How do educational and training institutions attract new customers online?

On May 27, I was invited by a teacher from an educational institution to join their anniversary welfare group. They said they wanted to do community conversion and asked me to give some advice. I thought I would just watch and give some suggestions, but the result was unexpected.

The event was very popular. The entire event utilized community fission, distribution fission, and group buying methods, and was done very professionally. There are more than 30 groups in total, each with about 200 people, rich prizes and high user participation.

In just 3 hours, more than 3,000 people signed up for the 9.9 yuan drainage course.

So I had to reproduce this event, disassemble the entire process of the event, and see what advantages can be used as reference. I hope it will be helpful to the owners and operators of educational institutions.

I. Organization Background

This is an English training institution in Hengli (small town) in Dongguan, focusing on high-score English, IELTS and TOEFL, oral presentations, and business English training. Break the traditional English teaching and help our children speak fluent English before graduating from high school and get high scores!

The theme of this event is the 13th anniversary gratitude and feedback event. It sells 9.9 yuan of lead courses through the community, and then transfers them to high-priced courses of around 299 and 999 yuan, which is a common low-to-high model in the education industry.

2. Data

Community size: 30 groups * 200 people, about 6,000 people

Number of participants: The number of participants in the mini program is 11,954 (may change later)

Number of transactions: More than 3,000

Estimated transaction amount: 3,000 people * 9.9 yuan at the front end, about 30,000 yuan, and the back end upgrades the order to 299 and 999. The data is still unknown. We follow the minimum 10% conversion rate and buy all at 299, which is estimated to be about 100,000 yuan.

3. Transaction product design

It is a flash sale product priced at 9.9 yuan, which includes not only products from institutions, but also products from lotteries and alliance merchants.

Sense of Value

The products sold at 9.9 yuan include courses and oral tests, lucky draws, other products, etc. The total value exceeds users' expectations and has a super high cost-effectiveness, which reduces users' decision-making costs. At the same time, 9.9 yuan also screens out users who can get free products.

Relevance

The flash sale products include English courses and oral tests, which are related to the full-priced courses sold in the back-end, attracting precise users and achieving better transactions.

low cost

This 9.9 yuan flash sale product, in addition to its own brand course products, also includes products from cross-industry cooperation. This makes the products seem like there are many of them, but the cost is very low. This is also the key to our setting up bait products.

4. Fission Mechanism Settings

Distribution fission

By distributing posters and forwarding them to various channels, as long as someone pays for them, the sharer can immediately receive a commission, which will be deposited into their WeChat wallet within seconds. The distribution product of this flash sale is 9.9 yuan, and the commission is 9 yuan for 1 person.

Team Rewards

If the group leader successfully organizes a group, as long as 3 people pay, the group leader can receive an air-conditioned quilt.

Team Member Rewards

Ordinary team members can earn 9 yuan for distributing one order, with no upper limit. If they successfully participate in a group purchase, they can also get an umbrella.

5. Operation Process

1. Preheat your circle of friends

On May 25th, I started posting on WeChat Moments at around 5pm, using the reason of gratitude and giving back for the 13th anniversary as an excuse to give away free gifts (a rechargeable fan, a children's skateboard, a multifunctional desk, a solid wood stool, choose 1 from 4). There were no conditions, only registration information was required. For parents in a small town, giving gifts is the fastest way to establish an initial sense of trust.

The information includes the parent's name, the child's name, and the child's age, and is also used for the purpose of leaving personal information for later targeted transactions.

A total of 5 messages were posted on the circle of friends for gift sending in one day, one of which was a screenshot of the message sent by the parents when they received the gift, to prove that the activity was real and effective.

On May 27, the second welfare activity was held in the circle of friends. Parents had to join the group to receive children's umbrellas and air-conditioning blankets. A QR code was sent to attract parents to join the group. With the preparation of the first activity, the second one quickly attracted the attention of many people.

At the same time, the circle of friends continued to share videos of many child students speaking English to shape the value of the product, let parents understand the professionalism of this institution, and also lay the groundwork for subsequent transactions.

