How to create private domain products with tens of millions of users?

If we were to select the hottest business term in 2021, " private domain traffic " would definitely be on the list, and SCRM, the behind-the-scenes product that supports private domain traffic operations, has also become a hot topic in product managers' work discussions.

I have been responsible for the product construction of the SCRM platform from 0 to 1, and was fortunate to witness the entire process of the user scale increasing from zero to one hundred, from one hundred to ten thousand, and from ten thousand to ten million.

In order to help latecomers avoid detours and achieve product goals as soon as possible, the business processes and product planning of the SCRM platform will be sorted out in detail from the four dimensions of growth, activation, retention and conversion.

The most important thing is that it will also reveal a little bit of practical experience. After all, there are not many SCRM product managers who have managed tens of millions of users at this stage.

1. What is SCRM?

The full name of SCRM is Social Customer Relationship Management, which can be intuitively understood as CRM based on social relationships.

In China, social relationships are mainly maintained on WeChat. In simple terms, the system that can achieve unified management of WeChat friends is SCRM.

2. User Growth

We first start by sorting out SCRM products from the dimension of user growth.

In the past few years, many companies used WeChat cracking tools to add users' private WeChat accounts. Later, as WeChat’s control was strengthened and corporate WeChat was connected to private WeChat, more and more companies began to connect to corporate WeChat.

The approach commonly adopted by companies is to register corporate WeChat accounts for employees, and employees use the corporate WeChat accounts to add users' private WeChat accounts.

What the industry calls user growth is the total number of WeChat friends added under a certain micro-enterprise entity.

1. What are the growth methods?

The user growth of SCRM products can be divided into two ways: employee-initiated additions and user-initiated additions .

The so-called employee active addition process is as follows:

1. Employees search for users on WeChat using their mobile phone numbers and initiate friend requests;
2. After the employee submits the application, the user will receive a service notification on WeChat;
3. When users open the service notification, they will see the employee's WeChat QR code;
4. The user long presses and identifies the WeChat QR code to complete adding friends.

The process for users to actively add is as follows:

1. The user sees the WeChat QR code somewhere in the APP, official account article, or mini program;
2. The user long presses and identifies the QR code;
3. After successful identification, the employee assigned to the user is automatically displayed;
4. User initiates friend addition.

2. What to do at the product level

What product work needs to be done for the two addition methods mentioned above, and what important data indicators need to be monitored? Let's briefly summarize it below.

Scenarios actively added by employees require password generation (also called serial code generation ).

Its function is to encrypt the user's mobile phone number into a string of characters that have no actual meaning. In this way, the work process can be completed without leaking the user's sensitive information.

In addition, it is best for companies to regulate internally to avoid adding users too frequently. A good solution is to limit the time interval between password generation and the total number of passwords generated on the same day.

At the data level, it is necessary to monitor the success rate of adding employees. For employees whose success rate of adding employees has been below the average for a long time, skills training can be implemented as a priority. For employees with excellent success rate in adding, they can be made into benchmark cases, and their experience can be abstracted into methodology.

Scenarios actively added by users require live code management .

The so-called live code is just an ordinary QR code for users, and they can add the employee’s WeChat account by scanning it.

But different users will be identified as different employees when scanning the code. Users will receive different welcome messages after adding employees through different drainage channels.

This requires the SCRM backend to support allocation rule configuration and welcome message configuration respectively.

In this scenario, it is important to accurately record the "user first added time" because many activities or gifts are restricted to new users. If the data is not recorded accurately, it will lead to a lot of unnecessary waste of resources.

3. Applicable scenarios and analysis of advantages and disadvantages

If user conversion is difficult or highly dependent on sales promotion, then employees should take the initiative to add users.

The operations side can set goals for employees to achieve for the purpose of assessment. If the budget permits, ranking incentives can also be added to encourage outstanding employees to add more users.

This approach has two benefits:

1. Costs are controllable . The additional expenses will only be used to reward employees, and there will be no situation where the expenses are uncontrollable.
2. Experience retention . The successful experiences of outstanding employees can be refined into processes and scripts, which can be quickly replicated to the entire team.

At the same time, the disadvantages are also obvious.

Once a company adopts a strict assessment mechanism for its employees, the employees' actions are likely to be distorted, leading to frequent harassment of users and false promises to users.

This will result in employees being complained about and their accounts being disabled.

However, if it is not difficult to convert users, or users have a strong motivation to buy, you can try to let users take the initiative to add them.

What we usually see is that when browsing an e-commerce app, we see a QR code that tells us that after scanning the code and adding a friend, we can receive a 20 yuan coupon.

To adopt this approach, you need to design attractive prizes. In addition to the coupons mentioned above, users can also be rewarded with a small gift, some exclusive privileges, or even directly with cash red envelopes.

