Official marketing methodologies of Douyin, Kuaishou, Zhihu, etc.

Douyin e-commerce FACT business matrix model, Kuaishou BEST marketing methodology, Kuaishou e-commerce STEPS brand merchant management methodology, Alimama deep chain management DEEPLINK method system, Xiaohongshu IDEA marketing methodology, Bilibili 4i interest marketing model... What do these high-sounding terms mean?

This article is about 5,000 words and will give you a comprehensive understanding of the latest official marketing methodologies of major platforms released in 2021. It takes about 10 minutes to read and about 30 minutes to understand. It is recommended to read it first and then read it.

When it comes to marketing methodology, I think there are two types.

One is the practical fighting skills on the front line, such as how to come up with a title, how to choose a cover, script templates, traffic investment skills, live broadcast language, etc. This kind of tactical methodology is down-to-earth, but requires high-frequency iteration (because it will be imitated, and then users will be tired, or platform rules and algorithms will change, so the life cycle is at most a few months). Many training institutions on the market also teach these things, starting with small tips to attract interest, and then providing SOPs and templates that have been proven successful. However, there is a high probability that by the time you see them, the successful cases will have been running for a long time and are about to enter a period of decline. Because this type of methodology has a short life cycle, training institutions can achieve high-frequency repurchases.

The other is the tactics at the strategic level, such as how to understand traffic scenarios, how to match people, goods and places, the indicator system for measuring content effectiveness, how to understand media characteristics, etc. This type of strategic methodology has a longer life cycle and requires processing from understanding to practical use, so there is no need to worry about being copied. Moreover, the official methodology usually integrates the operational strategies advocated by the media (backed by the support of products and algorithms), product tools, policy orientation, etc. Therefore, those who work deeply in the media must understand the white paper and be familiar with the methodology so that they can have a map in mind and a strategic direction.

1. Kuaishou: BEST Marketing Methodology

Kuaishou’s BEST marketing methodology was launched at Kuaishou’s first Emerging Brand Summit and Emerging Brand Launch Conference in Hangzhou on September 27, 2021. The first batch of 82 "emerging brands" were announced at the conference and the "BEST" marketing methodology was launched to enable their rapid growth. Therefore, it can be seen that BEST’s positioning is a very targeted methodological approach, which mainly solves the growth problem of emerging brands.

The BEST emerging brand marketing methodology can be broken down into brand hub building, scientific operations (Engagement), brand self-operation (Self-Operation), and conversion harvesting (Transaction), and is combined with the marketing tools and content projects of the Magnetic Engine platform to help emerging brands operate in the long term.

Under Kuaishou's BEST marketing model, emerging brands can continuously replenish their private traffic pools by building exclusive brand channels and positions, coupled with scientific operations and brand self-broadcasting, to continuously communicate with users, establish trust relationships, and accumulate highly sticky fans, bringing long-term value and compound interest effects to the brand. Brands can continuously stimulate new demands of fans through diverse content such as entertainment and knowledge, thereby achieving unlimited growth in purchasing power.

In fact, before BEST, Kuaishou also launched a STEPS methodology.

2. Kuaishou e-commerce: STEPS Kuaishou e-commerce brand merchant management methodology

On May 18, 2021, Kuaishou E-Commerce held a press conference to launch the Kuaishou 616 Quality Shopping Festival. Zhang Yipeng, head of the Kuaishou E-Commerce Marketing Center, officially released the Kuaishou E-Commerce brand merchant management methodology called "STEPS".

STEPS stands for Self-operation, Traffic, Elite distribution, Private domain, and Specific supply. Specifically, it refers to five aspects: brand self-broadcasting, public domain traffic blessing, expert distribution cooperation, private domain operation repurchase, and brand channel special supply.

