The marketing tricks that were misled by Pinduoduo

Pinduoduo is a company that has achieved rapid growth through fission, attracting many platforms to imitate it. These strategies for achieving rapid growth are becoming increasingly wild.

This is an era where traffic is scarce. Pinduoduo has launched another dimension of the battle for traffic: traffic fission, which is commonly known as old customers bringing in new ones.

We must have seen a lot of dazzling marketing tactics of Pinduoduo that exploit human weaknesses and test the bottom line of human nature.

Although it disgusts users, the effect is surprisingly good! Pinduoduo relied on these strategies to increase its active user base from 68 million in 2017 to 440 million in just three years. Is it because its prices are cheap? Because of its magical slogan?

Although they are related, neither of them is the core reason. There is only one core reason, that is, Pinduoduo is the first company to use fission as one of its core competitive advantages .

A company like this that has proven its huge commercial success through fission will inevitably be imitated by all kinds of heroes. Many platforms that focus on user volume and transaction volume have begun to imitate Pinduoduo frantically, and even plagiarize Pinduoduo's routines.

Let’s talk about Pinduoduo first

1. Save money monthly card

Let me tell you about my personal experience:

Previously, on the recommendation of a colleague, I planned to get a money-saving monthly card from Pinduoduo, which costs 29.9 yuan (my colleague’s monthly card was 8.9 yuan, and I seem to have been ripped off by Pinduoduo at the first hurdle. I checked and it’s now 5.9 yuan. The price fluctuation is really big). Although the price is expensive, I saw in the promotional copy that: when you sign up for a card, you will receive 1 50-yuan no-threshold coupon, 1 20-yuan no-threshold coupon, and some other types of coupons (4 5-yuan no-threshold coupons, 20-yuan discount coupons for purchases over 50 yuan, 10% off coupons, 1 free order/month, 62 free orders for big brands/month, etc.). It seems that you are definitely not losing money, and you may even make a lot of money.

So, I placed the order happily as if I had found a bargain. Of course, the main reason I went for it was the two large-value coupons of 50 and 20 with no threshold required.

Then, the most shocking moment came. After I applied for the card, I found out:

There are only 100 coupons of these two types in total, so you have to grab them yourself! Grab it yourself! Can you believe it?

The key is that all monthly card members of the entire platform join me in grabbing these 100 tickets. It would be strange if you can get them, the probability is even lower than winning the lottery.

Putting aside some other coupons, so when I applied for a monthly pass, did I buy the right to grab coupons?

I couldn't help but laugh. Pinduoduo had once again played with my IQ. I silently opened the customer service and applied for a refund.

2. Red Envelope Withdrawal

You may have read an article before about how Pinduoduo exploits human weaknesses to achieve its goals step by step.

It is roughly as follows: the "Double 11 Cash Withdrawal Activity" launched by Pinduoduo before will give you a big red envelope of more than 68 yuan for the first time, which is a considerable amount of money. Anyone who sees it will be excited and want to cash out.

If you also want to withdraw cash, it means that you are trapped. Most people will think about collecting 100 yuan and then withdrawing it. This is like passing levels in a game. The first level is the easiest. After killing the boss, you will be given a lot of treasures. But if you are hit by a big club in the first level, will you still want to continue playing?

Pinduoduo demonstrates this gamification-based marketing thinking to the fullest, and with each next step, it becomes increasingly difficult to obtain treasures.

Moreover, you have obtained a considerable amount of real money before, and the huge sunk costs drive people to go further and further on the wrong path.

——So, they started sharing and sending messages to groups.

Until the end, the amount that your friends help you increase with each click has been reduced to 0.01 yuan .

The 60-plus yuan red envelope at the beginning and the dozens of yuan increase in the first few clicks are actually illusions. After the price reached 99.5 yuan, Pinduoduo's true colors were revealed. It wants to squeeze out all your connections to increase the number of its active users.

At this point, the sunk costs are already very, very large, because you have spent a lot of time, energy, and interpersonal relationships to get to this point; if you don’t continue, then everything before will be a huge loss.

Finally, when you have harassed 50 friends again and exhausted your connections, you have finally achieved your goal and can withdraw the money.

