Product Operation: How to achieve user growth of tens of millions?

Ever since the concept of user growth became popular, many people have been interpreting how to achieve growth from various angles. However, those who are actually engaged in growth work know that the so-called growth is to follow user thinking, use data analysis, optimize and iterate growth methods. This method may be an operational means or it may be the product itself.

As a mature methodology, there is no need to talk about user growth itself. It just needs to be combined with actual implementation. However, the author finds that those who believe in growth tend to overlook one aspect, that is, the role of operations.

The author dare not claim to be very proficient in growth, after all, there are always people better than you. But when I was engaged in operations, I had a clear feeling that the role of operations in growth is indeed very important, and in the process of operations, growth thinking must also be used.

From this point of view, operations and growth are not in conflict, but rather can be closely connected. Growth is a kind of thinking, and operations are the way to implement growth thinking.

So, what can we do from an operational perspective to promote user growth? The most core method is to apply operational thinking. I will briefly talk about it based on my own experience.

What is operational thinking?

Before talking about how operational thinking can guide growth, it is necessary to sort out what operational thinking is.

The so-called operational thinking is to build an effective path between existing products and set goals. This path will involve many details. We need to optimize, iterate or even redesign according to the situations that arise during the execution process to ensure that the goals are achieved.

In fact, the definitional interpretation is very obscure and difficult to understand. I really like an answer on Zhihu, which may help you understand it better.

If a team wants to make money, the team manager will recruit people, form a team, control costs, and sell tickets, that is, build the "product" of the team, which is equivalent to the role of a product manager. So in order to make the "product" look more in line with market and user needs (someone is willing to watch the team play), it is necessary to optimize the "product" structure (star players, team names, salary caps, etc.) based on actual conditions.

In addition, it is very important to play the ball well. The head coach plays the role of making the team play well, which is equivalent to the role of operation. He is responsible for the team's training, tactics, lineup and all other details. The direct goal is to win again and again. The ultimate goal is to win the championship (product monetization), so it is necessary to pay attention to every game and the entire schedule.

From the above description, we can understand that both product and operation have the same goal (winning and making money), but the means of achieving it are different and the ideas reflected are also different. The difference is: product managers focus on the overall input-output and demand management, while operations pay more attention to the details of promoting products and seek to maximize profits in the process by optimizing existing resources.

Four Aspects of Operational Thinking

Now that we know what operational thinking is, let’s talk specifically about what operational thinking includes.

1. Global thinking

When doing operations, you must have a holistic mindset. Specifically, from contacting users to converting users to retaining users, you must focus on influencing the user's mind throughout the entire process, formulate full-process, interlocking actions, and ensure maximum operational results.

For example, the most commonly used customer acquisition method - group fission. Most operators will think that this process is very simple, users join the group -> forward the poster -> complete the review -> conversion within the group, but in fact, the operation operator needs to think about the whole process from a bird's eye view, and it will also involve issues such as how upstream and downstream cooperate in channel promotion, product conversion, etc.

2. Fine thinking

One of the specific reasons why operations are called "miscellaneous work" is that there are a lot of detailed work involved. This is actually a reflection of meticulous thinking, because the conversion rate of new customers brought about by extensive operations is often very low. Especially for operations-driven businesses, it is necessary to achieve channel refinement, process refinement and user refinement.

Take community operation for example. This is a job that requires polishing a lot of details to excel. In order to ensure that the community achieves a high conversion rate, it may be necessary to guide different users to different groups. Different groups must also provide different products or rights, and even each group must design different gameplay and activation methods, etc.

3. Leverage Thinking

Global thinking ensures the stable operation of operational processes, meticulous thinking maximizes operational results, and leverage thinking optimizes key details to achieve immediate results in operational projects. The most typical application of leverage thinking is the optimization of fission posters. The author once optimized the main title of a poster, repeatedly thinking about the scenarios and pain points, and ultimately helped the event achieve more than three times the traffic growth.

