“Buying traffic is seeking death, not buying traffic is waiting for death”, how the hell have we fallen into the ditch again?

Once you are faced with the dilemma of waiting to die or seeking death, then the problem in front of you is definitely not the real problem!

1

Let’s start with the “terminal is king” that was popular in the early years.

That was the era when hypermarkets were on the rise. Carrefour China President Joseph Schroeder was frequently the guest of honor at local government business conferences, and the organizers fawned upon him and treated him with great respect.

Carrefour opens ten stores per year, which is still very restrained.

In enterprises, terminal work is called "the finishing touch" and is considered extremely important.

"Display" is called the life of sales.

Retailers and many marketing experts advocate concentrating corporate resources on terminals, which is called "terminal is king." Others include passionate slogans such as "shopping terminal" and "decisive terminal".

The general logic is: since the finishing touch is so important, if we replace eleven forwards, Chinese football will be able to break out of Asia.

The end result is that terminal resources are becoming increasingly scarce and more expensive. The input is increasing, but the output is decreasing.

Everyone lamented: Making terminals is seeking death, not making terminals is waiting for death .

At that time, some famous "golden sentences" were widely circulated:

“The initial investment is large, but once the market opens up, the subsequent investment will naturally become less.”

"You may not make a profit in my store, but it has a brand effect and can drive the entire market, which is equivalent to advertising."

Does it look familiar?

Don’t the colorful clouds floating in the sky look like the 500 yuan you owed me last week?

Similar scenes were played out again and again. We have also experienced the era of "advertising is king", and the result is "advertising will lead to death, and not advertising will lead to death." In the era of "concept is king" for health products, the result is "if you make concepts, you will die; if you don't make concepts, you will die.

In recent years, no one has mentioned "advertising is king" for a long time, and the unhealthy trend of "terminal is king" has also passed, but a bigger unhealthy trend is getting stronger and stronger, that is, " traffic is king".

Of course, amid the upsurge of traffic being king, there are still cries of "buying traffic is seeking death, not buying traffic is waiting for death", and there are still lies such as "the market is opened, and subsequent investment will be reduced" and "it is equivalent to advertising".

It’s just that the term now is more advanced, such as “brand and effect integration”.

2

"Doing something will lead to death, and not doing something will lead to waiting for death." We seem to be particularly prone to falling into this dilemma.

As soon as he climbed out of one ditch, he fell into another one. What happened?

Let’s find a scenario that is easy to understand.

In the 36th chapter of "Water Margin", Song Jiang offended the brothers Mu Hong and Mu Chun in Jieyang Town and fled all the way to the Xunyang River.

There is a big river blocking the way in front and bullies chasing him from behind, and Song Jiang can't swim.

It’s a dilemma: “Cross the river and you will die; cross the river and you will wait for death.”

At the critical moment, an enthusiastic citizen named Zhang Hegong came running and wanted to "empower" Brother Gongming. He enthusiastically and proactively took him across the river.

Who would have thought that when the boat reached the middle of the river, the enthusiastic citizen instantly turned into a bandit, and the boatman Zhang Heng's true colors were revealed, and it would not just be about asking for more boat fare. “

Bandao noodles or wontons? You black bastard, choose the same one.

Bandao noodles means chopping you into the river, and wontons means tying you up and throwing you into the river.

It’s no longer a matter of seeking death or waiting for death, but rather “kill you while you’re sick.”

Here comes the key point. How does Brother Gongming solve this problem that has gone from a "dilemma" to a "fatal problem"?

The answer is just two words - brand .

As long as Song Jiang raised the brand slogan of "Shandong's timely rain", all the heroes would bow down to him. No matter whether you are a river dragon or a black whirlwind, a winged tiger or a dwarf tiger, you have no choice but to kowtow to me.

Huawei, Xiaomi, and Lao Gan Ma never worry about traffic issues, and OV, Gree, and Nongfu Spring never force people into a "dilemma."

