Analysis of Lian Coffee’s private domain gameplay!

Recently, I suddenly discovered that some companies have started using video accounts to live broadcast press conferences!

After a closer look, I found that a coffee brand I loved before, " Lian Coffee ", released a new product, "Very Friendly Oat Latte", and the bottle is pretty good:

When I saw this brand, I immediately became interested. After all, it is also a "net celebrity brand" that has been popular for a long time.

I remember that their mini program "Pocket Cafe" was really popular before . When I was in Beijing, almost all my colleagues were playing it, and everyone visited each other. It was very similar to the Animal Crossing game a while ago...

After careful observation, I found that Lian Coffee is also very good at private domain.

1. "Hard restart" based on private domain precipitation

Lian Coffee, which has been producing hit products frequently in the past few years, once "disappeared" for a hundred days due to vicious competition in the industry. This was also interpreted by the outside world as the "darkest moment" for Lian Coffee.

However, during the months of dormancy, Lian Coffee did not sit idle or give up.

In early September, Lian Coffee released a return tweet, officially announcing that it would begin to transform its business from "made-to-order delivery" to "retail model." Lian Coffee called this transformation a "hard reboot."

After its comeback, Lian Coffee launched a product of the same name, the "Hard Restart" energy coffee, which sold out as soon as it was launched, with more than 100,000 tweets per post...

Together with the oatmeal latte series released last week, this is already the second new product series after Lian Coffee’s return, and it continues the sales success of its predecessor.

How did this amazing brand do it?

1 ) Product selection: highly matching users 

If you carefully study Lian Coffee’s new products, you will find that its strategy for hot products is very simple:

The product is highly matched with existing private domain users, and ignites the entire network by detonating the private domain.

① "High-end" product formula

In terms of the new product formula, Coffee cleverly chose the "oat milk" plant-based formula, which has been highly discussed and recognized in the past two years.

On the one hand, oat milk has a "high-end" temperament, and with the blessing of Lian Coffee's inherent "Gold Medal Coffee Beans", it can better create a high-quality image, attract Lian Coffee's old users - young people in first-tier cities, and better activate old users.

At the same time, this choice can also maintain Lian Coffee's original "boutique" image, so that this transformation will not damage the brand temperament accumulated over the years as much as possible.

In addition, the popularity of sugar-free beverages such as Yuanqi Forest in recent years also shows young users' pursuit of maintaining their figure.

Therefore, this coffee is also made with "0 sucrose" flavor, further reducing users' purchasing resistance.

② "Shake bottle" product form

Since the transformation, Lian Coffee’s new products have all adopted the form of “shaker bottles”.

On the one hand, this form can maximize the quality of the coffee and ensure 0 additives. The "shake" operation can also make the coffee foam richer and taste better.

More importantly, it can give users a sense of ritual of "shaking before drinking" , making users more favorable towards the product; it can also be made into a product memory point that is easy to spread and promote.

At the same time, this design that allows people to drink coffee without a cup undoubtedly conveys the following message to users: Whether on a high-speed train, airplane, beach, or mountain, as long as you bring the Lian Coffee "Shaker Bottle", you can solve your need for high-quality coffee.

③ "High-value" product packaging

To be honest, Lian Coffee puts a lot of effort into the packaging of every new product.

For example, this time Lian Coffee chose to collaborate with the Instagram celebrity painter @dailypurrr. The final product is very beautiful and suitable for taking photos:

Recognizable and good-looking packaging can significantly increase the brand's "photo-taking rate" (the rate at which users take photos and share them on social platforms after purchasing). It can not only help promote the brand, but also improve word-of-mouth.

It is clear from the popularity of the kitten bottle on social platforms that seeing a large number of ordinary users sharing it can easily make people have a preconception of "is this product really good?"

2 ) Activate private domain: various forms of activities

Although it has been silent for several months, Lian Coffee’s first return tweet in September was particularly lively:

Lian Coffee, which has been working in the WeChat ecosystem for 6 years, has accumulated nearly 10 million private users through its official account and mini-programs . Compared with many startups, Lian Coffee is not a "cold start".

In order to activate 10 million highly sticky fans, Lian Coffee chose to launch "exclusive discounts for old users":

In the future, every time Lian Coffee launches a major new product, old users will receive a 50% discount to try it out, which will be valid forever.

Not only that, the first product also quickly became a hit online.

Although there was no big promotion, the new product "Hard Restart" energy coffee sold a month's worth of coffee in just 3 hours, and private sales exceeded 1 million in just 5 hours.

In December, Lian Coffee launched its second new product after its return, and also launched limited edition peripherals, using the peripherals to attract users into the community, creating a new user reach channel.

Lian Coffee also held a unique new product launch on Video Account - 8 hours of non-stop "cat broadcast", inviting a group of stray cats to do live broadcasts, attracting 30,000 people to "watch cats online" on weekdays. There were 280,000 live broadcast cheers (similar to likes) alone, and the number of fans increased by 3,200+.

