Deconstructing the growth operation strategy of Pinduoduo Mini Program!

In this article, the author will start with Pinduoduo’s five WeChat mini-programs, dismantle Pinduoduo’s growth operation strategy, and analyze Pinduoduo’s ambitions and capabilities beyond the Fifth Ring Road.

Since its very beginning in e-commerce user growth and operations, Pinduoduo has been a role model in the industry.

It started with the group-buying model, attracted by the WeChat ecosystem, and developed rapidly in 3 years before being listed in the United States. Its market value has now exceeded 80 billion US dollars, kicking Baidu and punching JD.com. The products and operations maintain amazing vitality and creativity: bargaining helps people get cash and spread it around their friends circle, orchard cultivation games have become the industry standard, and the 10 billion yuan subsidy has led Taobao, JD.com and Suning to learn from and copy it.

No idea for an activity? Using Pinduoduo has gradually become a routine operation for Internet product/operators.

However, Pinduoduo still has not gotten rid of the label of "outside the Fifth Ring Road". In the first quarter financial report of 2020, Pinduoduo's users have reached 630 million. The sinking market remains stable, and the "inside the Fifth Ring Road" has gradually broken through. In order to further grow, increase GMV and average order value, and fight against the two giants of Alibaba and JD.com, "users within the Fifth Ring Road" have also become Pinduoduo's further imagination space and direction of efforts.

I dare not talk about macro operations rashly, so this article will start with Pinduoduo’s five WeChat mini-programs, break down and learn about Pinduoduo’s growth operations, and also see Pinduoduo’s ambitions and capabilities beyond the Fifth Ring Road. The disassembly process is quite detailed, and there are also thoughts and summaries. Welcome to criticize~

Pinduoduo Enterprise In-App Purchase

Strictly speaking, Pinduoduo's in-app purchasing function is not an independent WeChat mini program. It is only an exclusive function opened by Pinduoduo to corporate users.

Currently, there is no open application entrance in the Pinduoduo app or mini program. Certified corporate users are required to share and invite new users. New users must be authenticated through corporate email to obtain in-app purchase rights. Currently supports enterprise user authentication for 300+ companies.

Successfully certified enterprise users can enjoy enterprise in-app purchase prices and unlock perks. After successful authentication, you can view the activities on the 10 billion subsidies page of the Pinduoduo APP and mini program, including information such as authentication identity, subsidy rights, in-app purchase price, and 1 yuan group purchase.

The 10 billion yuan subsidy is itself quite favorable, and combined with the company's in-house purchase price and exclusive allowances, the multiple price advantages are very attractive to users. In addition, identity authentication creates a sense of scarcity of rights and interests, and has certain sunk costs, which can better retain users and reduce churn.

The shopping allowance enjoyed by enterprise certified users is the discount coupons. The first coupon of 6 yuan off for purchases over 50 yuan is issued directly every week and is valid for that week. The remaining coupons of multiple levels need to be redeemed with popularity points. The popularity value can be understood as a kind of points. To obtain points, you need to participate in daily check-ins and invite user tasks, thus forming fission propagation. Moreover, the popularity value will be cleared at 23:59 on the last day of each week and will need to be accumulated again the next week. This will help ensure a stable invitation cycle for users to form behavioral habits and can also reduce "wool-pulling" behavior to a certain extent.

In addition to gaining popularity by sharing and attracting new users, the 1 yuan group is also a way to attract new users.

The popularity value invitation task focuses on inviting colleagues/friends, that is, the corporate user group, while the 1 yuan group package is said to be a welfare purchase for relatives and friends. Certified users first initiate a group purchase for free, and then invite 3 users to shop. However, after initiating a group purchase, Pinduoduo will give a free support quota, so you only need to invite two more relatives to shop. The invited relatives will enjoy the friends and family price, and corporate users who initiate a 1 yuan group can get the product for 1 yuan.

Enterprise users, their colleagues/friends, and their relatives are closely linked and are all relatively high-value users “within the five rings”. This growth idea and strategy is truly excellent.

There are only so many contents and ways to play in-app purchases, and currently it is still a project in which Pinduoduo has invested the most in operations . In addition to a wide range of products, discounts and gameplay support, it is also equipped with WeChat customer service to provide notifications of event information and answer daily questions, increasing the ways to reach users.

Moreover, the customer service uses WeChat for Business. Now that third-party WeChat user/community operation tools such as WeTool have been banned, the operation and management functions of WeChat for Business will be gradually explored, utilized, enriched and optimized. WeChat for Business will further erode the corporate office communication tool market that DingTalk has worked hard to build.

Pinduoduo In-App Purchase

Just after talking about Pinduoduo's corporate internal purchasing, another "Pinduoduo internal purchasing" appeared. The difference between the two is quite obvious. The Pinduoduo internal purchasing mini program is for internal purchasing items shared by Pinduoduo employees.

However, it is highly likely that they are just in a packaging form and not real Pinduoduo employees.

In Pinduoduo's in-app purchase app, you need to sign in and invite friends to get in-app purchase coupons. You can enjoy discounts by using a certain number of in-app purchase coupons when shopping. The process is relatively simple, similar to Pinduoduo's corporate in-app purchase method of using popularity points to exchange for allowances.

The fun of Pinduoduo's in-app purchasing mini program lies in: it strives to package real Pinduoduo employees, with real avatars, real names, real departments, real work numbers, real sharing paths, and real consulting employees. Although the word "real" needs to be put in quotation marks, it still gives users a relatively realistic experience. In-app purchases do enjoy additional discounts, which increases user trust and makes them less concerned when placing orders.