Some people may think that posting on Moments is useless, but now the reach rate of Moments is still the highest, with 700 million people browsing Moments every day. No matter what activities are being carried out, pre-promotion can be done through Moments, and sales can be carried out in waves to attract users' attention.

The following picture is a screenshot of the circle of friends on May 27

2. Community Operation

The name of the group is: XXX13th Anniversary Gift and Welfare XX Group, which is the brand name + event theme + welfare group, so that users will know what the group is for and what it is used for when they join the group. When I joined, it was already Group 21, and the group name was changed to Group 21 to give users the feeling that there are multiple groups, proving that the event is very popular.

The group announcement is a text inviting users to join the group. There is no welcome message. The text inviting users to join the group is sent out once in a while. This way, users will not be disturbed too frequently and new users can be told what the group is for and what activities are held. Many companies hold group activities, but because they welcome the group too frequently, users think it is an advertising group and block the group messages directly. This also leads to a decrease in the reach of subsequent activities.

3. Invite fission

After the free giveaway activities in the previous group, new users already have initial trust. Now we start to carry out community invitation fission activities, allowing users to directly invite friends to join the group. The number of people invited and the gifts given will be different.

For parents in small towns, this way of community fission is the simplest and most direct. The way to participate in activities does not need to be too complicated, so they are more willing to participate.

During the invitation process, a robot is set up in the group to check how many people have been invited to join the group and how many people have stayed, and give timely feedback to the inviter. The water army will take the lead in guiding everyone to check in time, and the merchant encourages the inviter to keep going.

The following is the invitation fission speech of this group:

Add the group owner's WeChat account to register and receive a multifunctional desk, charging fan, skateboard, or solid wood stool (valued at RMB 98) for free (choose one from four)

Invite parents who live near Hengli (1-15 years old) to join this group and send the following gifts:

Invite 3 people to get a children's portable umbrella worth 58 yuan

Invite 8 people to get a summer air-conditioning blanket worth 128 yuan;

Invite more than 12 people to join the group and get a children's portable umbrella + summer air-conditioning blanket;

Reply to the group: "@小助手邀请查询" to find out how many people have been invited.

Red envelope rain and super benefits will be released at the same time at 7:30 tonight! !

Rules and address for receiving gifts:

You can collect it with the group owner's registration information and show your mobile phone when collecting it.

The total number of free gifts is limited to 2,000. You cannot collect them on behalf of others or by mail. The deadline is May 28 to 30 (this week).

The address is: XXX

When someone invites two people to join the group, the staff will tag the parents and tell them what prizes they can get if they invite one more person, in order to boost the parents' enthusiasm.

When a certain number of people are invited to the group, the group owner will send out red envelopes to encourage interaction. In this way, there will be rewards for invitations, and red envelopes will be given when the group reaches a certain number of people. The group will fission faster, and the warm atmosphere will attract more people to participate.

4. Flash sale warm-up

As more and more people joined the group, we started to announce flash sales, announcing in the group that there would be super benefits at 7:30 p.m., and adding them after each invitation fission copy. There were also flash sale posters, text on the red envelope skin: (7:30 flash sale), and multiple scene announcements.

Countdown 1 hour poster

There is also a simultaneous warm-up in the circle of friends to attract parents who have not yet joined the group to join as soon as possible.

5. Active in answering questions

Before the flash sale, the teachers of the institution held a quiz activity in the group. The questions set were mainly some English quizzes with prizes. On the one hand, this popularized English learning skills for parents and highlighted professionalism. On the other hand, it livened up the group atmosphere before the flash sale and grabbed everyone's attention, which was also very important.

6. Official flash sale

At 7:30 p.m., before the official flash sale, red envelopes were first sent out to liven up the group atmosphere. Several short videos and teacher’s voice messages were then sent to introduce the company and products. The purpose was to increase customer trust and let parents fully understand this training institution. Only with trust can there be a deal.

