Marketing promotion review: Behind the screen-sweeping test games of NetEase, Snowball and others!

This article reviews and compares two test games from NetEase and Snowball to explore the tactics behind such operations.

Have you seen "Contagious"? Have you heard of "social currency"?

Jonah Berger summarized the six STEPPS principles that make anything go viral: social currency, triggers, emotions, publicity, use value, and stories. Products or ideas need to contain social currency, be easy to activate, easily arouse emotions, have public and practical value, and be integrated into stories. These six principles will help us promote our products, ideas, and behaviors more widely and create corresponding popular trends as much as possible.

So what is social currency?

When you are on a flight and are lucky enough to be upgraded from economy class to business class by the airline for free, and receive superior and thoughtful service, you feel very lucky and happy at this time, so you are eager and proactive to share all of this with more people. Because it makes you look more high-end, superior and distinguished, which is social currency. Through social currency, you can get more praise and more positive impressions from family, friends and colleagues.

In the Internet world, product design and operational activities are inseparable from social currency. We need to understand the users' inner thoughts, adjust and design the rules of the game, and make users feel that they have entered the world they desire. The design of products and activities must also cater to the users' needs to show off their identity value to their friends, thereby building the image they desire.

So, how to fully plan an operational activity for the purpose of attracting new users and promoting the brand? How are those activities designed to achieve viral and screen-sweeping effects?

This article reviews and compares two similar operational activities (Snowball Investment School Testing Activity vs. NetEase Cloud Music Jung Psychological Testing Activity). I believe you can get the answers you want.

Let’s first take a look at the Snowball Investment School Test Event. This is an investment social app “Snowball” that combines the topic of “Jianghu Schools” with the purpose of attracting new users and promoting the brand. It is an event for old users to answer questions and win prizes.

This is not a screen-sweeping event, and the user group it targets is also very limited, but the event is interesting and it is a low-cost and efficient way to drive traffic to the app. There are many things worth learning and drawing lessons from. So after experiencing the activity repeatedly, I reviewed it.

In order to give everyone a deeper understanding of the background of the event, I will first give a brief introduction to the Snowball app. Friends who are already familiar with the Snowball app can skip the first module and start directly from the event review module.

1. Snowball Background

Friends who are interested in investment and have the need for investment communication can easily become users of Snowball. This Weibo of the investment community is not just a name.

Xueqiu Stock is abbreviated as Xueqiu. The main body of the company is Beijing Xueqiu Information Technology Co., Ltd. (its products include: Xueying Securities, which provides US and Hong Kong stock account opening and trading services; Egg Roll Fund, a fund trading platform; Xueqiu Stock, a stock trading exchange community, known as the Weibo of the investment community). The founder and CEO is Fang Sanwen, the former deputy editor-in-chief of NetEase. He founded Xueqiu in 2010. Now, 8 years have passed, and this snowball is getting bigger and bigger.

As of July 2018, Snowball announced the completion of a US$120 million Series D financing round. Ant Financial is a new strategic investor in this round, which shows that the capital market highly recognizes Snowball.

1. Target Users

Mass investors.

In the early stage, we mainly support high-end users and big Vs, and then use these grown high-end users and big Vs and the high-quality UGC content they create on the platform to attract and retain more new users. This event is also carried out in accordance with this model.

2. Meet the needs

Build an investment + social platform to provide investors with cross-market (Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and the United States) and cross-product (stocks, funds, bonds, etc.) data query, news subscription, and interactive communication services anytime and anywhere.

3. Product Highlights

• An information waterfall similar to Sina Weibo displays personalized subscription information and provides investors with communication, interaction and investment trading services.
• Since the release of v1.0 in January 2012, as of August 2018, 6 and a half years have passed and a total of 130+ versions have been released. On average, one version is released every month, which is very efficient and stable.

• Judging from the download volume obtained from Kuchuan.com, the user growth trend has been maintained since 2015, and the cumulative Android download volume has exceeded 46.8 million to date. User reviews are also very high, with five-star reviews forming an F-shape, with more than 90% of them being five-star and more than 97% being five-star and four-star.

With such a development trend, Snowball is on the verge of becoming a unicorn enterprise in the investment field. Are you interested in interpreting and learning about the "Jianghu Sect" theme event organized by such an Internet + investment community platform?

2. Activity review: Snowball investment school test

As of the end of the event, which was August 26, 2018, a total of 49,228 people had taken the test. As for the number of shares, registered users, and followers, only the official website knows.

This article mainly reviews the process and gameplay of this event. Through detailed analysis and interpretation, we can understand how such an event was carried out, what shortcomings we need to be aware of, how to avoid pitfalls when doing similar activities in the future, and what advantages and highlights are worth learning and reference.

