These 9 ways to market your brand

If you go shopping often, you may have noticed a phenomenon that there are always queues of people at the door of some internet-famous milk tea shops, and sometimes the queues are even dozens of meters long. It's understandable to queue occasionally, but it's a bit puzzling if you always queue.

Does it really taste so good that it makes you fly? There are too many customers to handle. Do we have to wait in line every day?

The answer is of course no. Intentionally making customers queue is actually a common trick used by milk tea shops.

There is a brand of milk tea shop with more than 1,000 stores across the country. Their staff, when there are few customers, will skillfully chat with customers. In this way, the speed of making milk tea is relatively slow, and the queues of customers will gradually grow longer. Then they will stop chatting with customers and start making milk tea faster. Some internet-famous milk tea shops even hire people to queue up when they first open to create a sense of popularity.

The core of the milk tea shop's painstaking operation is to create a feeling, a feeling that the products are very popular and very popular. This feeling is the "hot selling feeling" .

"Hot-selling feeling" is an important method in brand promotion. It can be used for the brand's stage positioning and as a trust endorsement to enhance consumer trust. In the process of brand development, we must continuously inject the concept of hot sales and use the feeling of hot sales to achieve real hot sales.

In this article, let’s learn 9 common methods of using “hot sales” to promote your brand.

1. Why can we establish positioning by using hot sales?

Because, "hot sales will attract hot sales, and if it seems to sell well, it will really sell well." From a psychological level, people will "sympathize with losers, but buy the products of winners."

In the Chinese people’s perception, there is a saying that goes “When a wall falls, everyone pushes it; when a drum is broken, everyone beats it.” In the Western world, the Bible says in the Gospel of Matthew, "For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance. But from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away."

It all speaks to the same truth: "The poor stay poor, and the rich stay rich." Therefore, in marketing, you should always make your brand look rare and best-selling. Even if there are mountains of products in the warehouse, the audience cannot see any sign of unsalable goods.

We can better understand the above statement by looking at real-life examples. OFO, the small yellow bike company, was once extremely popular, but it encountered some difficulties. Once it was criticized for its bad performance, it triggered a run on the bank. 20 million people lined up online to get their deposits back, which became the last straw that broke the camel's back.

Apple's new mobile phone has been released, with long queues at the door and a sense of hot sales created. This is an old trick that has been used for many years, and the more it is played, the better it gets, and the better it sells. Now Huawei has started to use this method when releasing high-end models. A certain tea brand, which claims to be the most popular in the tea industry, hires college students to queue up at the door every day, and sells milk tea like a lottery for buying a house.

2. How to use hot sales to establish positioning?

There are 9 ways to convey "hot selling" information and create a sense of hot selling.

1. Annual sales

The amount of products sold in a year is huge, which is very impressive and makes people feel that this brand is very popular.

For example, Juewei Duck Neck advertises that it sells "400 million duck necks a year" and Xiangpiaopiao advertises that its "sales combined can circle the earth 10 times"

2. Stage sales

Compare your sales with those of your competitors. This can be annual sales or any time period of your choice: three months, six months, two years, or three years, as long as you are in the leading position during this time period.

3. Compare Yourself

For example, a brand claims that its sales have increased by 200% year-on-year, or have increased by more than 100% for three consecutive years. This makes people feel that the growth is very fast and the sales are quite good. But in fact, this category is in its explosive growth period, and the industry is growing rapidly. Its growth rate may not even make it into the top five, but it gives people the impression that it is selling well.

4. Growth rate

The rapid growth rate also proves that the brand is very popular and has a hot-selling feel.

For example, the pet medicine brand Xiaochong claims to be the "fastest growing pet medicine brand" and has "grown by more than 50% for seven consecutive years." This category is particularly suitable for categories whose key promotion targets are dealers, as dealers prefer to find brands with fast growth.

5. Industry ranking

Most industries have various ranking lists. If you can rank high on the more authoritative lists (preferably first), you can use it to promote your company. For example, Tmall and JD.com award various awards to brands with good performance in each category every year. Many businesses use this to promote themselves and make the audience feel that they are very popular online.

6. Hot sales in the region

If you cannot sell well in the national market, or cannot sell well overall, but sell well in certain areas, you can advertise that you have higher sales and are more popular in a certain area.

7. Hot-selling single products

If you only have one product that is among the best-selling in the industry, you can promote yourself like this: "XX product sales first exceeded XXX million units", "XXX product sales ranked first in the entire network in 201X"

8. Expert recommendation

There are all kinds of experts in every industry, including academic experts, KOLs, and internet celebrities. If you see many experts promoting a certain brand of products in a certain period of time, it will give people the illusion that this brand is very popular.

For example, when you go to a bookstore, you see a pile of new books in a prominent position. When you get closer, you see that the cover is full of celebrity recommendations. When you open it, you see a bunch of recommendations from experts and celebrities again. Suddenly, you have the illusion that this is the current bestseller.

9. PR is hot

Companies can use public relations activities to convey "hot selling" information to the audience. For example, when the fast food brand Lao Xiang Ji acquired Wuhan Yonghe in 2018, it organized an event called “Banquet for the Whole City”, which became a sensation and won rave reviews.

On July 25, Hometown Chicken’s acquisition of Wuhan Yonghe and brand strategy press conference was held in Wuhan, with more than 100 media outlets reporting on it and 9 major platforms broadcasting it live.

On July 26, Lao Xiang Ji celebrated the acquisition of Wuhan Yonghe and held a banquet for the whole city. Free lunch at all Lao Xiang Ji restaurants in Wuhan! All Lao Xiang Ji restaurants in Anhui and Nanjing offer free small portions of chicken soup all day long!

On the day of the event, there were long queues at each store. Even the China Police Anhui Weibo account reposted the news that Lao Xiang Ji was hosting a banquet for the whole city, and commented: "It seems that more police forces will be needed near Lao Xiang Ji. Don't fight over chicken soup!"

How long does it take to go from a novice to a brand marketing expert?

Some people cannot make it even after more than ten years, while others can become proficient in just one year.

Time is not the key; systematic study, deliberate practice, and actual project work are.

In marketing, only by looking at the overall picture can you see the details clearly. Only after going through the whole process can you understand it.

Author: Liu Guoqiang

Source: Liu Guoqiang Demolition Marketing (sslj36)