Why does everyone want to become an internet celebrity brand?

2018-2019 is the first year for emerging consumer brands: the dividends from Douyin, Kuaishou, and Xiaohongshu have made a group of internet celebrity brands popular.

In addition to "Perfect Diary" and "HFP" in the beauty industry, "Sanban" in the toothpaste industry, and "Santonban" in the coffee industry, even "Zhong Xue Gao", "Zhongjie" and "Aoxue Double Yolk Egg" have appeared in the ice cream industry.

Internet celebrity brands are lucky. They are lucky in that they can become household names overnight, dominate the major social networks, and have sales of tens of millions overnight. Investors are flocking to them to invest in them.

But internet celebrity brands are also unfortunate.

At a time when everyone is chasing traffic and hot products, and trying their best to become famous, what we fail to see is that the internet celebrity effect may also bring about a huge backlash.

Be cautious when creating an internet celebrity brand.

1. Everyone wants to be an influencer brand

Why does everyone want to be an internet celebrity brand? Because the brand marketing path of consumer goods has undergone tremendous changes in recent years.

In the era of traditional fast-moving consumer goods, the media are traditional media such as television and outdoor, and conversion is achieved after at least three exposures. In the past, advertisements were just advertisements. Since the rise of social media 1.0 (Weibo + WeChat), not only central media can speak out, but everyone can speak out.

As a result, consumers’ “opinions” have an unprecedented influence on consumer brands - advertising needs to learn how to create events and hits in order to be discussed.

From then on, it was not enough to just do advertising, you also had to become an internet celebrity who could be "discussed by others."

The content e-commerce of Xiaohongshu, Douyin and Kuaishou is fueling the fire again. With the launch of the era of grass-planting, content recommendation has become the main logic.

If you can create content that grabs the attention of the general public, you can quickly get high traffic, strong exposure, and high conversions.

Therefore, "becoming an Internet celebrity brand" has become the direction that most consumer brands aspire to.

From my observation, there are three ways for Internet celebrity brands to become famous:

The first type: those who are born with the genes to become internet celebrities and are ready to become internet celebrities from birth.

The HFP, Perfect Diary, San Gu, Half Acre Flower Field... that we are familiar with all follow this path.

HFP (Home Facial Pro) targeted the ingredient-oriented beauty category and followed the social media marketing strategy of The Ordinary from the United States. From 2016 to 2017, it used a unified template on its official accounts and launched intensive campaigns, turning itself into an Internet celebrity.

▲ Source: CK Business Logic Research Institute

Half Acre Flower Field, which has been very popular recently, uses before-and-after pictures of the matte effect on Xiaohongshu, which can achieve 2,000-10,000 likes for a single post on Xiaohongshu.

These emerging brands enter niche categories, create a hit product or differentiation point, and then use massive social media campaigns to create a mental image of the hit product.

The second type: the old brands that "let me live another 500 years" are experiencing a second spring

Many old domestic brands have died in the historical trend. Their images are often outdated and they are unable to enter new channels. For example, Friendship Vanishing Cream and Hero Pen are either dead or half-dead in the competition with new brands.

Therefore, in order to keep up with the trend and squeeze into the road of Internet celebrity brands, there is a group of old brands who can still live like they are 20 years old at the age of 60.

Cross-border is their most commonly used "blood transfusion" routine: Liushen and RIO jointly released "Floral Water Cocktail", as well as Luzhou Laojiao perfume, White Rabbit Toffees lipstick, Fortune Cleansing Oil... "Being able to maintain the classics and become an Internet celebrity" has become the marketing motto of old-era brands.

The two most famous brands that have made a comeback in the beauty industry are Pechoin and Olay. Pechoin, as a brand that is more than 80 years old, has redesigned itself, organized events, and created long graphics. Olay, on the other hand, has returned to the attention of young people thanks to its hit product, a small light bulb.

The third type: those who became popular for no apparent reason

There are also some brands that are so popular that they themselves are confused.

This summer, one of the most inexplicably popular ice creams on the internet is the "Aoxue Double Yolk Egg".

This brand actually has a 23-year history in Northeast China. It has been producing classic ice creams such as "Crystal Grape" and "Taro Grape". They have been sold quietly in supermarkets all year round. The brand is not well-known. I only got to know Aoxue after the "Double Yolk Egg" became popular.