Pinduoduo rushed to provide traffic to Tesla and subsidized them to help them sell goods, but Tesla didn't appreciate it and refused to ship the goods.

Those physical enterprises that have adhered to their values ​​for a long time will never choose between "seeking death" and "waiting for death".

If anyone is blind enough to put me in a dilemma, I will make you even more embarrassed. Sister Dong Mingzhu has the most say in this matter.

The ruthless boss Guangyu Huang silently gave thirty-six likes.

3

Once you are caught in the dilemma of "waiting to die" and "seeking death", what is in front of you is not the real problem.

Your problem may seem like “no sales at the terminal”, “no traffic”, or “no conversion”, but in fact it is more likely that your product is not attractive, lacks application scenarios, has no good experience, no brand appeal, or even no market demand.

Just like Brother Gongming "crossing the river is seeking death, not crossing the river is waiting for death", it was because he offended the Mu brothers, and when he escaped, he was in a panic and did not show his sign in time. It has nothing to do with the Xunyang River in front of him.

Without Xunyang River, there is still Yangtze River. Without Yangtze River, there is still Valley of Death.

As long as you lack real market value, there will always be a hurdle that will make you think you are seeking death if you think about it, but you are just waiting to die.

There is no longer the old sayings of “doing advertising is a death sentence, don’t do advertising and wait for death” and “doing terminals is a death sentence, don’t do terminals and wait for death”. Now there is “buying traffic is a death sentence, don’t buy traffic and wait for death”. In the future, there will be “doing conversion is a death sentence, don’t do conversion and wait for death”, “doing private domain is a death sentence, don’t do private domain and wait for death”, “doing middle platform is a death sentence, don’t do middle platform and wait for death”…

The ways of dying are colorful and interesting.

The root problem never has such a dilemma , such as customer perceived value, such as demand. No one will ever say “creating value is seeking death, not creating value is waiting for death” or “meeting market demand is seeking death, not meeting market demand is waiting for death”.

So when you encounter a dilemma, the first thing you need to do is to step away from the current problem, find the root problem, and see what is really going on.

Pay special attention to "caring citizens". "The girl wants to cross the river, who will push me?"

There must be a bunch of great people in the crowd shouting in unison: "Let me push you!" One after another, "masters" came on colorful clouds.

If you encounter the "traffic dilemma", he will help you solve the traffic problem. If you encounter the "live streaming and selling goods dilemma", he will help you solve the live streaming and selling goods problem.

"The Internationale" has long taught us that "there has never been any savior". Once these enthusiastic citizens reach the center of the river, they will either become the target of the boat fire and be lucky enough to get some money from you, or they will have to eat flat noodles.

Or he will be discovered to be an impostor in disguise, and the water will be deep and the waves will be fierce, so he and you will fall into the river together.

4

The reason is not difficult to understand, and our physical bosses are all smart people, so why do they still fall into traps so frequently?

This can also be explained by two simple words: one is called " illusion " and the other is called "hallucination" .

The illusion is that we always judge recent correlations as causation.

Companies want sales, and once advertising is put out, sales will increase, so “advertising is king”;

Once the terminal is launched, sales will increase, so "the terminal is king";

Later, once traffic was purchased, sales increased, so "traffic is king".

The goal was scored by the forward, so many companies have the urge to replace eleven forwards. The "king" who caused chaos before was the link closest to the transaction.

Even though we deeply realize that sales volume is a comprehensive factor, we still need to differentiate our products, provide better customer experience, and gain brand recognition.

But once we face performance pressure, our eyes will involuntarily focus on the link closest to sales. This is instinct.

Lao Miao said that Dong Mingzhu believes that live streaming to sell goods is a scam, and said that she does not attach much importance to the role of traffic. Someone left a message saying that Gree is a large enterprise, so it does not value traffic. If it is a small enterprise that does not value traffic, it can only wait for death.