1. Activity entrance: Snowball app homepage banner

The banner on the homepage is the core entrance to this event. This is the first event entrance that investors on the site see. Another possible event entrance is the "Snowball Investment School Test" event link shared through social channels (WeChat, Moments, Weibo, QQ, Snowball Chat, etc.). The most easily spread one is the event mini-program entrance shared to WeChat friends, and the event mini-program QR code shared to Moments.

2. Activity theme: Investment school test

Everyone has seen martial arts dramas, which feature numerous martial arts sects and various unique skills. There are also factions in stock trading. The leader of the "value investment school" is the famous stock god Buffett; the most famous leader of the "growth investment school" is Peter Lynch; and the "technical analysis school" has a long history and keeps pace with the times.

It combines investment and martial arts, has a similar artistic conception and is very interesting. I believe that many people who are interested in investment will click in.

3. Activity form: Question test

Users see the activity description on Snowball and click on the link to jump to the test page (WeChat mini program). After completing 10 multiple-choice questions, the test results are generated immediately and shared to the Snowball community by default. Users can also save pictures and share them on their own, or share the activity mini program to WeChat friends with one click.

4. Activity Description

Time: August 22nd to August 26th, 5 consecutive days, the list of winning users will be announced before 19:00 every day.

rule:

award:

5. Activity Process

(1) The activity process is simple and the cost of participation is low

• The blue part is the first time users see the event on the Xueqiu website and browse the event rules and prize descriptions;
• The orange part is the first time you test (click "Test Now"), you need to obtain WeChat authorization to open the WeChat applet. When you test again (click "Test Again"), you will jump directly without repeated authorization.
• The green part is completed within the WeChat mini program, and is also the core process of this testing activity: "Start the test - complete the questions - display the results."

(2) After testing it many times, I found several interesting points:

①Why should this activity be completed in the WeChat applet instead of in the Snowball app?

From the process, we can see that the Snowball app is only used as an entrance to the event, and there is a "Today's Topic" every day to track the sect testing activities and announce the winners. The test results are synchronized in the Snowball community by default. Many participants can comment and interact under the event topic. The above is all the content of this event carried by the Snowball app.

The core modules of event participation and sharing are all implemented within the WeChat mini program. Why?

I think there are mainly three reasons:

1. The purpose of this activity is to attract new users and promote the brand to old users of the site. WeChat mini programs are easy to participate in and share. Relatively speaking, the cost of user participation is low, which is more conducive to sharing and dissemination.
2. Leveraging the power of user circles is even more true for investment. Just like rich people have many rich friends, users who love investment also have many friends who love investment. In this regard, no one does it better than WeChat.
3. Considering Snowball itself, it mainly provides investment community services. The purpose of this event is to attract new users and it has a certain timeliness. From the perspective of site operation and maintenance costs, it is understandable that they do not want to create a separate event module to carry it.

② “47,258 people have taken the test” is a small strategy that makes you want to try it out quickly.

There is a line of small words on the test start page: "47,258 people have taken the test", but it is this real-time changing and rising number that gives you the urge to click "Start Test". So many people have taken the test, it should be very interesting, so I might as well give it a try.

This is a small product operation strategy, but it invisibly adds a sense of mystery to the event, which is very helpful in alleviating user concerns and increasing event participation.

③Have you noticed the recommendations from big Vs below the test results?

In the early days, Snowball mainly introduced high-end users and supported big Vs to create high-quality content. To date, the quality and quantity of UGC content are very impressive. The icing on the cake of this event is the recommendation from this like-minded investor.

Two big V users will be recommended below the test results. Click on their avatars to save them directly as pictures. The picture content guides new users to download the Snowball app and contains the Snowball app’s QR code. It has no association with the two users just recommended.

I specifically searched for the big V users recommended to me on Snowball, and found that most of them have tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of fans. They are all original columnists of Snowball and have created dozens or hundreds of articles. It can be seen that their influence on the site cannot be underestimated.

6. Activity content: Sect positions

From the event description, we know that this event will last for 5 consecutive days. Every day, one lucky person will be randomly selected from each sect to give the corresponding prize of each sect, totaling 20 prizes.

(1) The winning rate is also set randomly

There are four sects in total: Demon Sect, Wudang, Beggars' Sect, and Shaolin. The prizes correspond to the sects: Xiaomi smart speaker, home juicer, JD.com 100 yuan shopping card, and vegetarian snack package.

It is said that the higher the sect position, the higher the chance of winning. So, I paid special attention to the four winners pushed in the daily topic on the site. Their positions are exactly the same as mine (I have answered questions frantically and got several sect positions), so why am I not the winner.

