children, focusing on manufacturing and selling smart hardware related to the healthy growth of children in a home environment.

"Three dads chose JD.com as the crowdfunding platform from the beginning and successfully raised 11.22 million yuan in just 30 days, becoming the first 10 million yuan crowdfunding brand in China.

The crowdfunding field chosen by "Three Dads" at that time was the popular air purification smart hardware, but its entry point was relatively small - the mother and baby group, and it was positioned as the smart children's Gundam Guardian and Guardian Angel smart air purifiers (hot-selling products) that would reassure parents. Through crowdfunding, "Three Dads" has successfully established itself as the number one smart brand in the maternal and infant category.

Even after Xiaomi "entered" the air purifier field, "Three Dads" was able to expand its products horizontally by relying on children's air purifiers, such as making children's robots.

The reason why the "Gundam Guardian" air purifier for children from "Three Dads" has become a hit is mainly because it solves the pain points for users: eliminating PM2.5 and removing formaldehyde. These two pain points may be the issues that parents are most concerned about.

In order to achieve these two points, the "three dads" reduced the PM2.5 value to zero and removed formaldehyde as thoroughly as possible. Although the product's appearance is not very good, from the user's perspective, removing PM2.5 and formaldehyde is what they really care about.

"Three Dads" quickly grew from a startup into a big brand company with the help of children's purifiers. This is the power of explosive sales operations. Its case provides an inspiration to more companies and brand operators; they can use hot-selling products to drive brand operations and then elevate brand operations to a new level.

So, how to create a hit product? The answer is that it needs to be operated from beginning to end.

1. Find small entry points in popular fields

We must understand that when companies want to create a hit product, especially start-ups, they must first choose a popular field and start with a small entry point. Only then will they have a chance to successfully create a hit product. This is the primary link in the operation of a hit product.

This is the case with "Three Dads". It chose the field of maternal and child purification products, which is a very popular field but few people enter it quickly. Therefore, both the opportunity and user awareness are very valuable.

Why do you have to choose a popular field? Because in hot fields, there are often larger investment institutions and partners behind the scenes, creating a hit in this field will make your horizontal cooperation and vertical integration very smooth.

It is actually easy to understand why they choose to enter through a small incision. This mainly comes from the vision of brand operators, who can see opportunities for differentiation in popular fields.

The brand operator of "Three Dads" was very wise. He was the first to see the field of maternal and child purifiers, and then focused on children's purifier products. Because purifiers for pregnant women and adults had already been developed in the market at that time, but few companies were involved in children's purifiers, so "Three Dads" decisively entered the market and successfully created a hit product.

2. Thoroughly implement one or two functional points

If you want a hit product to be successful, you need to do a good job in one or two functional areas.

Brand operations that try to do everything well and form a closed loop often fail miserably. The reason is simple. Companies that want to create a hit product are often start-ups (once a mature large company creates a hit product, it will be very fast and successful). However, start-ups are relatively weak in both team capabilities and resource capabilities and cannot compete with large companies.

There is a method to fully develop one or two functional points, that is, you must choose the functional points that users have an urgent need for and develop them fully. "Three Dads" started with air purification products for mothers and babies, and immediately made great efforts to solve the two pain points that users are most concerned about: removing PM2.5 and formaldehyde. Once these two pain points are resolved, a hit product will be created and the brand will naturally be successfully built.

3. Timely marketing and “positioning”

Creating a hit product requires timely marketing. If the brand operator cannot quickly promote the hit product (including the product’s positioning, features, advantages, etc.), it will not be able to obtain financing and market.

The “three dads” promptly told their peers and investors that only by quickly raising funds through crowdfunding and obtaining investment and resources could they quickly distance themselves from their competitors and successfully “take the lead” in the market. It has been proven that when operating a hot-selling product, timely promotion will bring three obvious effects, as shown in the figure below.

1) Gaining the top position in the market

The subtext is: I made a really great product, how dare you copy it? You have to be different from me! In this way, the market position of the hit product is unshakable.

2) Get investment

Timely promotion will obtain the fastest financing and the best partners, laying the foundation for the subsequent operation of the brand.

3) Obtaining a large number of seed users

Timely promotion will bring the first batch of seed users to the hit product, and will also bring subsequent fan support.

In addition, the hot-selling products themselves have a dissemination effect. Combined with the online PR (a component in Google's search ranking algorithm, with levels ranging from 1 to 10, 10 being the full score, and the higher the PR value, the more important the position of the webpage in the search ranking), the dissemination will bring a great topic effect to the brand, which in turn will bring a lot of natural traffic and long-tail traffic, thus forming the long-tail effect of the hot-selling products.

4. Targeting communication materials: Building brand image and promoting market sales

The so-called brand communication refers to the fact that enterprises or brand operators use brand core values ​​as principles and, within the overall framework of brand identification, use advertising, public relations, interpersonal relationships, sales and other communication methods to promote specific brands, thereby establishing a brand image and promoting market sales.