The reason why the double yolk ice cream became a hit was that it was noticed by Lawson and entered Lawson convenience stores across the country.

We previously said in “What kind of opportunities can create new consumer brands”:

"The channels are actually also facing the pressure of differentiation. Their buyers will often look for new categories and differentiated products, especially new brands that conform to the current social network appearance economy, to enter their own channels and differentiate themselves from other supermarkets."

Presumably for this reason, Lawson took a fancy to Aoxue's newly developed "Double Yolk Egg", and this ice cream brand from Northeast China entered Shanghai.

Heytea also cultivated the Guangdong market for many years and finally opened up new horizons in Shanghai. After entering Shanghai, Aoxue double yolk eggs were discovered by Shanghai consumers for their unique shape and dual flavors. They were posted on social networking channels such as Douyin and became an instant hit.

No matter which of the above internet celebrity brands, they all enjoyed the pleasure of becoming famous overnight: sales soared overnight, customer acquisition costs decreased, the brand name became popular, and people who wanted to cooperate with them flocked to them...

However, after staying in the limelight for too long, while internet celebrity brands reap the benefits of traffic, they are also inevitably hit by backlash from public opinion.

2. Backlash from Internet celebrity brands

I have always felt that building a brand and being a person actually have many similarities.

Ordinary people always imagine how glamorous their lives will be after they become famous. Similarly, people who build brands often fantasize that if their brand goes viral one day, their sales will skyrocket. However, becoming an internet celebrity does not mean that you gain trust, but that you suddenly step into the spotlight and everything you do will be infinitely magnified.

The birth of Internet celebrities originated from new media, but new media itself is still a medium that has not been fully standardized and has a short existence. Apart from traffic, it cannot bring more endorsements to brands.

Becoming an internet celebrity brand is like becoming a traffic star overnight. It brings traffic, but not brand.

Traffic is traffic, brand is brand. Brand means trust and recognition, while traffic is just attention.

Influencer brands don’t gain any trust, they just gain more attention.

Water can carry a boat, but it can also capsize it - it is media traffic that has made Internet celebrity brands popular, but media opinion can also destroy the entire brand.

The downside of becoming an internet celebrity is that you will be branded with several inherent stigmas and labels of an internet celebrity: the public stereotype is that internet celebrity brands do not have years of experience and only rely on flashy appearances to attract attention, and are very likely to be "three-no products."

Such stereotypes are not going away quickly, and no one will carefully examine whether your brand really has a license.

At this time, the worst off are those "Internet celebrity brands that are not prepared to become Internet celebrities." For example: Speaking of Aoxue mentioned earlier. A few days ago, I bought Aoxue’s double yolk ice cream for my team to eat together, and posted a message on WeChat Moments.

Under my circle of friends, I received a lot of friendly suggestions such as "I heard that double yolk ice cream has problems, so it is recommended to eat less."

This news appeared on the hot search not long ago, and I still have some impression of it, so I searched it again and saw a bunch of "Internet celebrity double yolk ice cream failed random inspection". It turned out that this news has been fermenting for more than a month, which scared me.

Later, I read the report carefully and found out the whole story:

The low-temperature storage conditions for ice cream are very strict. If some small shops do not strictly control it, the ice cream will deteriorate. Aoxue happened to have a distributor in Wenzhou, which was not careful with storage and was found to have problems during random inspections.

The issue of safe transportation and storage of ice cream is itself a pain point in the industry. After the incident, Aoxue has also taken corresponding actions, such as: regular spot checks on retailers, and reviewing the cold chain qualifications of distributors.

If I hadn’t checked carefully, I’ve heard several friends give me this advice, and I’m not familiar with this brand, and I would have been worried next time I ate it anyway.

Because of this incident, I began to think about brand public relations again:

Many brands have experienced similar "PR incidents", but Aoxue suffered particularly miserably because of this mistake - the screen was full of reports and protests, and the Internet celebrity ice cream was instantly blacklisted. Why?

I think a big part of it is because it’s an influencer brand.