After “withdrawing”, I found that I got two “cash coupons” instead of the “WeChat withdrawal” advertised in black and white before (and it is limited to 12 hours, are you surprised?):

Are you confused and unable to cry at this moment?

Note: In fact, with regard to the above two points, Pinduoduo’s promotional copy has already involved fraud.

Didi

Although Didi's actions are far less excessive than Pinduoduo's, it does not prevent it from learning some of Pinduoduo's cool operations.

I am considered a high-quality customer of Didi. In 2019, I have spent a total of 7,129.24 yuan, and most of the times I took express cars.

Although I usually drive to and from get off work, I always have to take a taxi for some special reasons. The main reason is that I need to go to a place to do something, and it is difficult to park there (such as a large hospital), or there are no parking spaces at all (such as a busy commercial district), or the parking fee is extremely expensive (such as a scenic spot). There is no way, I can only take a taxi at this time.

I am a person who is nostalgic, and this is also reflected in my product usage habits.

Although there are many new taxi-hailing platforms now, such as the latest travel platforms Geshang Travel and Xiangdao Travel (these companies have many coupons during the promotion period); there are also some old travel platforms Cao Cao Special Car, Didi Travel, and Yidao; as well as comprehensive map taxi-hailing platforms such as Gaode and Baidu.

But every time I take a taxi, my first choice is still Didi. This may be the power of habit.

Okay, let’s get back to the topic. What exactly did Didi do that made me sick?

1. Taxi fares

The concept of taxi money is actually quite simple. After each consumption, a random taxi money red envelope will be returned. It is not a point, but can be understood as a coupon. It must accumulate to a value of 8 yuan to offset the taxi fare.

Doesn’t it look good? I was going to take a taxi anyway, and you can even give me a refund for the taxi fare. Isn’t this free money? I'm not at a loss either.

But the core of this marketing strategy is that it will give people a sense of luck: they think that they can accumulate a not-insignificant 8 yuan voucher by taking a few taxis.

But is it really that simple?

I clearly remember that the taxi money I received the first time I participated in this activity was 2.6 yuan, the second time was 1.5 yuan, and the third time was 0.8 yuan.

Did you find it? In decreasing order, isn’t it very similar to Pinduoduo’s scheme of giving cash red envelopes to people who invite them, and allowing them to withdraw cash when the amount reaches 100 yuan?

As Pinduoduo attracts more and more people, the cash red envelopes returned will become smaller and smaller. In the end, even if you attract an old PDD user, you will only get 1 cent back. There are very few users who can collect 100 yuan to withdraw. This can only be done by someone who has visited all the aunts and uncles or harassed all the colleagues and friends.

The refund logic of Didi’s taxi money is almost the same as that of PDD. If you want to get 8 yuan, it is almost impossible without taking 10 taxis.

Maybe you will say, 10 times is not too many. I took a taxi to and from get off work every day, and I collected all the money in a week.

Is it really that simple?

How could such a shrewd Didi let you get this coupon so easily?

So, he hid another very disgusting design, which is that the taxi money will expire.

For example, the 2.6 yuan I refunded for the first time will expire after 3 days; that is to say, if I took a taxi 3 times in 3 days and refunded 2.6 yuan, 1.5 yuan, and 0.8 yuan respectively, then on the fourth day, my total taxi money would only be 2.3 yuan (1.5+0.8), because the 2.6 yuan would expire. On the fifth day, the 1.5 yuan will also expire...

This means that you need to take taxis frequently in a short period of time in order to finally get a usable 8 yuan cash red envelope.

The original intention of this marketing campaign is to increase the frequency of user repurchases through subsidies, activate users to reuse products, and increase the number of taxi rides per unit time.

I admit that when I first saw this thing, I thought it was pretty good and was very happy to participate. However, when I saw the increasingly lower refund amount and the taxi fares expiring every now and then, I felt very disappointed. After thinking about it, I decided to just take a taxi as usual. I am not worthy of this 8 yuan red packet.

In fact, I really hate this kind of marketing activities. In my opinion, this kind of deceptive activities are the product of strong KPI guidance.