After a parent has paid, the staff will send a screenshot of the order. Taking advantage of the herd mentality of human nature, when you see many people buying and sales are good, you will be more motivated to buy, and at the same time, the circle of friends will synchronize the activities within the group again.

7. Retweet with courtesy

On Friday, May 28, we held an activity in the group where people forwarded messages to their friends’ circles and collected likes. With only 19 likes, you would receive a special class and an electric toothbrush, which you could pick up at the store on Saturday and Sunday. Through the likes collection activity, the event can be exposed again. It will be released on Friday and can be collected on Saturday and Sunday, which will provide faster feedback and attract more people to participate.

8. Parents post pictures

When parents go to the training institution to receive gifts, they take photos and send them to the group, with a unified line of speech:

Thanks to XXX Education

The activity is real and effective

The gift has been received

If you haven't received it yet, hurry up and claim it. Please invite more people to join the group to register and receive it for free.

This action is to prove that the activity is real and effective, and to allow parents who have not yet participated to participate as soon as possible. However, only pictures of the gifts were posted here. A better way would be to post pictures of parents holding the prizes and taking photos with the teacher, which would be more realistic.

The above is the gameplay of the entire community distribution process. The details are actually very rich, but there are still good points and shortcomings, in my opinion.

6. Advantages that can be learned from

1. Preheat the circle of friends by sending gifts first and establishing links with parents, which can screen out seed users for community fission activities. Let parents pay attention to the anniversary celebration and pave the way for subsequent community activities and flash sales.

2. Invitation fission activities are simple and direct, and convenient for parents to operate. As long as the bait is attractive, the number of community members can be increased rapidly.

3. For gifts of physical items, the recipients need to go to the store to pick them up in person. Parents can only invite people nearby to select a more precise group of people.

4. Before the flash sale, there will be red envelope rain, company product introduction, and interactive Q&A to demonstrate the professionalism of the organization and increase parents’ trust in the organization.

5. After parents receive the prizes, guide them to post pictures in the group, which is equivalent to customer testimony to prove that the event is real.

6. The community has a large number of pictures, audios, and videos, which have better visual effects than pure text.

7. The poster is very down-to-earth and in line with the aesthetic taste of urban parents. The font is large and mainly red. There is a ticker on the distribution activity details page, showing that XXX has purchased it, making people feel that the activity is very popular and many people have purchased it. There are also floating texts to attract users' attention even more.

7. Points to be optimized & solutions

1. You can also set ranking rewards for invitation fission. For example, the top three on the ranking list will receive prizes based on the number of invitees.

2. The experience of introducing the company before the flash sale is poor. Several similar products have been released, all of which are conversations between teachers and students. It is suggested to add other things, such as parents' evaluations, teacher introductions, and classroom environment.

3. The physical gifts given away are not relevant enough to the main products and are likely to attract freeloaders. After receiving the prize, I will not follow the group or purchase paid products. English training institutions are suitable for giving away English picture books, stickers, etc.

4. The next day after the flash sale, there was no further promotion of the flash sale. The suggestion is to promote it at least once a day, and also add previous parents’ comments and children’s class videos.

5. The team leader lacked training and did not provide copywriting for posting on social media. Teach the team leader/distributor what to do, provide copywriting, fool-proof operation, and increase the team leader's motivation to share.

The above advantages and disadvantages are what I can think of. Everyone is welcome to add to them. I will make a summary at the end of the review.

The anniversary activities organized by educational institutions through sales in WeChat Moments, community invitation fission, and flash sales are generally good. This approach is also suitable for offline stores, and many people may have done it.

However, social media flash events are short-term. I think we still need to work harder to research how to build a self-circulating private traffic system for stores. I personally think that for educational stores like this, they should unify their content output, accurately reach parents through different teacher IPs, and build trust; at the same time, through daily interactive check-ins in the community and organizing activities, they should establish a closed loop of private domain traffic from online to offline; based on changes in student needs, they should continuously develop products to attract traffic and welfare products to complete flash transactions. Once growth and repeat purchases become a self-perpetuating cycle, the operation can be replicated.

Author: Peng Yingfeng

Source: Social Network