4. User thinking

The implementation of the above three types of thinking will be considered from the user's perspective, and this is the most basic part of operational thinking, namely user thinking. As the name suggests, user thinking is to think about the operation process, details, actions, copywriting, etc. from the user's perspective, to ensure that everything the user sees and experiences is in line with psychological expectations as much as possible, so as to achieve the operational effect we want.

Let’s take group fission as an example: Why do users forward? How to get benefits more easily after forwarding? How can the audit method make users feel better? How to listen to the class specifically? All of the above must be done from the user's perspective, and try to ensure that the overall process is smooth, otherwise the fission effect will be difficult to achieve.

How to achieve growth with the help of operational thinking?

We have explained what operational thinking is before. So how can we use operational thinking to achieve user growth? In fact, operational growth is mainly reflected in user acquisition, monetization, retention, and bringing in new customers. As an online education practitioner, there are many opportunities to use operational thinking, and two of the most common things are: attracting new customers and conversions.

1. Attract new customers

An important aspect of using operational thinking to drive growth is to be good at using rules and tools flexibly and iteratively to attract new customers.

A typical application of using rules to improve the effect of attracting new users is to study the Tik Tok algorithm to increase video playback volume and thus achieve fan growth. For example, the Douyin operation of Fan Deng Reading Club is a typical example of growth driven by operational thinking. It established a Douyin matrix through differentiated operation of "disguised accounts", used different accounts to output content in different fields, successfully understood the algorithm rules, and accumulated more than 100 million fans.

Let’s talk about the impact of tools on attracting new users. The most typical example is community fission. The operation tool wetool was banned, which made countless operators wail at the time. This was because community tools such as wetool greatly improved the efficiency of community operation, especially the efficiency of attracting new members to the community. Based on its functions, many fission gameplays were extended, such as group fission and group assistance. Each gameplay can be extended to a complete operation model. This is the role of operational thinking.

2. Conversion

Many people understand conversion as sales and marketing. In fact, conversion is a concept that can be easily interpreted by many parties, but the more unified understanding is "using certain methods to accelerate the sales of products." This is obviously inseparable from operational thinking.

For operations, product transformation is a very long and systematic process, and global and detailed thinking are essential. Take the most typical community conversion scenario as an example. From the time a user is pulled into a group to the time the conversion is completed within the group, step-by-step operational design is required, including what kind of hook is needed for each node, what kind of copywriting is needed for what kind of atmosphere, and so on.

For example, the conversion rate of Changtou Academy's training camp was an industry benchmark for a period of time. The conversion began from the moment the user entered their group and started learning, and the refined operation was in place. For example: designing morning reading, evening sharing, course snacks, student sharing and other links to keep them active; assigning operators with different personalities to contact different types of users in the group to achieve accurate conversion; providing stories, games, etc. in various ways every day to attract users' attention and stimulate their desire to participate.

In short, as the most frequently encountered links, operators can achieve significant user growth by effectively using operational thinking, which is an excellent weapon to demonstrate their own business contribution.

Summarize

Operation is a way to achieve growth. Specifically, it is to apply operational thinking to achieve growth in user scale and product revenue. Based on this, three viewpoints on operational thinking are sorted out.

First, operational thinking is a guiding method to improve operational results in work such as promoting products and retaining users. It focuses on details and micro aspects, but also takes the overall situation into consideration and attaches importance to the user cycle.

Second, operational thinking includes four aspects: global thinking, detailed thinking, leverage thinking, and user thinking. Each aspect will have a very significant impact on operational work.

Third, the links that can achieve significant user growth with the help of operational thinking are attracting new users and conversion. Attracting new users can be improved by applying tools and rules, while conversion requires attention to a lot of detailed designs to influence user decisions.

The above is my understanding about operations and growth. It is just a starting point for discussion and I hope it will trigger more people’s thinking.

Author: Wild Solitary Mushroom

Source: Wild Sophora japonica