Product operation, how to cross-border thinking?

In the process of career change or operational growth, you will inevitably experience multiple products. These products may be in different forms, such as portals to mobile information, or in different fields, ranging from finance to sports to O2O and so on.

At the point of transition, we need to reset our consciousness appropriately, avoid solidifying our experience, humbly recognize new areas, and then recombine the experience and skills of past products. Today I would like to take a closer look at the cross-border operations and how to think about the changes in operational scenarios when facing new products and fields.

User groups cross borders

For example, football fans, food lovers, female consumers, square dance aunties, and those born after 1995 have experienced changes in both preferences and ages. Even the same user may show completely different attitudes and attributes in different product scenarios. There is a saying that goes, "Speak differently to different people and to different people." When facing "new" users, the operational philosophy must inevitably change.

From the user perspective alone, the transformation of user groups has two meanings:

1. Research new users’ understanding and perspective of the product from scratch

For example, for the same e-commerce business, online shopping may mean different things to female users and those born after 1995, the entry points for gaining their trust may also be different, and their price sensitivity and quality requirements may also be different. When mapped to operations, Solgen, category structure, marketing creativity, etc. will be different.

2. Subversion of promotion channels

In addition to the sweeping advertising campaigns on advertising platforms, another feature is how to find the unique gathering places, gathering methods, and appeal methods for new users, especially in the early stages. The vertical attributes of each group are the greatest potential energy, and the earlier they are explored, the more likely it is to achieve a growth breakthrough.

For example, the programmer users I face work on PCs, so QQ groups naturally carry a large number of users with active needs. They are strangers to each other but frequently discuss technical issues. This is a unique promotion scenario. Because it is difficult for general communities to communicate frequently without strict management and sufficient mutual understanding.

Product and business crossover

For example, PC, mobile terminal, e-commerce business, O2O, social networking , and information products all have completely different business logics, and the business logic determines the product form. First is the new business context, and second is the new product process.

From the perspective of products and business alone, the transformation has several meanings:

1. Research the mainstream forms, innovations and differences of industry products from scratch

There are two points here. The first is that cross-border products themselves have different forms. The second is that products in some fields are more differentiated. For example, the general transaction processes of e-commerce products are similar, while tool products have different design considerations for similar needs. Slight functional differences or entry methods may lead to different growth rates, and even determine life or death.

For example, the article "The Thoughts Behind the Birth of Fenda " introduced earlier reflects this point very well. The answerer constantly compares the core elements of the product, such as the differences in motivations from big V to mid-V, the mechanism of content dissemination, the tone of the content, the speed of growth, with similar products and his own accumulated advantages to find breakthrough points for the product.

2. The data system behind it

The core data of different businesses are different. O2O includes order volume, turnover, number of users, profit margin, etc.; information includes number of users, amount of content, number of readings, number of interactions, etc., which are completely different systems. Based on the core data and product logic, a complete set of data relationships is derived.

Only based on the data system can we decompose the corresponding operational tasks and monitor the key links that may lead to user churn or increase activity.

3. Grasp the core experience

Especially when the product has no reputation in the early stages, the faster you explore, focus on and improve the core experience of the service, the more likely you will gain early retention and reputation. For example, what do users in the community care about? The amount of UGC (level of popularity), the number of interactions, and the number of followers are all done in parallel, and often require artificial creation of these results. In e-commerce or O2O, price and the quality of goods and services are the core experience.

Cross-border operation methods

This perception is very common. Similar operational methods may have different purposes and specific implementation methods in different products.

For example, WeChat public accounts are a standard means of operation, but their roles, operational advantages and proportions vary greatly in the operation systems of different businesses. In terms of functions, some products use official accounts as part of their functional system, some as channels for acquiring users, and some as platforms for brand promotion. In terms of advantages, the operational potential in terms of content and interaction in areas with popular topics is greater.

When operating new products, such as community building and marketing activities, we cannot blindly copy previous operating experience .