The benefits of this approach are quite obvious, as it can quickly acquire a large number of users in a short period of time.

But the disadvantages are equally obvious. Users attracted by the benefits are of relatively low quality. Many users come here purely to get the free stuff, and they hardly convert later.

It is worth noting that the two growth modes are not absolutely mutually exclusive, and each has its own advantages and disadvantages.

In practical applications, the two methods can be combined according to business requirements, which can often achieve the effect of 1+1>2.

3. User Activation

Generally speaking, user activation means that the user experiences the core value of a product or service. After we migrate users to the enterprise microblog private domain, we will immediately start working on user activation.

1. What is the definition of enterprise micro-private domain user activation?

In the private domain scenario of WeChat Enterprise, what specific actions or behaviors does user activation refer to?

Before officially revealing the answer, let’s take a look at whether the following three definitions are appropriate. They are: users placing orders to purchase goods, users receiving coupons and users browsing information.

None of these three approaches is suitable. Why do you say that?

Defining user activation as placing an order to purchase a product actually confuses activation and conversion. Defining users receiving coupons and browsing information as activation actually fails to maximize the value of the company's WeChat private domain.

The greatest value of the private domain of corporate WeChat lies in the two-way communication between users and enterprises, while the public domain is often a one-way output of enterprises. At this point the answer is about to surface.

The most appropriate way is to use the number of messages sent by users as the criterion for user activation. The specific number depends on the business scenario of the enterprise.

If you pay close attention, you'll see that this is what most companies do.

Therefore, you will see that health managers always ask you about your daily routine and physical condition, and financial advisors’ friends circles are full of articles titled “Teaching you how to manage your finances” with a note saying they welcome consultations.

These are all to attract users to actively send messages and complete the key action of user activation.

2. What needs to be done at the product level

In order to achieve the goal of user activation, the product side needs to do the following three types of work: user tags, content middle platform, and clue middle platform.

1) User Tags

The purpose of building a user tag system is to help employees accurately screen users through different tag combinations. Because one employee may add hundreds of users at least, or thousands of users at most. Without rich user tags, the efficiency of employee work will be greatly reduced.

The construction of a universal user tag system can be considered from the following three different dimensions.

1. Demographic attribute labels, such as gender, age group, birthday, etc.
2. Wealth attribute labels, such as: user net worth, real estate status, whether or not there is a car, etc.
3. Unique attribute labels for WeChat, such as interaction status, time of becoming friends, number of messages sent, etc.

Recently, many companies have begun to build a user tag system in combination with the RFM model, which is also a good idea.

2) Content middle platform

The greatest value of the content platform is to provide high-quality materials for user activation.

From the perspective of content production on the management side, in addition to supporting the content operation team to publish original content, companies with conditions can also consider connecting to third-party material libraries, which can quickly improve the richness of content materials in a short period of time.

From the perspective of employee-side content organization and presentation, at least three things need to be done:

1. Content aggregation, also known as content topics or content themes, aims to aggregate individual articles into a list of topics that are valuable to employees in order to increase content usage.
2. Content indexing, namely content classification and content labeling, aims to improve employee usage efficiency.
3. The purpose of content presentation, namely the content banner position, is to amplify the value of a single piece of content and attract more employees to use it.

3) Clue middle platform

If you have added the WeChat accounts of some company employees, you may have received similar messages:

1. Kindly remind you that 2 coupons in your name will expire tomorrow, please use them as soon as possible;
2. It has been 60 days since your last purchase. We have specially applied for a large discount for you. Please check.
3. Today is your birthday. We have prepared a birthday surprise gift package for you. Please click to check it.

The reason why Enterprise WeChat Butler can send out such accurate information is that it relies on the powerful clue middle platform.

The private domain clue middle platform needs to include at least the following three modules:

1. Clue generation: Generate corresponding clues based on pre-set judgment conditions.
2. Lead allocation: After the leads are generated, they will be sent to designated employees for follow-up according to the corresponding allocation rules.
3. Follow up on leads. After receiving leads, employees will check the lead details and use this as an excuse to proactively provide services to customers or convert sales.

3. How to ensure that the operational SOP is strictly implemented

During the entire process of user activation, a large number of operational SOPs need to be executed by front-line employees. Once a problem occurs in any of the links, the overall user activation rate will decrease.

How to ensure the implementation of operational SOPs has always been a major challenge in operational management.

The conventional approach is: set goals - break them down into key actions - promote execution - track reports.

If the company is small and has around a hundred front-line employees, there is absolutely no problem in adopting this conventional approach. However, if the company is large enough and has more than a thousand front-line employees, it will be extremely time-consuming and laborious to adopt conventional practices. And often the results are half as good as the effort, and the desired results cannot be achieved.

