How to play "618"? Take this advertising guide for free

This year’s “618” mid-year shopping festival coincides with the Dragon Boat Festival and Father’s Day. It is foreseeable that the battle for consumers among e -commerce sellers will become more intense…

The big sale hasn’t arrived yet, but the launch has already begun! So under such favorable conditions, what kind of marketing "postures" should TOP sellers and customers with good reputation and sales, and ordinary sellers with limited budgets adopt to achieve both exposure and sales?

Today, Qingguajun will conduct a comparative analysis of the “ 618” marketing strategies of TOP sellers and ordinary sellers from three aspects : resource strategy, targeting strategy, and creative strategy .

1. Resource Strategy

TOP Sellers

Since TOP sellers are large in size and have sufficient marketing budgets, it is recommended that they adopt a resource acquisition strategy of "multi- channel + multiple ad spaces + multiple ad formats" to grab traffic on a large scale and achieve strong brand exposure.

Among them, it is recommended to give priority to the top-level high-quality advertising positions in high-quality media channels with better traffic quantity and quality, such as large and medium-sized media such as Toutiao , NetEase , iQiyi, Youku, Momo , Moji Weather , or HERO-level media in various vertical fields, which can all become optional channels for TOP e-commerce sellers to place advertisements.

As for the form of advertising, during the warm-up and testing period before the big promotion, because the main focus is generally on brand event promotion , choosing splash screen ads, video patch ads, and interstitial ads may be relatively more effective; and during the official outbreak period of the event, because the advertiser's goal is to pursue conversion effects, graphic information flow ads and large-size banner ads may be relatively more effective. In addition, e-commerce sellers in the categories of apparel, beauty, accessories, and food can also choose live streaming platforms such as Inke and Huajiao to live stream their events in order to lock in and attract more target audiences and drive user participation; of course, choosing channels such as Douyin , Kuaishou , and Meipai to deliver short video information flow ads is also a current hot marketing "posture."

However, the resource strategy described above is not absolute. In the actual "618" advertising , TOP e-commerce advertisers should still combine product attributes, target population characteristics, media target population matching, media overlap (i.e. the target population overlap ratio between multimedia) and promotion budget, etc., to reasonably formulate resource combination strategies to maximize ROI.

Ordinary seller

Ordinary sellers refer to medium-sized stores. Since its promotion goal is to attract store traffic and promote conversions, and the marketing budget is limited, it is generally not recommended to choose high-quality advertising positions in top media, nor is it recommended to choose advertising forms such as video patches and splash screens that charge higher fees and are more suitable for product promotion. Of course, it is not recommended to "cast a wide net" and choose multiple promotion channels to avoid advertising failure. Instead, it is recommended to choose secondary advertising positions in top media, such as the second and third screen information flow ads in various top information flow channels such as Toutiao, NetEase News , Sogou, UC Browser , iQiyi, Youku, etc.; or it is recommended to place information flow ads or banner ads in high-quality media in vertical fields with a high degree of overlap with the target population (for example, to promote baby diapers, you can choose female vertical media such as Mayu , Auntie , Babytree , etc.), so as to obtain the maximum advertising conversion effect with the least investment.

2. Targeted Strategy

TOP Sellers

It is best to start the campaign about 2 weeks before the big promotion (or even earlier). Among them, it is not recommended to set the targeting conditions too narrowly (finely) in the initial testing stage of the delivery, such as setting "gender", "age", "region", "interest", "network environment", etc. at the same time, so as to avoid the target audience of eligible stores being very small and the exposure being low. Instead, it is recommended to adopt a "broad targeting" general investment strategy, that is, only perform simple targeting settings (such as only setting gender, age, and a small number of interest tags) to conduct pre-exposure of large-scale brands and activities, and help stores find more potential high-quality consumers that meet their positioning; then , in the subsequent delivery stage, adjust and optimize the targeting strategy based on the data performance in the testing phase, extend the high-quality targeting strategy, and stop the loss of low-quality targeting strategies: such as filtering inefficient media or ad positions, filtering inefficient regions and time periods, and increasing the delivery of targeting strategies with higher click effects.

Ordinary seller

Unlike top-tier sellers with ample budgets, ordinary sellers simply cannot rely on long-term, large-scale investments to accumulate market share and lock in massive target audiences. Instead, they hope that the cold start cycle between input and output will be as short as possible and the ROI will be as high as possible.

Therefore, precise orientation is the key!

Regarding the targeting strategy of ordinary sellers, Meishujun recommends that they should first grasp the time period when the advertisement is displayed - time targeting. That is, if most of the clicks come from between 8:00-20:00, then it is best to suspend delivery or lower bids during other time periods, as well as during some periods with poor data during this period; secondly, regional targeting can be performed. That is, based on advertising data performance, historical transaction orders, etc., cities with a higher concentration of target audiences are selected for targeted delivery; in addition, redirection must be done. That is, redirecting audiences who have clicked on your ads, browsed your store, and added products to their shopping carts to efficiently achieve the final conversion.