(2) Test question preparation

There are ten questions in total. The order of each question is fixed, but the order of the four answers ABCD for each question is random. Not only that, the participants' choice of any answer and the corresponding result are also random. This test activity is very random from the questions to the answers to the winnings.

Don’t ask me how I know this, you will know it if you watch it a few more times. All test-related activities are similar, which is to match the answers arbitrarily within a few known results.

(3) Test result preparation

The test results show that there are 4 styles corresponding to the 4 sects. The sect name, 8-character description of the sect, sect character design, and martial arts secrets in each style are all the same. The only changes are the user's profile picture, user nickname (obtained through WeChat authorization) and randomly assigned teaching position. There is also a brief description of the event and a QR code for participating in the mini program at the bottom of the page to facilitate sharing and participation.

In this way, the materials that partners responsible for content preparation and rule matching need to prepare are very limited, the workload is not large, and it can be completed at a low cost.

Out of curiosity, I also specifically checked the corresponding positions of the four major sects. I really want to know which of the four sects is the most powerful, what are the different positions in each sect, and what kind of position will make it easier for me to win the prize?

• Demon Cult: The leader, the left and right messengers of light, the four Dharma kings, the five scattered people...
• Wudang: Forbidden Land Elder, Master, Current Master, Elder, Kung Fu Transmission Elder, Punishment Elder...
• Beggars' Sect: Leader, Deputy Leader, Nine-bag Elder, Kung Fu Elder, Law Enforcement Elder, Leader of the Stick...
• Shaolin Temple: host, abbot, master, chief monk, deacon, arhat...

7. Review summary

Worth learning:

1. Combining investment and sects and using this as the theme for launching an activity will make boring investment more interesting and easier to attract people's attention. There are sects in the world and positions vary in levels. Although the positions in the sects are not transparent enough, each position feels very impressive when viewed alone. The mentality of comparison soars and the willingness to share is strengthened.
2. The setting of the test questions and the contrasting meanings of the four answers ABCD allow new users who are still unfamiliar with investment to complete the questions smoothly, become interested in investment, and thus register as new users.
3. From the activity process, activity content, prize setting, etc., it can be seen that this is a very low-cost user acquisition and brand promotion activity, which mainly uses the social channel WeChat circle as a carrier to share and attract traffic, and then has the recommendation of big Vs on the site to attract attention. The specific conversion data is unknown, but the direction and goal are accurate. Although there are not many participating users, there are still 49,228. The key is that the efficiency of attracting new users in a small range and with high precision is relatively high.

Disadvantages:

(1) For an app with tens of millions of users, only 49,228 people have participated in the activity test so far. It can be seen that the user participation is not very high. This is related to the fact that the prizes are not attractive enough, the number of prizes is too small, and the winning rules are not transparent.

The winning rate has no correlation with the level of the position. There are only 20 vacancies in total, and only 4 vacancies per day. The possibility of human intervention is too high, and everything is opaque. Users will easily think that the platform will tend to choose participants with a certain fan base and great influence, which will greatly reduce enthusiasm for participation.

(2) The activity is interesting to a certain extent, but not much thought has been put into the control of user psychology, and it cannot be accurately grasped. The content of the sect positions is not complete and transparent enough. It can arouse the curiosity of users, but it is not scarce enough. From the 700+ pictures and comments in the comment area of ​​​​the site, it can be seen that everyone’s sect positions are highly repeated, which are too common and ordinary. The user’s comparison psychology is not satisfied. The scarcity is not enough, and the willingness to share is weak.

When it comes to accurately grasping user psychology and achieving significant activity effects, we have to mention the Jungian psychological test prototype activity planned by NetEase Cloud Music, which was wildly shared on WeChat Moments a few days ago.

3. Comparative Analysis: Jungian Psychological Test of NetEase Cloud Music

1. Event Highlights

1. Conducting interactive quiz tests with users in the form of chat dialogue is novel and interesting.
2. Personality tests themselves are extremely attractive and they understand the user's inner thoughts. Everyone wants to truly understand themselves. Combined with the existing knowledge of Jungian psychology, this is used to popularize and use Jungian psychology content. From the rapid screen-sweeping of the event, it can be seen that this cross-industry promotion and new product publicity event cooperation was very successful.
3. The event landing page is cleverly designed. Highly sticky users can first learn about and participate in the event from within the site, and more new and old users must have come through sharing.

Unlike the widely used QR code scanning method today, this app tells users through sharing that they need to enter "personality" in NetEase Cloud Music before they can participate in the personality test. New users need to download it first to experience it, while old users can directly open the App and search. From the outset, the purpose of the activity, whether it is user acquisition or brand promotion, is clear.