If a product wants to build a brand through operation, whether it is the accurate grasp of brand positioning mentioned earlier, the full understanding of user psychology, or the multi-brand strategic deployment, it ultimately needs to be achieved through the sword of communication.

The materials and content for brand communication are very rich, and brands have no shortage of communication channels and successful models. As a brand operator, the first thing you need to consider is how to find the right materials for your brand communication and use the most reasonable cost to achieve the best results.

In this regard, China Unicom has set an example for the majority of brand operators. Let’s take a closer look. The China Unicom brand logo is shown below.

1. Brand Identity

A logo refers to a mark that indicates the characteristics of an object, usually a simple, easily recognizable object or graphic. As the most intuitive way for human beings to communicate, symbols are ubiquitous in social and production activities.

Prominence is an important feature of a logo. Except for invisible logos, most logos are designed to attract people's attention. Therefore, strong and eye-catching colors and concise and clear graphics are the basic characteristics that a logo should have.

For a brand to spread effectively, it must first have a sign (logo) that users can recognize at a glance. The logo is also one of the materials for product brand communication.

For example, China Unicom’s logo evolved from the ancient Chinese auspicious pattern “Pan Chang”. The lines loop through the logo, symbolizing China Unicom's speed, smoothness, orderliness and longevity as a telecommunications company.

The China Unicom logo has two "hearts" clearly connected up and down, which vividly demonstrates the service tenet of "China Unicom" that communication and connection are the core values ​​of the company and it always considers the users and is closely connected with the users.

The color of China Unicom’s logo is Chinese red, which represents boldness, enthusiasm and vitality. This is the most representative color of the Chinese complex. The red color, which symbolizes good luck and happiness, not only increases the affinity of China Unicom, but also gives users a strong visual impact. At the same time, it is consistent with China Unicom's brand positioning of vitality, fashion and innovation. At this point, we would like to give a thumbs up to China Unicom’s brand operators.

No matter what a logo is going to explain or indicate, whether it is an allegory or a symbol, it must first be easy to understand and be in line with the user's cognitive psychology and cognitive ability; secondly, it must be accurate so that the user can accurately understand it and see it at a glance in a very short time.

2. Text

The so-called characters refer to symbols that record, communicate ideas, and carry language. Words, like language, are carriers of information. Text reproduces the meaning of spoken language in a simple visual pattern. Therefore, text is also one of the materials for brand communication.

China Unicom’s brand communication materials use text. The color of its text is the most inclusive and cohesive ink black, which is a symbol of nobility and stability. The red double "i" symbolizes communication between two people anytime and anywhere, highlighting the brand spirit of "letting everything connect freely". In the vertical combination, it cleverly forms the shape of an auspicious spike, strengthening China Unicom's auspicious and happy image in the hearts of users.

The pronunciation of “i” is the same as that of “love”, which extends China Unicom’s brand concept of “closely connected, heart-to-heart” and caters to the overall brand operation idea of ​​“providing users with integrated communication and information services”. The text is matched with red and black, which has a harmonious, stable and tense visual beauty, giving users a visual impact.

Therefore, when text is used as material for brand communication, it needs to be read repeatedly to make the text clearly visible, allowing users to break through the limitations of time and space and maximize the communication effect.

5. Practice communication execution: maximize brand benefits

The so-called execution ability refers to the operational capability to implement strategic intentions and achieve predetermined goals. It is the key to transforming corporate strategies and plans into benefits and results. In product operations, especially brand operations, execution refers to the ability, degree and willingness to complete tasks.

After making a decision, the next step is execution. No matter how good a decision is, it is useless if it is not implemented. Good execution capability is an important condition for maximizing the effectiveness of brand communication. So how can we quickly develop the execution capabilities of brand communication?

1. Communication is a prerequisite

Only with good understanding can there be good execution, and communication is the prerequisite for execution. Only through communication, collective wisdom and joint efforts can we clarify the strategic rules and regulations during the implementation process and make brand communication execution smoother.

In order to spread the brand, in terms of execution, the brand operator conducted market research and communicated with users from the very beginning, and finally held a successful brand communication event based on the survey report.

Effective communication can pool ideas, obtain correct and complete information, and help brand operators clarify their thoughts during the execution process. Facts and evidence are the most convincing during the execution process.

2. Have clear goals

No matter what you do, you must first have a clear goal. For example, when brand operators promote and launch a brand, they must first clarify the goals, make plans to increase brand awareness, and let users understand and know the connotation of the brand, so as to achieve the goal of promoting sales.

Let’s take “Three Squirrels” as an example. If the main products of the brand you operate are fast-moving consumer goods, you must do a good job in product branding communication. First of all, you need to understand one thing: what the goal is, and then use data and forms to reflect clear and specific broken down goals, such as the specific market share, shelf rate, and shelf volume of the brand's products in each district.