2. The “magical” Lian Coffee: a hit-making machine

People who are familiar with Lian Coffee will certainly not doubt their experience in creating hit products, and the title of hit-making machine has long been officially certified.

As early as 2018, Lian Coffee created one of the best "mini program hits" in China: Pocket Coffee House.

On the first day of the launch of this mini program, the PV (number of visitors) reached 4.2 million+, and a total of 520,000+ coffee shops were opened; more than 10% of the coffee shops achieved real sales.

That year, Lian Coffee won the "Annual Smart Service Award" officially selected by WeChat for its "Pocket Coffee Shop". By the way, the KFC "Pocket Fried Chicken Shop", which was very similar to this idea, even won the Cannes Gold Award that year.

How was coffee made at that time?

1 ) Turn distribution into a “game”

Lian Coffee has done a great job packaging its “distribution” without any trace of promotion. Rather than calling it a promotion, it is more like a “business game” that makes users rush to join:

① Real business experience

Just like an offline coffee shop, if you want to open one, the first step is to decorate the store according to your preferences and set the cafe name, store introduction and other information.

The second step is to select the products you want to put on the shelves. The products on the shelves can be sold and can be delivered normally after your friends purchase them.

After the decoration is completed, users need to share the mini program to WeChat groups or Moments before they can officially open for business.

At the same time, the business status of the shop can be evaluated through the "Internet celebrity index". All dynamics, including friends visiting, selling coffee and completing tasks, can increase the index; the coffee shop also has its own "account book" to see the financial status of the store...

In this way, the operating conditions of the coffee shop become clearer, and users can operate the coffee shop according to their needs, thereby increasing the user usage time.

At the same time, watching the index increase little by little, this kind of "timely feedback" will make users feel fulfilled and increase their business motivation by +1.

② Set up reciprocity rules

For every cup of coffee sold, you have a chance to get 0.1-0.3 cups of "Growth Coffee"; once you have accumulated a full cup of "Growth Coffee", you can redeem it for a free cup of coffee offline.

At the same time, the price of coffee in the store is generally 10 yuan lower than the official price. When friends buy coffee here, they can use a coupon for a 10 yuan discount on every cup.

Therefore, opening a store not only allows you to save free coffee for yourself, but also allows your friends to buy their own cheap coffee here , which is simply not more cost-effective.

With such good things happening, users will certainly be motivated to share their own coffee shops.

③ Socially driven users

"Pocket Cafe" also has various rankings, including the "Business Ranking" for shop owners:

There are also "tycoon list" and "like list" for customers:

Rich list: Ranking of the number of cups ordered;

Likes list: Ranking of number of visits by friends.

In addition, in "Discover Cafe", users can also visit celebrity cafes, cafes they have visited, and nearby cafes to see how other cafes are doing.

In this way, when you see your name appear at the end of the "business rankings" or when you visit and see that other people's coffee shops are doing well, you may not be able to resist the urge to "show off" and start spending more time on running the coffee shop.

2 ) Make the membership system a “currency”

In addition to turning the distribution system into a game, Lian Coffee also turned membership rewards into "currency."

Why do I say so?

The general distribution logic is this: you help me sell goods, and I give you money.

At Lian Coffee, all rebates are returned in the form of "Growth Coffee", which can be exchanged for free coffee. This is equivalent to the "currency" within the Lian Coffee system.

Generally speaking, Lian Coffee will use "growth coffee" to reward some "high-value behaviors" , such as sharing coupons and encouraging new users to place orders, sell coffee, etc.

This will not only encourage users to become "salesmen" for the brand ; at the same time, since this currency system can only circulate within Lian Coffee, it can also increase the consumption frequency of "salesmen" and improve user stickiness.

Lian Coffee has also set up a "coffee library" to give users the opportunity to "stock up" a few more cups of coffee during promotions. It can be given to friends or sold directly in the Pocket Cafe.

It can be said that it is a "membership growth system born for social interaction."

3 ) Make fission look cool

In addition to "pocket coffee shops", coffee's "innate advantages" also make it easier for coffee to split.

Lian Coffee has two ways to attract new customers through group buying, both of which are relatively conventional:

One is "invite 2 new users and get 1 yuan coffee"; the other is "buy 5 cups at a discount price", which can be stored in the coffee library and consumed slowly.

Although the group play method is relatively conventional, the effect is very good. After all, coffee is indeed a product that is very suitable for attracting new customers at a low price: low cost and high premium. A cup of coffee that usually costs more than ten or twenty yuan now only costs one yuan, which seems more affordable. At the same time, the coffee category itself is quite classy, ​​and users will not have any psychological burden when sharing it.

3. Conclusion

Steve Jobs once said that innovation is the "recombination of old elements."

Lian Coffee's advantage lies in the fact that they have a lot of "old elements": they have long-established market awareness, a team that has fought in battles, and a mature supply chain system; of course, the most important thing is that they have 10 million private domain users with extremely high stickiness that have been accumulated over a long period of time.

What will be the future path of Lian Coffee as it transforms into a retail brand? Let's wait and see.

Author: Operation Research Society

Source: Operation Research Society (U_quan)