Click on the input box in the App and you will find that the keyword "personality" ranks first in popular searches, which makes it easy for users to search with one click. The search results are also clear at a glance. The first recommended result is "Your Jung Psychological Test". Click to enter.

2. Activity process

(1) Arouse users’ curiosity before answering the questions, and make the personality test full of mystery

From the test results shared by a friend, I learned that there are twelve personality archetypes, which inevitably aroused my curiosity. Which personality type do I have?

Before starting the test, some knowledge about Jungian psychology was popularized. The collective subconscious is divided into 12 personality archetypes (the Innocent, the Orphan, the Caregiver, the Lover, the Warrior, the Ruler, the Rebel, the Magician, the Creator, the Seeker, the Fool, and the Wise). If you choose to answer the question directly, this content will be discarded and will not affect the subsequent answers. Out of curiosity, many users will still click to find out. Even if you choose to answer the question directly, key information will still be pushed out.

(2) Answering questions is fun and easy, which gives users a strong sense of participation and an experience beyond their expectations

The principle of answering questions is very simple, users only need to answer the questions based on their first instinct.

The answering method is very novel. The test questions are told to users in the form of a chat dialogue. The questions themselves are illustrated with pictures and texts, which cleverly interacts with users, increases the sense of fun, and the operation process and user experience are good. After completing the questions, users are required to enter their names to prepare for sharing the test results.

While the personality prototype analysis is in progress, songs are randomly recommended (either new songs, popular songs, or songs that fit the scene) and played simultaneously. Users can check their own personality type while listening to music, giving users an experience that exceeds their expectations.

After answering the questions, the test results are gratifying, the mystery is revealed, and it is extremely scarce, so users are willing to share actively.

The test user's external and internal personality are quickly displayed synchronously, as well as the scarcity of such personality combinations in the world, which accounts for less than 10% (for example, such personality combinations account for only 4% of the world's total). At this moment, the user's willingness to share arises spontaneously.

The test result page is then opened and displayed directly in the form of a picture. The picture includes external and internal personality, three corresponding keywords, and a brief interpretation of this type of personality. It can be shared to social platforms such as WeChat with one click.

Another point is that before sharing the test result page, users can click to view their external and internal personality archetypes respectively, and can also see the official authoritative interpretation of this type of personality. There is also a share button in the lower right corner. After clicking share, the detailed interpretation and sharing entrance are all hidden, and there is not even a QR code left. It only tells you to open NetEase Cloud Music and search for "personality" to take the test.

3. Thinking and Discovery

The two events have similar purposes, both of which are to attract new users and promote the brand; the event methods are similar, both require users to participate in interactive question-and-answer tests, give test results, and encourage users to share in order to gain new users; the effects of the events are very different. Apart from the large difference in the user base of the two products themselves, from the perspective of accurately grasping user psychology, Jung's psychological test is superior.

• Compared with the answering method that interacts with users in dialogue, the results given by simply answering questions seem a bit conventional and clichéd.
• The investment school test is interesting to a certain extent, but it does not accurately grasp the user psychology, and the users' desire to compare and show off is not strong enough. The Jungian psychological testing activity is well aware of the user psychology. Curiosity, mystery, and scarcity are fully displayed and used in this activity, and the accurate grasp of user psychology is evident. It not only allows users to listen to beautiful music, but also helps users understand their own personality archetypes. Users are more willing to share, and their willingness to share is very high, so the effect of the activity is significant.
• The content of the investment school test topic is not complete enough and the summary is not transparent, while the knowledge of personality psychology is complete and authoritative. Judging from the user perception and acceptance of the activity theme, the advantage of Jungian psychology in content is reflected.

end

The Snowball sect testing activity, which has nearly 50,000 participants and is actively shared and spread, is not something that everyone can do well. From event planning, to process design, to event execution and tracking, there are many things worth learning from. This will be the most suitable reference case when you want to design an event with similar purpose and form.

NetEase Cloud Music's Jungian psychological test activity, which achieved a viral and screen-sweeping effect, has a profound grasp of the social currency principle that makes everything go viral, understands the user's heart well, and discovers the user's desire to share their unique, excellent, and wise personality charm. By leveraging the game through Jungian psychological tests, users can have a sense of scarcity, exclusivity, and immersive belonging, which stimulates users' desire to spread the word of mouth, and ultimately the activity achieves a viral and screen-sweeping effect.

It can be seen that when organizing activities, we must have a deep understanding of user psychology. Only when users are fully satisfied psychologically will they be willing to spend time actively participating and sharing, and the effect of the activity will naturally be significant. As Jim Meehan, creator of the Please Don’t Tell cocktail menu, said:

“The most influential market is based on personal recommendations. Nothing is more inspiring than your friends recommending a place or product to you with all their strength.”

I think it is true.

Source: winnie0825