3. Have a detailed implementation plan

Effective execution cannot be achieved by simply setting goals. A goal is usually just a direction, and taking appropriate measures to achieve the goal is an important means to promote communication work.

Everyone has different abilities to understand, which will lead to certain deviations in the execution process. Therefore, a detailed and standardized implementation plan is necessary to carry out work in a planned manner during the communication process.

Doing anything is a process and we cannot try to achieve everything in one step. A detailed execution plan is an important factor in developing brand communication execution capabilities.

6. Conquer the communication channels: enhance brand value recognition

Communication channels, also known as communication media and communication tools, are the carriers of communication content.

Communication channels have two meanings:

1. The means of transmitting information (telephone, Internet, radio, television and other media related to communication technology);
2. An institution or organization that is engaged in the selection, collection, processing, production and transmission of information (newspapers, radio and television stations, etc.).

If a product wants to be remembered by users, it must be made known and understood by users in some way, and building a brand is one of those ways. After the brand is created, users will become aware of the brand. This series of processes is called the brand communication channel.

If you want your product to become a brand and spread the word, you must first choose the right communication channel. After being added value through channels, a brand will become more attractive and users will accept it with satisfaction.

So, what are the communication channels? Let’s take “Three Squirrels” as an example to analyze it.

The brand communication of "Three Squirrels" has set an example for product operators. In the fierce competition in the e-commerce business, "Three Squirrels" successfully ranked first in the entire industry within just over a year of its establishment, becoming the vanguard of nut brands. In the process of brand communication, which communication channels did "Three Squirrels" use to stand out?

1. Online media

Online media, like traditional newspapers, radio, television and other media, are channels for information dissemination and tools for communication, such as Weibo, WeChat, forums, and video websites.

Compared with traditional media, the advantages of online media are:

• Widespread (global);
• The information data is huge (comprehensive);
• Simple and convenient operation (idiot-proof);
• Strong communication and interactivity (fully dynamic);
• The retention time is relatively long (all year round, around the clock);
• It is highly sensual (full contact).

For example, WeChat is currently the most widely used communication tool. People can send voice messages, videos, text and pictures through WeChat. It supports multiple people to participate, and also supports services such as Moments, public accounts, and Shake. It is a good channel for information dissemination.

WeChat is one of the most popular information dissemination platforms at present, and many companies use WeChat official accounts to implement brand operations.

In this regard, "Three Squirrels" does a good job. In its official WeChat public account, we can often see a lot of information about products, such as holiday benefits and new product specials. Through the WeChat official account, users can easily learn about the product information of "Three Squirrels". This kind of daily communication can easily form a brand.

2. Television media

Television media refers to a platform that uses television as a propaganda carrier to disseminate information. Compared with other media, the advantages of television media are: information is disseminated in a timely manner, the audience is not restricted by cultural level, it is highly interactive, and the images it disseminate are intuitive, easy to understand, and vivid.

Common forms of television media communication include talent shows, sponsorships of various satellite TV stations, and inserted advertisements in TV dramas.

For example, in April 2017, the TV series "Ode to Joy 2" became popular, and "Three Squirrels" was also popular. See the picture below for the inserted advertisement of the TV series "Three Squirrels".

The "Three Squirrels" brand successfully became popular as a TV drama sponsor, which brought it huge sales and became one of the most popular foods among the majority of users. As one of the most influential media in the information society, television plays a vital role in guiding public opinion and influencing user decisions.

When using television media for brand communication, one thing must be kept in mind: television media is a linear communication channel, has poor preservation, and is relatively expensive, which means that the investment is too large for small businesses.

3. Outdoor media

Outdoor media refers to the media used to publish advertising information in outdoor venues such as subways, in front of commercial areas, on buses, and on roadsides. It is a communication medium in public spaces. Its main forms include road signs, neon lights, carriages, large inflatable models, etc. Its advantages are:

• It is targeted, effective, fluid and mandatory;
• Utilize self-made programs, play them instantly, and have rich content and colors (not only large advertisements, but also advertisements inserted between various programs such as variety shows, animations, and radio dramas), and display them in a variety of ways (graphics, text, 2D animation, naked-eye 3D, etc.);
• It is mainly placed in shopping malls and subways with concentrated traffic flow, with strong communication effect and compulsory nature.

Using outdoor media to spread products can not only enrich users' cultural life and make them more receptive, but also increase product visibility and enhance brand value recognition. "Three Squirrels has not fallen behind in this regard. It has created its own subway brand "Special Train", as shown below.

Subway advertisement of "Three Squirrels"

Subway is a common means of transportation for people. "Three Squirrels" chooses to use the subway venue to promote its brand. People often see "Three Squirrels" advertisements while taking the subway. Over time, "Three Squirrels" has been deeply imprinted in the minds of users and gradually formed a brand concept.

Author: Kenfai

Source: Kenfai