The first thing that brand merchants should do on Kuaishou e-commerce is to broadcast their own content based on their brand personality; the second is to help brands get started with new stores through the operation and support of public domain traffic; the third is to cooperate with influencers in distribution and explore the explosiveness of their own brands and products in the Kuaishou e-commerce ecosystem; the fourth is to conduct repeat purchase operations in short video and live broadcast scenarios based on Kuaishou’s private domain economy; the fifth is to develop channel-specific products to better meet the needs of different channels. ——Zhang Yipeng’s explanation of the “STEPS” methodology

But for e-commerce merchants who pay more attention to results, they may not care about how to spell the word STEPS. They need to help merchants achieve conversion quickly so that they can remain on the platform and then seek long-term operation. Therefore, in subsequent external presentations, the practical order of STEPS became ESTPS: first use the lowest-cost distribution model E to test products and find the right crowd, which has a higher certainty of success than cold-start self-broadcasting. Then use public domain traffic T to assist brand self-broadcasting S to quickly achieve cold-start scale. Then strengthen operational capabilities to increase private domain repurchases P. Finally, a small number of successful brands enter S.

“Generally, we don’t recommend brands to start live streaming right away as a first step. We may recommend becoming an influencer distributor first.” The advantage of doing this is that you can quickly test the target population at a lower cost and understand the matching degree of the products. “We find the target group, and then we can position the advertising products for the target group, and finally we have a closed-loop transaction system.” - Xiao Gu, head of Kuaishou e-commerce

In comparison, STEPS's practical version, ESTPS, is more practical than the more macro BEST.

3. Douyin e-commerce: FACT business matrix model

I didn’t find the official marketing methodology of TikTok, but more like the product capability matrix of Bytedance. I don’t know whether it is because ByteDance, as an algorithm-driven, product-oriented company, does not pay much attention to operational methodology, or because the system is too large and it is difficult to unify understanding at the methodological level. However, Douyin e-commerce has a FACT business matrix model, which is the most detailed among all the methodologies. The FACT business matrix model was introduced by Mu Qing, vice president of Douyin e-commerce at the "2021 Douyin E-commerce Ecosystem Conference" on April 8, 2021: F (Field) is the position management of self-broadcasting by merchants, A (Alliance) is the matrix management of massive influencers, C (Campaign) is the combined outbreak of marketing activities, and T (Top-KOL) is the win-win situation of product and sales of top Vs, and content-centered e-commerce business capabilities are the premise and foundation.

Compared with the serial logic of STEPS, FACT represents the four major business positions of merchants in Douyin e-commerce and is more like a parallel logic. Merchants can flexibly allocate operational resources and marketing investments in the four major business areas based on the GMV growth needs at different stages, to achieve stable, efficient and continuous growth in the total volume of Douyin e-commerce business.

1. Merchants’ own broadcast (Field): the basic plate of daily sales management

1. Personalization of brands and businesses
2. Stable product guarantee
3. Complete pre-sales and after-sales services
4. Closely coordinated advertising (huge amount of Qianchuan)
5. Comprehensive data analysis (TikTok e-commerce compass)

2. Alliance: An amplifier for business growth

1. Efficient matchmaking and connection building of talents, quickly increasing the number of cooperative talents (DouLink offline product selection meeting, selected alliance online matchmaking platform, Nebula plan online talent recruitment activities, live e-commerce base)
2. Expert data diagnosis to improve the accuracy of cooperative experts (Douyin e-commerce compass tool module measurement dimensions: expert conversion rate, single product display times)

3. Marketing activities (Campaign): the explosive place of large-scale sales

1. Multi-level platform marketing activities (platform promotions, marketing IP activities such as Douyin Super Product Day, industry activities such as the beauty industry spring and summer rejuvenation season)
2. Complete and adequate preparation planning

4. Top KOLs: A win-win promotion platform for both product and sales

Mixed field: Merchants implant one or several products into the live broadcast spots of celebrities or top influencers, thereby achieving an explosion in sales of a single product. By implanting the same product into mixed fields for a long time, the product can be made into a "hot product" on the platform. Special session: Merchants invite celebrities or top influencers to conduct special live broadcasts only for this merchant or brand. This can not only promote products, but also deliver brand information in the special session, leveraging the influence of top influencers to enhance brand awareness and influence.

If you need the complete "2021 Douyin E-commerce Merchant Management Methodology White Paper", please leave a comment and I will share the network disk address.

4. Alimama: Deeplink Management Methodology System

It may seem a bit incongruous to insert Alimama among several media platforms, but after all, many of the methodologies of each platform are aimed at e-commerce merchants, and what brands need is business, growth, and profit. It doesn’t matter whether the platform is traffic-oriented, content-oriented or transaction-oriented.
On September 2, 2021, at the Alibaba M Summit, the DEEPLINK method system for deep chain management was officially released.