Pinduoduo Brand Black Card

Pinduoduo Brand Black Card Mini Program is based on branded products and uses the black card concept to offer discounts and achieve fission.

When you enter the mini program for the first time, you will be guided to sign in to receive the Black Card Gold. Click to sign in to receive it. The card is only valid for 2 hours and can only be received once a day. The time limit is emphasized to highlight its value. In addition, you can invite friends to sign in and receive black card gold, and you can get up to 20 yuan for fission propagation.

Black card gold can be used as cash when placing an order, but the amount of black card gold that can be used for each product is different. Generally, low-priced products can only use a smaller amount of black card gold.

The recommended products are currently all well-known brands, and the target users are also relatively clear.

The black card originated from the concept of banking and finance. It was originally an unlimited credit card exclusively for distinguished customers. It is now being used more in some operational activities. The various black cards and knight cards that were once popular on Douyin and Alipay all use this concept to shape the high value of the product, enhance trust endorsement, and make users willing to pay.

Duoduobiyouplus

The Duoduobiyuplus mini program is a little different. It seems to be positioned as a grass-planting community, but it is too straightforward and crude, and the content introduction is still a direct product description.

On the homepage, it says “2,683,260 stylish people want to buy”, which shows that the target users are not low-end users. Currently, the number of people who want to buy each product is in the hundreds or even dozens, and the overall number of users is still relatively small.

In addition, the Duoduobiyu mini program is also very unlike Pinduoduo's style in terms of fission. It only supports adding products to lists and direct purchases. The only function involving sharing and dissemination is product selection. Users can share the items in the list with friends for voting, allowing other users to choose the items they like more. Stay tuned, there will probably be new adjustments later.

Lynn Fans Benefits

Lynn Fans Benefits is also a mini program that focuses on discounts, with the main features of "employee screening, price monitoring, lowest price within 15 days, and 100% authentic products", and users like to "take advantage of the discounts". This mini program directly talks about selected wool products and wool coupons. Inviting users can obtain different levels of coupons, which can be used based on the wool price, with multiple discounts.

Lynn has a variety of operating methods. In addition to inviting friends to obtain coupons, it also actively guides users to add WeChat, join communities, and has community-exclusive lottery activities, which is also fission communication. The small function of price curve also allows users to see the price change curve of goods, highlighting the current low price, which can be said to be full of tricks.

Summarize

The above are the 5 Pinduoduo mini programs that have been disassembled. Although some of them currently have less product and operation investment and the results may not be amazing, there are still many areas worth thinking about and learning from.

1. Vertical product design and refined user operations

The five Pinduoduo mini programs analyzed are designed and operated for different user groups. Users such as corporate white-collar users, high-value brand users, and content-preferring users are exactly the user groups that Pinduoduo, the leader in the sinking market, lacks.

Through targeted product design, commodity selection, and event operations, we can relatively independently attract new customers and convert them, and ultimately direct them to Pinduoduo, thereby gradually enriching the user level and enhancing user value. This also explains the title: the area within the Fifth Ring Road is not a forbidden area for Pinduoduo.

2. Create specific concepts to enhance user trust

Pinduoduo's products and operations have always been excellent in analyzing and applying user psychology.

Corporate identity authentication, employee screening of in-app purchases, recommended product selection officers, and people with style, all enhance the authenticity of activities through the creation of personalities, increase users' trust in activities and products, and lower the threshold for decision-making.

Black card gold, wool coupons, and in-app purchase coupons are also very creative, hitting the user's psychology and creating a certain sense of scarcity. Moreover, Pinduoduo’s most common operation is to provide partial upfront rewards and additional official support when users are required to make sharing invitations, using the goal approach psychology and sunk costs to encourage users to keep sharing and not give up easily.

3. Strive to keep product process simple and optimize detail design

The invitation and fission process in the mini program is simple and clear, which is different from the complex retention activities in the Pinduoduo APP. Because the user stickiness of the mini program is lower, the new user fission also pays great attention to the conversion loss in each link. A more simplified process can achieve "don't let users think but take direct action."

In addition, the design of product details such as price curves and consulting staff can amplify the effect of the activity. In the Internet age of open information exchange at high speed, achieving user growth by relying on unprecedented creativity is rare. The gap between different competing products is more reflected in the design of processes and the optimization of details. The multiplication effect can amplify the positive effects of every detail. Conversely, bad details can ruin a product or activity.

4. Fission, new user acquisition, self-propagation, multiple user operation touchpoints

The fission sharing in Pinduoduo products is always everywhere, and this feature is also reflected in the mini program. Multiple sharing points are reasonably distributed in the user behavior path, forming user self-propagation, and growth is thus formed.

A fission and new customer acquisition activity with an investment of 10 points is not as good as five sharing tasks with an investment of 2 points. Sharing that comes naturally is often more efficient.

In addition, many of Pinduoduo's mini-programs will actively guide users to add customer service numbers and join communities. At the very least, a direct customer service entrance will be provided within the mini-program to ensure that users can be reached in a timely manner. If they are inactive in the mini-program, they can be reached in the community. If community messages are blocked, personal accounts can be used to greet them. Only by operating multiple touchpoints can we reduce user loss and maximize user value.

Well, the above is the analysis and thinking about Pinduoduo’s 5 mini programs. These mini programs are only part of Pinduoduo’s mini program matrix. You are welcome to communicate more about how to play and how to think about it.

Author: Wu Yijiu

Source: Wu Yijiu