Brand No. 1: Double 11 promotion, four levels and three characteristics

The Double 11 shopping season has begun to warm up, and brands are all showing off their talents. So how should we formulate strategic directions for different goals, and how should we gradually climb to a higher direction after achieving them? This article may give you some food for thought.

Fourth level

• Phase 1: 0-10 million: Single-point single product, efficient conversion, traffic into sales
• Phase 2: 10 million to 100 million: product line expansion, channel penetration, and deep cultivation of user minds
• Phase 3: 100 million to 1 billion: cross-border endorsement, breaking circles and user retention
• Phase 4: 5 billion club: supply chain, category penetration, two players, one shake, one focus

Phase 1: 0 to 1 Verification

Keywords: single point breakthrough, single product penetration

When new products and brands first enter the market, the problem they face is not the brand's problem, but finding traffic and converting sales. By improving and eliminating differentiated selling points of single products and single points, we can gradually increase conversion and run through the content conversion path from traffic to efficiency.

The brand strategy at this stage is focused on potential consumers who are interested in the category (category > product). Because new brands have relatively low awareness, they need to use category awareness or bonuses + unique differentiated selling points of products to convert consumers within the category. The focus is on A2-A3 groups, increasing interest through product differentiation content, strengthening interactions to establish connections, and promoting orders and purchases.

Focus: 0 to 1 verification. That is: verify the product and demand hypothesis. The measurement standard is (conversion efficiency) sales. The biggest problem at this stage is the adaptation of product and demand; product and content; product and media. In the final analysis, it comes down to the answer, investment and conversion efficiency.

Usually at this stage, we start with a single point or a single product, use the single point as a pilot, and use the single product for penetration. During this stage, we need to have brand thinking. However, it is definitely not a big deal to build the brand immediately. We still need to develop around this product and solve the problem of product sales.

That is: effective distillation of the product's unique and differentiated selling points.

How to get started with the product:

Starting from the function, find support in craftsmanship and raw materials. At this stage, the product selling points should be less empty and more practical. That is: visible, tangible, somatosensory, and visual. It is not only about refining the selling points, but also considering the presentation form of the selling points. Whether it is the product and the content, the product and the media, whether it is pictures and texts or short videos, can the selling points be brought out, and whether the expressiveness, penetration, and perception are strong.

Single point breakthrough, concentrate resources on one medium, one sector under one medium, one type of KOL under one sector, and penetrate with one keyword.

For example: three and a half

In the early stage, the focus was on Xiachufang and Perfect Diary focused on Xiaohongshu. If one of them didn’t work, then neither of them worked. But if one of them worked, basically 80% of the methods can be copied. Finding the right adaptation points behind the needs is very critical. The rest is copying, amplification, and conversion rate indicators.

For example: Swisse

When launching blood orange essence, in the first phase of Xiaohongshu, the focus was on the benefits of blood orange and why blood orange can supplement collagen, helping consumers understand the benefits of blood orange. The product was even named after its function: blood orange collagen liquid (rather than blood orange essence).

The product’s nickname “Collagen Liquid” lowers the consumer’s cognitive threshold, and what you see is what you get; by promoting its efficacy and principles, it helps consumers understand the efficacy of blood oranges.

Phase II: 10 million to 100 million, 10 times faster growth

Keywords: Enlarge the target population

Expanding from A2/3 to A1, if the focus is still on A2/3 at this stage, it will inevitably lead to weak growth in the later stage. Through matrix placement and advertising exposure, we can target A1 and increase the base of the exposed population.

Usually, in the 100-100 million stage, most brands are not faced with traffic problems, but with the problem of how to occupy the minds of users as soon as possible and how to cultivate the minds of users. Therefore, in the second stage, we should gradually form the actions, routines and strategies for brands to occupy the minds and cultivate the minds.

Phase 1: Focus on product + content + conversion

Phase 2: Start taking branding into consideration

The law of quantity is the basic law. Exposure, reach, interaction, and conversion can increase sales tenfold. In addition to secondary reach and conversion of existing users, the core is to increase the initial value equivalent and expand the basic base.

From 10 million to 100 million, the sales growth is 10 times faster. How did we achieve this 10 times growth? There are two key points: 1) product line expansion, 2) channel penetration.

1. Product expansion

The expansion here is to extend the specifications and sizes of the original hot-selling products upwards and downwards. A, APro, A-. Instead of changing the product items, the purpose is to expand the consumer stratification through product expansion and meet the needs of consumers at different levels. Product flavoring can also be used to expand products. Whether it is product expansion (A, APro, A-) or flavor extension, the consistency of the items must be maintained, or the basic tone of the brand must be maintained.

2. Channel penetration

Channel penetration is not just about online and offline, but also about media penetration. Exposure is a hard indicator. It is best to choose a region with high potential, a city with high potential in a region with high potential, a channel with high potential in a city with high potential, and a terminal with high potential in a channel with high potential.

What is high potential energy? For example: whether a restaurant is a big store, whether it is a chain, whether it ranks high on Dianping.com, and whether it can accept membership cards. A big store has higher potential energy than a small store, a chain has higher potential energy than a single store, a store ranked high on Dianping.com has higher potential energy than a store ranked low, and a store that can accept membership deposits has higher potential energy than a store that cannot accept membership deposits.

Start to catch the rhythm online to get hot sales, category first, single product first. The value of being first is to accumulate credibility for the brand. 618, Double Eleven, and New Year's Day should be planned 3-5 weeks in advance.