1. Changes in goals and strengths

We should reconsider these two points together. For example, we usually hope that the official account can spread widely and attract new users, and the community can establish user stickiness. However, whether such scenarios and advantages exist in different user attributes and businesses must be specifically evaluated. Forcibly copying experience may result in half the result with twice the effort.

2. Rational division of proportion

Due to different goals and advantages, the efficiency of operating methods is different, so the same investment of human and material resources cannot be applied. Dual evaluation of experience replication and peer cases to redistribute the investment proportion in the operation system.

3. Marketing scenario transformation

Especially when planning operational activities, past cases should fully consider the product goals and user attributes of new products. The same idea may have different effects on different users, and the same activity format may not necessarily meet the business goals of a new product. For example, you can guess the number of goals in a football match, but this is not appropriate in a basketball match.

User structure cross-border

The most typical situation is the transition from 2C products to 2B products, and from single individual users to user groups in an enterprise structure. The latter's form can be derived into various user structures such as single decision maker, multi-department decision-making, and administrative decision-making depending on the different products and services.

The most significant operational difference is that for Type C users, they may be attracted by an advertisement or a share; for Type B users, it is necessary to satisfy multiple dimensions such as product promotion, sales, after-sales, and price at the same time, and find the key influential roles in the complex structure in order to win their hearts.

In addition, supplementary classes and interest-based education for teenagers also have a diverse user structure, including the experience of the students, the criteria of the parents, costs and other factors. For example, in English tutoring, students are very interested, but their grades do not improve significantly in the end. Parents, as the payers, are obviously dissatisfied, which in turn affects the payment rate.

1. Classify related users

2C products are mainly user stratified, of course 2B products also have user stratification, which is another dimension. This means that all related parties that participate in the use and have cost input must be listed and classified. For example, a management tool is provided to sales staff, but the administration may need to connect it to calculate performance, so the administration’s connection cost must also be taken into account.

Hit the key points of core decision makers (those who make the final decision and pay the money or can take the lead in promoting the process) and reduce the resistance of related parties.

2. Make good use of structural advantages

A complex user structure means that there are structural relationships between related users, which may be departments, entire companies, one-way decision-making, etc. We no longer need to simply cast a wide net to promote to the C-end, but instead tap into and make good use of the structural advantages of user groups to form coverage from point to surface.

For example, sales tools, after breaking through the company's decision-making level, will be popularized for use by sales throughout the company, and will then spread to the level of customers under their jurisdiction. Each link will expand from point to surface.

3. Changes in the direction of demand mining

For C-end users, operations can directly obtain demand feedback through data and user communication, while B-end products are applied by customers to their users, which adds an extra level and a longer link for tapping user needs.

Operations must go beyond customers and be familiar with the customer's user market. Customer demand feedback must be screened to restore the real needs of the user market.

For example, Duiba, which was introduced before, has various APPs as its direct customers. The APPs are connected to the points mall provided by Duiba in order to activate APP users. There are two types of demand mining here:

1. Only by being familiar with the C-end operation of the APP can you formulate redemption processes and rules applicable to different products, which is the fundamental solution to customers' problems.

2. When planning marketing activities and prizes, it is necessary to understand the psychology of different C-type users among many customers and achieve high adaptability, so that more customers are willing to use it and achieve low input and high output. For example, when you are facing 3,000 customers, planning an event and only 10 APPs are willing to put it on the shelves for use has completely different meanings than having 200 APPs use it.

Cross-border zeroing

When applying for a new position in operations , continuity of background is a factor, but skills and experience are more commonly required. For example, when applying for a community operation position, having worked in community operations before is important, but the field is secondary, so cross-border work is often passive.

The above explains the cross-border transformation of operations from a single dimension. In more cases, it is the simultaneous cross-border of fields + products + users. In fact, what is emphasized is a zero-based mentality. Past experience is our wealth, and combining it with new scenarios to disassemble applications is our advantage.

Mobile application product promotion service: APP promotion service Qinggua Media information flow

This article was compiled and published by @天佐 (Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting!