How to use “product” thinking to guide event operations?

In order to stimulate consumption, major e-commerce companies are now keen on creating festivals, such as 618, Double 11, Mother and Baby Day, Butterfly Festival, etc. However, most festivals try a little here and there without a clear direction and little awareness of iteration, making it very difficult to produce high-quality events. In the process of exploring the "venue productization design ideas", the author of this article has some thoughts and reflections, which I will share with you below.

With the development of e-commerce, various activities such as 618, Double 11, Mother and Baby Day, and Butterfly Festival are coming. In the past two years of working in interactive design for e-commerce activities, I have observed that many activities are like “try this today, try that tomorrow”, with no clear direction and little awareness of iteration, making it very difficult to produce high-quality activities.

In the process of exploring the "venue product design ideas", I had some thoughts and reflections. The following articles mainly include:

1. Why use the “productization” approach to guide activity design?
2. How to “productize” an event venue?

1. Why use the “productization” approach to guide event venue design?

Different from the existing pages, e-commerce activities have three major characteristics:

(1) Short online time

It is usually only online for 1-2 weeks. Special large-scale events such as Double 11 and 618 may last for 1 month.

(2) Strong explosive power and great discounts

Compared with ordinary e-commerce pages, the activities focus on large discounts and have very strong explosive power. Some excellent activities can bring good sales results.

(3) Strong operation orientation

• Activities require the integration of resources, have a strong sales purpose, and have strong operational attributes.
• The operation's planning of the event basically determines the framework of the event.

Many small-scale activities do not involve interaction designers or product managers, which also leads to the "productization" iterative ideas being easily overlooked. I have come across many small-scale activities, and the brief design process is as follows:

In the above process, the iterative thinking and overall sedimentation are relatively weak. By the time we plan the second event, the person in charge of operations may have left and the designer may have been replaced. Without the awareness of “productization” iteration, it is difficult to gain experience from the previous activity and make further improvements.

The current status of e-commerce event venue design has two main characteristics:

• Most activities lack previous experience and lack guidance in design;
• Competition in events is becoming more and more intense. If you want to stand out, you need to design in a "meticulous and polished" way rather than following the old "simple and crude" approach.

Therefore, in order to create high-quality events, you must have an iterative productization approach. The larger the event, the more important the productization idea is.

2. How to “productize” an event venue?

In many venue design practices, I summarized 6 steps:

Step 1: Clarify the core purpose

Clarify the core purpose of the activity and break down the goals in detail from various dimensions.

The underlying purpose of the activity generally does not change much. Before designing, we need to clarify why the activity exists and what value it can bring to users/merchants/platforms. Only in this way can we ensure that we do not deviate from the core during execution and fundamentally guarantee the continuity of the activity.

Take "JD.com 618" as an example. As a grand shopping festival, the purpose of the event is roughly broken down as follows for different roles:

Step 2: Sort out the core points of force

Sort out the core focus points from the short-term, medium-term and long-term dimensions.

When designing an event, sometimes we want to make some interesting designs, but there are always some limitations during the implementation process, and many contents cannot be realized. In addition, the activity itself is highly uncertain, with many changes from initial planning to final launch. In this case, how can we ensure that the alternative also achieves the goal?

In practice, I usually sort out the core focus points of each stage, namely "short-term", "medium-term" and "long-term", based on the general direction, and classify the things I want to do respectively. For example, if the bold attempt in the "long-term" column cannot be evaluated, you can consider splitting it into achievable "medium-term" and "short-term" focus points and verify them first. If after verification, it is found that the long-term direction is correct, then we will push towards the "long-term" strategy. This way, you won’t abandon the design because it cannot be realized, and you can also ensure that you don’t deviate from the general direction.

Step 3: Collect experience questions

Collect the experience questions from previous years' activities and compile a list of questions.

If an event is held multiple times, there will generally be a accumulation of documents, such as design walkthrough reports, user research reports, etc. After sorting out the experience issues, we found that some problems cannot be solved on a single page and the link experience needs to be optimized.

In this way, we can help ourselves jump out of a single page, have a more global perspective, and gain a clearer understanding of the entire project. If your page doesn’t get settled, don’t worry. You can start from this time, record the problems you find, and try to solve them in the subsequent design.

The following classification is recommended for the list of questions:

Step 4: Design refinement

Design around "goals, focus points, and problem tables" and implement them as much as possible; pay attention to planning verification points and key indicators in advance.

During the design process, always focus on the "goal" in Step 1 and the "focus" in Step 2, and pay attention to the "problem table" in Step 3 to ensure that the design output can achieve the pre-set goals and that the design is not superficial but truly in-depth.

In addition, you should also pay attention to the issues to be verified in advance and think about the verification ideas. For issues that require qualitative verification, I usually sort out the focus points first and discuss appropriate verification methods with my research colleagues. For issues that require quantitative verification, I usually plan observation indicators in advance and communicate with operations about the tracking status to ensure that there is data to be seen later. This can avoid aimless design without knowing whether the result is good or bad.

Step 5: Design Verification

After going online, respond to and solve some problems quickly; at the same time, be sure to retain screenshots, data, and user research feedback to verify your ideas.

After the activity goes online, pay attention to collecting opinions from all parties. For problems that are easy to solve, they can be quickly iterated online. Be sure to retain online page screenshots, page data, user survey results, etc., to verify ideas, output corresponding conclusions, and guide the next design.

Step 6: Overall review

Review this activity, adjust iterative ideas, and prepare for the next design.

First, check whether the “purpose” and “focus” have been achieved. If you find that the direction is off, correct it in time.

Next, review the “problem list”, cross out issues that have been resolved, and add new issues that have arisen.

Again, for the problems to be verified, analyze various feedbacks and data to precipitate conclusions with guiding value.

The above are the 6 steps of the iterative thinking for “productization” of venue design. Continuous cycles of sedimentation in design can help improve the quality of venue design and create high-quality events.

Written at the end

The above are my preliminary thoughts on the “productization of e-commerce event venue design”. There are still many imperfections, and I welcome your criticism and corrections. I am still exploring, and welcome to discuss and learn from each other.

Author: Xiaoxi

Source: Xiaoxi