So you might want to consider using some black technology to help. As long as the key actions in the SOP are simple, repetitive and standardized, it is possible to achieve the goal of user activation through some technical means. As for the specific technical means, it is not convenient to explain them here.

4. User Retention

What is user retention? The intuitive understanding is that users come and don’t leave.

1. What is the business scenario?

How can we make sure that users come and never leave? Borrowing the classic model mentioned in the book "Addiction", there are four parts: trigger, action, variable rewards, and investment.

1) Trigger

"Triggering" in the WeChat private domain scenario can be understood as allowing products or services to reach as many users as possible, and the ways to reach users are nothing more than the following three: small window chat, community, and Moments.

Small window private chat: You will receive various message notifications, register to receive prizes with one click, and authorize real information to get points.

Community: You will often see exclusive activities and exclusive red envelopes in the group that only members of the group can participate in.

Moments: If you scroll through your Moments, you’ll most likely come across links to limited-time specials on popular internet celebrity products.

2) Action

After the user is triggered, your next goal is to get him to use it. The "use" here can be watching a live broadcast or participating in a lottery.

Regardless of the format, the action the user takes must be simple.

3) Variable rewards

As long as users take action, they will be rewarded immediately. Rewards lead to the next action, and the next action leads to new rewards.

By repeating this cycle, users can develop a habit.

Common forms of rewards in private domain operations are: flash sales, winning prizes, sign-ins, etc.

4) Investment

There is another important step in the addiction model: commitment. Let users continue to invest, and eventually they will be unable to leave because they have invested too much. To put it bluntly, it means increasing the migration costs of users.

You can design a user level system, medal system, etc. to increase the user's sunk cost.

2. What needs to be done at the product level

In combination with the business scenarios described above, the following three aspects need to be designed at the product level, namely: incentive system, activity middle platform, and mini program.

1) Incentive system

The incentive system is the specific implementation of the addiction model in product design, involving:

• User level: You can design user levels from 1 to N. Different levels have corresponding identity tags and privileges. The higher the level, the more prestigious the identity tag and the more privileges it has.
• Points system: You can design different tasks or scenarios, and give points as rewards to users after they complete the tasks. The points users earn can be redeemed for prizes or privileges.
• Punch in and sign in: In order to improve user stickiness, you can also consider designing a mechanism to reward sign-in. By checking in, you can attract a large number of loyal fans to check in every day. You will be awarded 20 points on the first day of checking in, 7 consecutive check-ins will be awarded a 7-day VIP trial period, and a limited edition medal will be awarded for checking in for a year.

2) Activity middle platform

In order to support various forms of operational activities, you need a supporting activity center. The activity platform needs to have the following three functional sections:

1. Activity template: Operators can select appropriate activity templates according to different scenarios and set the lottery format and activity time.
2. Activity rules: Which customer groups can participate in the lottery, how many times each user can participate, and what is the probability of a user winning. This information is also configured in the activity center.
3. Prize configuration: What attracts users to participate in the event is definitely the prizes. Therefore, it is necessary to support operations staff in configuring different prizes and how to redeem the prizes.

3) Mini Programs

Perhaps you have already wondered, what kind of product form should be used to present user levels and points, user participation in lotteries or watching live broadcasts, and these C-end user-oriented functions?

Is it a public account? Or build your own official website? None of these may be appropriate, and the best answer is WeChat mini-programs.

Why do you say that? Here are two most direct reasons:

1. Easy to use: Just log in with WeChat account and use it immediately without registering an account or subscribing.
2. It is easy for enterprises to connect data: as long as the tracking points are done well, the user's behavior within the mini program can be connected with the enterprise WeChat data and the company's internal data, facilitating unified management and operation.

Compared with public domain operations, mini programs are portal websites for private domain operations. It’s just that public domain operations rely on advertising and delivery, and content is displayed after users search for keywords. Private domain operations require managers to push content to users, or spread the content through word of mouth among users.

Therefore, you will see that companies operating in the private domain have all made a combination of "Enterprise WeChat + Mini Programs" and used Mini Programs to carry out ToC business.

3. How to reduce user churn

The correct use of the addiction model is to increase user interaction and thus improve retention. If user loss has already occurred or is about to occur, what can we do to regain lost users?

In the private domain scenario, users deleting friends or refusing list inheritance can be defined as hard churn. It is difficult to recall such users. Human intervention is needed and attempts are made by giving high-value gifts or services.

If a user has not been active for a long time, or is averse to being disturbed by marketing messages, preventive measures need to be taken for such users.

How to prevent it? Giving large coupons to long-term inactive silent users can avoid churn to a certain extent. For users who are more sensitive to marketing content, you can identify and locate them through keywords in chat messages, and then send marketing content to filter out these users.