I divide brands into four quadrants based on brand power/traffic:

1. Low-brand, low-traffic, start-up brands require a cold start, such as some new brands you have never heard of.
2. Brands with high brand value and low traffic are often aging brands that need to find new consumer traffic. For example, Dabao.
3. High traffic and low brand, internet celebrity brand, high income and high risk. For example, Osho.
4. High traffic and high brand are strong brands with strong trust and can continue to grow. For example, Haidilao.

Internet celebrity brands like Aoxue have high sales and high risks. The risk lies in the fact that the public does not trust Internet celebrities and has long had a mentality of "Look, there really is a problem!"

Internet celebrities have traffic, and the media will also want to take advantage of the traffic and cater to the expectations of the public. They are increasingly inclined to report from the angle of "Internet celebrity products are exposed to have quality problems" rather than spreading the information in full.

The book "The Crowd" mentions: "The group is always in a state of low rational thinking. The arguments they use and the arguments that can influence them are very low-level, and they can only be regarded as rational thinking by analogy."

Consumers can easily fall in love with a product because of Amway, and can also easily dislike a brand because of public opinion.

This is the disaster of traffic > brand .

3. Be cautious when becoming an influencer brand

Internet celebrity brands are indeed more prone to problems because they have a common problem, which is imperfect brand building and lack of brand power.

What is the essence of "Internet celebrity brand"? It's like a kid who became famous at a young age. He received the spotlight and applause even though his mind was not yet fully mature.

People standing under the spotlight are destined to bear greater responsibilities. The public is less trusting of children, so when they make mistakes, they are more likely to be condemned, as if to express "I told you he was unreliable."

If a brand is compared to a person, then a brand with brand power is like an old friend I have been in contact with for more than ten years. I trust him very much and can entrust my tasks to him with confidence. If he makes a mistake occasionally, I can understand.

The essence of brand power is trust - you can buy it with your eyes closed and pick any product from the shelf and you won’t go wrong.

This is the most practical dilemma faced by internet celebrity brands. What they lack the most is popularity, but trust.

Therefore, brands should try their best to move from the fourth quadrant internet celebrity brands to strong brands.

How can we build brand power? They may start building their brand from the following aspects:

Do a good job in channel management and quality control: Whether it is a supermarket or a small shop, being able to ensure product quality from the time it leaves the factory to the time it reaches the consumer is the foundation of the brand. Only by achieving this level can consumers be able to buy with confidence no matter where they buy.

Maintain product innovation capabilities : Hot-selling products can make people notice you, and only by continuously producing hot-selling products can people remember you.

Heytea has done a great job in this regard. In the spring and summer of 2018, the "brown sugar pearl milk" category became popular (represented by Luckin Coffee), and it was almost overshadowing Heytea. Heytea was able to immediately follow up and launch "Bobo Tea", while also developing multiple product lines such as ice cream, soft European bread, and alcoholic beverages. The founder of Heytea once said that they developed dozens of products throughout 2017, but only 10 were finally launched on the market.

Brand power upgrade : Brand power not only relies on natural growth, nor just on marketing methods, but also on leverage.

When we stay in a hotel, if the toiletries are high-end, such as L'Occitane, we will feel that the hotel is very tasteful, and L'Occitane has also made its presence felt.

I saw that Aoxue is supplying 3D ice cream to hotpot restaurants such as Haidilao and Coucou, which also helps to enhance the endorsement on the B-end.

Be prepared for public relations: Mature brands can do a good job of quality control and have emergency plans. After a crisis occurs, a timely and transparent response is the only best strategy.

If you make a mistake, you must admit it; if you are beaten, you must stand at attention. Haidilao’s textbook response is worth studying.

Becoming an Internet celebrity is only the first step for a brand, just like stepping onto the stage and having a spotlight. Whether or not one can perform well depends on subsequent hard work and management.

If it is destined to become the king in the end, then the unfortunate fate of the internet celebrity brand is the best training for the young man.

Let’s reflect on what we said at the beginning: “Traffic Anxiety” and “How to Make a Hot Sale”

...In this first year of consumer product entrepreneurship, is it true that all we lack in building a brand is just traffic? What we lack is trust.

Traffic can be bought, it’s just a matter of price, but brand power is very difficult to build. It cannot be bought with money, but relies on the accumulation of time and strength.

Author: Daojie Doris

Source: Daojie Doris