Alibaba’s AIPL model should be familiar to everyone, and Deeplink operates:

The 4-layer AIPL population is further refined into 7-layer DEEP-INK population. Through discovery, seeding, interaction, action, first purchase, repeat purchase, and favorite, refined consumer assets are formed, mapped with AIPL, and upgraded to define "global" indicators. This will enable brands to more carefully analyze the behavioral performance of the global consumer population at each stage, thereby formulating marketing strategies in a targeted manner and realizing refined brand marketing and operational activities.

Deepchain management DEEPLINK is also applied to Dharmadisk and constitutes the underlying logic of Wanxiangtai, that is, crowd asset operation, which sets the system logic to help products find the target population.

I have to say that Alibaba's data system is still strong. The indicator system of the seven-level population is divided into data fields of basic dimension, operational dimension, and mental dimension:

It would be great to have full-link data! If there is full-link data, the last content of my article half a year ago (the idea and application of building an AIPL model based on Zhihu content) combined with the ideal of a data closed loop can be realized. So next are the three heroes of the community.

5. Bilibili: 4i Interest Marketing Model

In 2020, Bilibili AD TALK released the "3i Interest Marketing Model" based on UP Master marketing. On December 10, 2021, AD TALK was upgraded to the "4i Interest Marketing Model", a marketing methodology based on the Bilibili ecosystem.
The 4i interest marketing model is divided into four stages: insight, immersion, impress, and icon.

The 4i interest marketing model starts with insights into the community. Through the allocation of marketing resources, it utilizes four integrated communication paths: circle marketing, node marketing, event marketing, and grass-seeding marketing. Ultimately, it demonstrates three levels of compound interest around content, including time compound interest, community compound interest, and IP compound interest. ——<Zhang Zhendong, Vice President of Bilibili

Insight means that brands can gain all-round insights into target users based on Bilibili’s big data. In addition to normal resources, brand owners use B station's official "Fireworks" and "Takeoff" and other tools to promote traffic, and enhance the communication effect based on the interaction between users and brand owners in the community. Bilibili divides resources into fixed node content resources and circle content resources. The fixed nodes in the fixed node content resources are divided into public calendars and B station’s self-made Z-generation calendar. Circle content resources refer to the fact that Bilibili has 7,000 core cultural circles. These vertical content can help brands penetrate a certain circle of people.

Communication includes circle marketing, node marketing, event marketing, and grass-planting marketing. Circle marketing refers to penetrating circle people through vertical content, cutting into the most benchmark high-sensitive people, and then harvesting general users; node marketing means that brands can choose key moments of Bilibili to match their own marketing nodes to achieve marketing resonance; event marketing means that when a brand wants to plan an event, Bilibili can help the brand plan events that amplify resonance based on the underlying preferences of users; grass-planting marketing means high-quality content helps brands complete grass-planting, which can bring brand effects to the brand while paying attention to the results.

Compound interest includes time compound interest, community compound interest, and IP compound interest. The long-tail effect is the compound interest of time; the continuous fission of brand content in the community through secondary creation is the compound interest of the community; the increase in related search volume after brand launch is the compound interest of IP. Compared with other platforms, Bilibili's methodology seems more self-centered. The Z-generation community atmosphere of Bilibili requires brands to learn young people’s ways of expression and circle culture if they want to enter this platform.

6. Xiaohongshu: IDEA Marketing Methodology

This is the latest one. On December 22, 2021, the 2022 Xiaohongshu Business Ecosystem Conference was held in Shanghai, and the IDEA marketing methodology was proposed at the meeting.
That is, through Insight into needs, Define product definition, Expand to seize the track, Advocate to support the brand, four steps to help brands build a good product market strategy and help brands accelerate growth.

Among them, Insight focuses on helping brands understand the needs of target audiences through community data tools; thereby Define products that are more suitable for the market, find differentiated tracks and scene selling points; after the product is launched, expand and seize the track through cooperation with Dandelion experts (KOL, KOC, celebrities) content creation + traffic exposure tools (French fries, information flow ads, DMP crowd packages) + search interception track positioning (search brand words, category words, easter eggs, product specials); finally, combine IP resource marketing to enhance brand awareness and attract more users to advocate for the brand.