This just reverses the cause and effect relationship: whether it is Gree, Huawei, Nongfu Spring, or Lao Gan Ma, they eventually became large companies because they did not value traffic, but focused on the competitiveness of products, strategic competitiveness, and market demand. It’s not because we have become a big company that we don’t value traffic.

Those companies that follow the baton of traffic will never have a good ending.

With such an "illusion" foundation, traffic owners can create an illusion. The illusion is that "traffic is extremely important and scarce."

It is business common sense that has been repeated time and again: traffic itself does not generate direct commercial value and can only be monetized by parasitizing on products.

If traffic owners want to sell traffic at a good price, they need to emphasize the importance of traffic on the one hand and create traffic anxiety on the other.

Under the promotion of major traffic platforms and some media people, "traffic is the essence of business" has become a business "common sense".

Sales volume = traffic * conversion * average order value. This so-called "business formula" which is only at the level of elementary school arithmetic is actually used as the golden rule of operations.

At the same time, with their advocacy, "traffic exhaustion", "traffic peaking", and "traffic becoming more and more expensive and scarce" soon became a "consensus".

5

Is traffic really becoming increasingly scarce?

I asked many marketing practitioners, and most of them answered in the affirmative. I also asked many business owners, and most of them were skeptical.

The answer to this question is very simple. We just need to get to the root of the matter and ask the parties directly, yes, us ordinary people.

For example, you can interview the middle-aged women who are dancing in the square.

They will definitely ask you first what traffic is.

You open an APP on your phone and tell it that every time you look at it, every time you click on it, and every time you invest in it is called traffic.

Then you tell her that this thing will become increasingly scarce and more expensive.

Believe it or not, they will look at you with sympathy:

"Is there something wrong with this kid's brain? Did he join some pyramid scheme and get fooled?"

Premier Li Keqiang said sadly that there are 600 million people in China whose monthly income is less than 1,000 yuan.

For ordinary people like us, attention is worthless and we have plenty of it.

Money is valuable.

Twenty-four hours a day, except for sleeping, we use our attention all the time. If this thing could be sold for money, and it became increasingly scarce and more expensive, we would all be rich.

Is this the legendary “watching TikTok and shopping on Taobao will force the United States back to being an agricultural country”?

Come on, come on, whoever buys our traffic, we will never raise the price arbitrarily. We will include all your relatives and make you buy until you go bankrupt.

When doing business, you must first use common sense:

If we use attention to define traffic, with more than one billion people and 24 hours per person per day, the total amount will not change much. The difference is that our attention will change with changes in the carrier, identity, age, and needs.

The traffic has not dried up and there is no cap. The users are there and the attention is there.

As vast as the sea of ​​smoke, endless, and constantly changing.

It is natural for traffic owners to emphasize the importance of traffic, and all "scarcity" is hyped . But when there are really more, the price will really go up.

When more and more companies see through this routine and burst this illusion bubble, the value of traffic will truly return.

Ultimately, all Internet platforms are essentially advertising companies.

It’s just that the previous advertising resources are now called “traffic combinations”. The dead “advertising is king” has now been resurrected and renamed “traffic is king”.

For physical businesses, this doesn’t matter; they can do whatever they want.

After going through so much chaos of "XX is king", we are still doing fine. We are and will be the main force of social economy.

If you do a good job with your value, your products, and your brand, you will be able to have a stronger consumer experience and a stronger resonance with values, and you will naturally be a better "traffic host."

Platforms know best that the best way to monetize traffic is to realize user value through better hosting.

Traffic owners always provide support when it is necessary and take advantage of you when it is necessary. It depends on which path you take.

Sister Dong does live broadcasts and Lei Jun holds press conferences, and they never worry about traffic issues.

As long as you are the "timely rain", why are you afraid of the "black whirlwind"?

Author: Xiangma Lao Miao

Source: Lao Miao Si Marketing