5. User Conversion

The reason why a large number of companies invest time and resources in building SCRM platforms to carry out private domain operations is that their ultimate goal must be conversion. If the conversion effect is not ideal, even if the previous work is done well, it will be in vain. The situation of being well received but not popular is definitely something that the company does not want to encounter.

How can we avoid this from happening? Next, we will introduce the user conversion scenarios, product-level design, and strategies for difficult-to-convert users.

1. Three types of user conversion scenarios

User conversion in the private domain can generally be divided into three scenarios: demand conversion, trust conversion, and service conversion.

1. Demand conversion: Help users sort out their needs, propose reasonable solutions, and promote conversion.
2. Trust conversion: By establishing a personal image, maintaining long-term relationships with users, and constantly encouraging users to make transactions.
3. Service conversion: Satisfy user expectations through thoughtful service and achieve sales conversion in the service process.

2. What needs to be done at the product level

1) Requirements Analysis Tools

As a consumer, you certainly don't like the feeling of being sold to.

If a corporate WeChat manager comes up to you and starts selling you products, telling you how good their products are, you will habitually ignore him or even block him. But if the business micro-manager can analyze the problem with you in depth and detail and give you a satisfactory answer, your favorability towards him will increase and the probability of a deal may increase.

Therefore, the SCRM platform must have a set of demand analysis tools to help the enterprise micro-manager better communicate with users about their needs.

A complete set of demand analysis tools is a 360-degree panoramic view of users for sales conversion, including: basic information, behavior tracks, and transaction information.

• Basic information: The information involved includes: name, gender, purchase intention, city, contact information, etc.
• Behavior track: The user's behavior data in the APP, official account and mini program can be processed into a track view, so that the enterprise micro-butler can see the user's dynamics at a glance.
• Transaction information: It is very necessary to show the user's past transaction records to the enterprise WeChat manager. If the user purchases a certain type of product multiple times, you can also generate purchase recommendations or suggestions, which is also very helpful for user conversion.

2) Character Treasure Box

Trust is crucial to user conversion. If there is no trust, the more you say to users, the more wary they will be.

Building trust requires long-term efforts, and using WeChat Moments to establish a personal image has become a basic consensus in the industry. The help that the product side can provide is: historical circle of friends and daily circle of friends tasks. If you use these two tools well, your character score will at least be above the passing line.

1. Historical Moments: Since the official website does not provide an entry for users to view all Moments of the WeChat Enterprise Manager, the SCRM platform needs to provide a similar function for users to view the Moments of the Manager. Of course, the circle of friends content that users see are all configured in the background by administrators in advance.
2. Daily Moments tasks: In order to operate a unified external persona, managers can configure the Moments content to be sent on that day for each WeChat Butler through the background. After successful configuration, housekeepers will receive task reminders and perform each step according to the prompts.

3) Service Notifier

Service is an important part of private domain operations. If users can get a good service experience throughout their life cycle, the possibility of them making a deal will be greatly improved.

In the service link, there are two points on the product side that can enable user conversion, namely: capturing key service nodes and full life cycle service trajectory.

Capturing key service nodes: The platform automatically captures information with service value and notifies the butler to proactively initiate services to users.

For example, if an Internet hospital obtains information through authorization or other means that you have recently undergone a physical examination, it will notify the doctor and ask you whether you need an interpretation of the physical examination report. If you agree, the doctor will output a diagnosis based on the physical examination report and online consultation records. At the same time, a link to purchase the medicine is also attached. At this point, there is a very high probability that the user will place an order to buy medicine. This is a typical scenario for completing user conversion through services.

Full life cycle service trajectory: In some high-unit-price conversion scenarios, a user may be followed up by multiple WeChat account managers. Therefore, the platform needs to support butlers to view all chat records and previous service records, so that the new butler can better connect with users.

3. What to do with users who cannot be converted

I believe you must have encountered users who cannot be converted. What should you do?

Increase the number of contacts. This will make users feel disturbed and may even cause user churn.

Frequent changes of personnel to follow up. This will make users feel that the company is using them as guinea pigs and that they are not respected.

The most appropriate method is to invite users to join the community.

This approach has two obvious benefits:

1. Using communities to educate users may not generate orders immediately, but it is possible to convert some of them through community promotion and other auxiliary means.
2. The process of chatting with users in a group is also the process of collecting user needs and feedback. If you have C2M capabilities, you can design new products based on these needs, quickly bring them to market, and obtain new orders.

VI. Summary

This article analyzes private domain SCRM products based on business scenarios. Whether you plan to build your own SCRM product or purchase it from a third party, I hope the perspective provided in this article can help you.

At present, private domain operations, as an effective way to resolve public domain traffic anxiety and solve operational problems, have attracted the attention of more and more companies. I believe that more companies and teams will join in the future.

Author: Tian Jiang Mu

Source: Dusk