It satisfies the operators' own demands, but deeply hurts the users. To be more precise, it may be users like me; after all, there are still some people who will never tire of trying to collect 8 yuan even if it is difficult.

For most consumers, such activities can basically be characterized as "deceiving consumers."

They attract you with a very easy-to-obtain activity promotion, and then wait until you find out that the difficulty of implementing this activity is far less easy than it is advertised. I believe that most people, after being "cheated once", will not want to do it again a second time.

I can't help but wonder, does this activity help or hurt the product?

Perhaps judging from the Didi case alone, the damage is not that great. After all, there are only a few travel platforms, and the most important thing for people to take a taxi is to have sufficient supply of vehicles; the best thing is that there is a Didi Express to accept the order within 10 meters at the moment of hailing a taxi, which is convenient and efficient. Therefore, many people will still choose Didi, even if they are emotionally deceived.

I think this is one of the reasons why Didi dares to carry out this activity despite the dissatisfaction of users, because it will not lead to a large loss of users.

As for the benefits, I think for those who have to take a taxi anyway, it would be a waste not to take it. If you give me extra taxi money now, I will take it. Even if you don’t collect all the 8 yuan taxi coupons in the end, you won’t lose anything.

However, for those users who hold out hope for taxi money, it is very likely that in order to collect 8 yuan, they will be stimulated to increase the number and frequency of orders, only to find out in the end that all their efforts are in vain.

For Didi, its goal has been achieved as user activity and revenue have increased.

2. Points Mall

I think Didi’s points mall is the least noticeable one because there are so few things on it.

Although this part has nothing to do with Pinduoduo, Didi’s points mall is almost just a decoration. The only reason I can think of for him to do this is that he doesn't want you to take advantage of him with the points, and the redemption value of the points is pitifully low.

I can't help but ask, if points are so ineffective for you, why did you design the points system in the first place?

I just want to ask everyone, besides occasionally exchanging 2 or 3 yuan taxi coupons, have you ever exchanged anything else?

The cruelest thing in the world is to give people hope and then ruthlessly deprive you of your hope. I give you points, but you find out there is nothing you can exchange for them.

——Didi is comparable to Pinduoduo in this regard.

Taobao

In order to increase the number of active users and transaction volume, Taobao has racked its brains to imitate various methods in the past two years.

For example, Taobao’s money-saving zone, 10 billion subsidies, money-saving monthly cards, Tmall Farm which is comparable to Pinduoduo Farm, red envelope sign-in, etc. Basically, all the marketing functions of Pinduoduo have been moved here, which is really simple and crude.

Double 11's "Team PK Energy" event

Taobao’s previous Double 11 “Team PK Energy” event was also fission in nature. Through the event mechanism, it used social platforms to continuously spread the Double 11 event, luring users to participate and letting them indulge in it.

At that time, one of our product colleagues also made an interpretation and analysis of this:

In terms of activity form:

• The activity introduces a competitive PK competition, which, through the form of a game (competition), essentially stimulates the user's inner "desire to win", making the user unable to stop;
• The team-based nature of the activity allows team members to feel group pressure and be influenced by group effects, which is a richer experience than single-player combat.
• Taking "Pinduoduo" as an example, similar multi-person group buying activities benefit multiple people, while fission and other activities are more for single users; the passive participants in this team PK activity have no sense of participation, do not understand the activity or are on guard against it.

Overall, the participation experience of the event itself is very poor (Taobao’s most active users were not surveyed here, but all relevant personnel have such feedback). It overly forces users to participate, takes up all of their remaining time, and infringes on their social relationships.

After playing round after round, you will find that you are exhausted both physically and mentally, and have consumed a lot of energy and connections.

Summarize

All the tricks are to take advantage of human nature to achieve their own business goals. We do not judge whether this is right or wrong. Because from the perspective of the enterprise, it needs to continuously increase users and revenue; from the perspective of the user, it needs to meet its own needs on these products - everyone gets what they need, that's all.

I just hope that certain companies will not mislead users in a false and obviously deceptive way, which not only hurts users' views on the product, but also causes users to distrust the entire Internet industry.

Author: Team Smart

Source: Smart Team