What’s interesting about IDEA is that compared to the marketing strategies of other platforms, IDEA is a more complete market strategy, which strengthens the pre-large-scale launch of I and D, and helps brands better guide production and operations.
Related reading: The 2022 business battlefield outlook of the "Three Community Heroes" of Zhihu, Bilibili, and Xiaohongshu, with a mind map of practical business conferences

7. Zhihu

It’s a pity that I didn’t find the official Zhihu marketing methodology summarized in letters. To be precise, I should be ashamed, after all, I am also a business operator...

This omission is caused by two reasons: first, the above-mentioned methodologies were released at the business conferences of various platforms this year, and Zhihu’s business conference was held much earlier than the other two of the three community giants. At that time, it was not realized that everyone would use this way of expression. So I mostly use Chinese sentences (which is very Zhihu).

For example, the marketing value concept of the question-and-answer community is "one question, one street; one answer, one store." For example, the long-term operational philosophy of "managing Zhihu content like operating a Tmall store."

So at the end of the year, when everyone was upgrading their marketing theories and even platform values, Zhihu played its last card of 2021 on December 17 - proposing the marketing concept of "planting grass elsewhere, planting trees on Zhihu".

Among the interpretations of various media, Yibang’s article “Planting Grass Everywhere, Planting Trees in One Place” explains it more clearly, and can be simply summarized as follows: the influence of multi-platform content references on consumer decisions; content that brings a sense of gain brings “reliable consumer answers on Zhihu”; and the long-term marketing strategy requires “planting trees”.

Unfortunately, it is mainly at the conceptual level, and has not yet been implemented into specific product solutions and marketing methodologies. Before this, the methodology for Zhihu's commercial content operations was still the "five-step method" I mentioned before:

1. Combining the platform to select good products and bringing good content to good products is the real content marketing;
2. Choose the right topic based on the purpose. The topic determines the attributes and size of the audience. Brand, category, and general traffic questions are suitable for different marketing demands.
3. Good content is the core. The production of good content can come from brands, service providers, and UGC (KOL, KOC). In addition to professional popular science, the creation direction can also be real experience, experience sharing, etc.
4. You need to treat content as a store and have a long-term perspective. In the early stages, you need to focus on content interaction data and extend the ROI observation period.
5. Content is not a landing page, but a medium for interaction with users in the community. We should actively pay attention to and respond to user interaction and word of mouth.

Interpretation of the five-step method: "Good content is good business" 2021 Zhihu Business Conference Business Content Solution Sharing

Execution Methodology Reference: Important Upgrade | Commercial Content Creation Practical Manual

The original intention of the five-step method is to reduce the brand's fear of Zhihu content marketing, so as not to be discouraged by the threshold of creating high-quality long-text and graphic content, so a linear expression method of five steps is adopted. It also includes product selection, account matrix (store opening stage), targeting (site selection stage), delivery (customer attraction stage), indicators (selling stage), etc., which are similar to several other methodologies in essence and are more practical.

But there are also flaws. For example, there are relatively few integrations of product tools. Although there are toast for topic selection, cheese for opening stores, and Zhi+ for launch, other tools and gameplay, especially brand gameplay, have not been integrated. In addition, in view of the fact that there were mostly new consumer merchants at that time, the guidance of brand-owned content was strengthened, and not much was said about the gameplay combined with PU (Zhihu's name for KOL). This is somewhat different from the "tree planting" concept that was upgraded at the end of the year and needs to be upgraded.

Therefore, combining the above marketing methodologies, most of which involve common links such as content marketing value, market insights and data tools, accounts (or content matrices), creators (distribution or endorsement), brand self-operation and sedimentation positions, IP and event marketing, combined with Zhihu's long-term marketing concept of planting trees, the unique content structure characteristics of the question-and-answer community, the advantages of sense of gain content, the role of KOL professional endorsement, flexible multi-scenario delivery tools, etc., should be able to extract a more advanced and comprehensive marketing methodology.
This will be one of my focus points in January, and I will share it later.

Author: Yuan Chao

Source: Internet Marketing Yuan Chao