In addition, Meishujun would like to say: crowd targeting is essential! The crowd targeting mentioned here does not just target the crowd by setting static labels (such as gender, hobbies, etc.), but should grasp the user's short-term behavior and target the real high-demand customers under the special scenario of " 618 " and the objective conditions of limited merchant budgets. To this end, Meishu has comprehensively integrated data (first-party advertiser data, Meishu AdNut population data, connected third-party data, etc.) to build a static population portrait (gender, age, interests, brand preferences, etc.), and collected short-term population data (recently active applications, recent search behaviors, recent places visited, etc.) and real-scene data (current location, currently open applications, etc.) to fully record users' online and offline dynamic behavior trajectories; combined with Meishu's exclusive dynamic weighting algorithm to accurately determine user needs, and more three-dimensionally and accurately identify the current different life cycles of users with different needs (new customers are interested? Comparing products? Old customers are repurchasing...), so as to guide e-commerce advertisers to reasonably formulate population targeting strategies and reasonably allocate marketing budgets to make advertising "worth it".

3. Creative Strategy

TOP Sellers

TOP sellers generally have higher brand awareness and credibility. If you want to attract more old customers to repurchase and new customers to purchase during the "618" period, you can have the following ideas for creative materials:

1) Creativity is extremely tempting

That is, use the discounts of big sales to attract and stimulate customers to click on ads and generate conversions. For example, the copy may include words such as "discounts for purchases over a certain amount", "20% off storewide", "buy two, get one free", etc.

2) Creativity has a sense of urgency

For example, words such as "limited time discount", "limited time gift", "early purchase", or deadline may appear in the copy to increase the customer's sense of urgency and call (stimulate) them to take immediate action, thereby effectively promoting conversions.

3) Creativity is different for different people

That is, create multiple versions of creative (it is recommended to have about 6 versions per ad slot) and display them in a personalized way to better capture more target audiences. For example, in the case of Han Du Yishe’s campaign during the “Double 11” shopping festival (click here to review), Meishu Technology adopted a dynamic creative optimization strategy, achieving “multi-person and multi-faceted” advertising display - such as using “this wave will make you stunningly beautiful” to attract people who pursue high-value outfits; using “creating personalized designs” to match people who pursue personalized styles; using “50% off” and “starting from 58 yuan” to stimulate the interest of people who pursue high cost-effectiveness, low price discounts, etc. In addition to personalized matching of copy, picture materials will also be displayed dynamically and differently according to different groups of people's life stages (students, white-collar workers), interest preferences (like cute style, OL style, etc.), etc. This helps brands efficiently achieve sales conversions.

Ordinary seller

In the current market competition landscape where product homogeneity is very serious, if ordinary sellers want to successfully attract consumers' attention and make them fall in love with your products among many brands, they should not follow the crowd in using "stereotyped" creative materials - for example, when selling shampoo, almost all merchants' advertisements focus on "anti-dandruff" and "smoothness" selling points; do not try to rely solely on imitating the advertising ideas of similar powerful TOP sellers, so as not to "imitate the ugly"; and do not rely solely on unscrupulous price cuts and promotions to attract consumers. Instead, the following strategies are recommended:

1) Determine the creative idea based on the opponent's disadvantages

For example, the advertising idea mentioned above that imitates similar powerful TOP sellers is wrong. However, we can determine creative points based on the disadvantages of similar powerful TOP sellers. For example, if the high prices of TOP sellers’ products are a disadvantage, then ordinary sellers’ creative ideas can include words like “spend half the price to buy the same product as XX” (but be sure to remember not to infringe on rights or exaggerate the display to avoid breaking the law).

2) Creative scene display

That is, to understand the ultimate purpose and usage scenarios of customers' purchases, and to use the advantages of products and services to solve the audience's current urgent needs, so that the advertisements appear "just right" and stimulate the audience to click on the advertisements. For example, "A must-have for driving in summer" and "A 1.5m tall outfit that looks like a 1.65m style" all capture the product's core selling points, audience focus and contextual aspects for promotion, which can better grab the audience's attention and occupy their minds.

Nowadays, with the upgrading of consumption, consumers have higher and higher requirements for product quality and service, as well as personalized brand experience. Therefore, blindly reducing prices and promoting sales should no longer be the main marketing theme of the "618" promotion. Brands should use new and creative marketing methods to win more favor from consumers. Only in this way can we dig deep and win the "6.18"!

This article was compiled and published by @Meishu Technology (Qinggua Media) when it is reprinted. Please indicate the author information and source!

Product promotion services: APP promotion services, advertising platform, Longyou Games