• The rhythm of leading products should be positioned
• Off-site traffic needs to be coordinated
• In-site purchases require investment
• Brand PR needs to keep up
• Cross-border joint venture

For example, in the case of Xiaoxiandun, in 2018, it mainly focused on weight loss and skin care; in 2019, it enhanced the extension of the concept of pregnancy care and anti-aging, and at the same time increased the percentage of skin care recommendations from 28% to 45%. This means that the combination of skin care and function is effective.

Focusing on the A2-A3 population, complete the user population portrait, and based on the A2-A3 user population portrait, iterate keywords and penetrate the population.

After April 2019, the scenarios for Xiaoxiandun's advertising began to change. The proportion of "weight loss" scenarios decreased to 11%, and the proportion of "skin care" scenarios was the highest, accounting for more than 45% of the total. The proportion of "pregnancy care" and "freezing age" scenarios increased significantly, and the proportion of "health preservation" scenarios was still at the bottom.

We used super-head KOLs to increase awareness, and used "weight loss", "skin care", "anti-aging", "health preservation", and "pregnancy care" as keywords for penetration. We gradually developed the core keywords: skin care as the main focus, health preservation as the foundation, pregnancy care, and anti-aging as the grass-planting strategy to penetrate the population.

Phase 3: 100 million to 1 billion

Keyword: Upperweight

This stage is also 10 times, the same question is where does the 10 times come from?

(1) Online + Offline

(2) Breaking the circle and attracting new users

(3) Move to a higher level

The core is to rely on the pull of the brand to drive sales growth. In other words, at this stage, simply talking about products, traffic, and conversion is not enough to support sales growth. It is necessary to combine brands, products, traffic, and content. Only at this stage can we enter a comprehensive stage of product, effect, and sales integration.

Brand actions extend from brand and category groups to interest groups, attracting interested groups through top-tier product promotion + celebrity endorsements + brand crossover + advertising and public relations, enlarging traffic entrances, and gradually transitioning from A2-A3 groups to A1 and O consumer groups. The purpose of crossover and brand co-branding is to break the boundaries of categories, and the core of crossover is also to attract new traffic.

The focus of this stage is on breaking the circle and attracting new customers among the O and A1 groups:

• Attract new customers within the category: users who are interested in competing products or the same category

• Attract new customers from similar products: Analyze the overlap between the customer groups of this product and similar products, and conduct targeted marketing to customers who have similar products performing well but the customer group needs to improve.

• Attract new customers across product categories: Compare with your own 5A customers to see which product categories have higher TGI besides your own product, and target the corresponding industry groups with the product.

• Attract new customers by using the scene crowd: Based on personalized demands, we can tap into the scene crowd with a high overlap rate and large scale with the 5A crowd.

From brand users, to competitor users, to category users, to cross-category users, and finally to scenario users. Only by constantly breaking through the circle can we maintain growth, especially in the stage of crossing the chasm; this is even more true for achieving exponential growth - traffic, breaking the circle, conversion, operation, and sedimentation of mind.

Based on consumer portrait labels and sales base data: define the brand's core portrait labels and lock in the A4-A5 core strategic groups: emerging white-collar workers, senior middle-class, sophisticated mothers, small town youth, Gen Z (Generation Z), urban silver-haired people, small town middle-aged and elderly people, and urban blue-collar workers. Based on the A4-A5 portraits, attract new user circles to increase traffic.

now that:

The right person (user portrait)

Multi-level (5A tiered)

Multi-dimensional reach (off-site and on-site)

Stage 4: 5 Billion Club

Keywords: Mind penetration, building a moat

Through long-term operations and content output, the brand improves the ROI of O-A1-A3-A4, strengthens the continuous reach of A5 super users, and drives the long-term compound value of the brand.

• Only by taking into account all aspects at the organizational level, from products to marketing, to channels, and finally to the supply chain, and even talent management and financial management, can we build a solid wall and consolidate the moat.
• At the brand level, we use multiple dimensions, multiple frequencies, and multiple touches to build a full-link brand growth from advertising to content marketing, and then to scenarios, not only online but also including the penetration of offline channels.

The method of spending money to buy traffic in exchange for sales is acceptable in the early stages of a brand. However, if the brand still relies on traffic in exchange for sales in the middle and late stages, the brand will have to work for KOLs and Internet celebrities. In essence, KOLs and Internet celebrities are channels, not brands themselves. Selling goods and building brands are two different things. If users trust KOLs, not brands.

This means that the company's brand has not really established the mind and brand awareness among the target population. Once the consumer's mind is saturated, it will be very difficult to break into it again - the key to seizing the opportunity is the window period of the category. Once consumers are overloaded with a certain type of information, it is difficult for them to remember the same type of information.

For example, from 2017 to 2020, Neiwai has 110 retail experience stores in 29 first- and second-tier cities across the country, and has strategic cooperation with first-tier owners such as Kerry, Sun Hung Kai, Swire, Hang Lung, and China Resources. On the one hand, choosing a high-potential business district as the location of an offline store can reflect the brand image and effectively form brand endorsement.

On the other hand, as traffic becomes more and more expensive, offline channels can bring brands greater room for category expansion and more development opportunities. With the help of the layout of offline channels, Neiwai has gradually expanded from underwear to home casual wear, dance sports and home products.

5. Three Natures

1. Single product flanks to create hot items

In a new category, avoid competition and focus resources through single product strategy. First online, then offline, use online data and then combine it with offline to select a sample market for testing. Including: product, taste, packaging, online KOL/KOC recommendation discourse system, offline channel selection and terminal display, promotion methods, and recommendation words.

2. Focus and magnification, series extension

After a single product is running and sales have stabilized from the primary level to a certain level, it is necessary to launch the second stage rocket. That is, after completing the adaptation of the original channel, the original market, and the original population in the model market, according to the channel characteristics of the model market and the extraction characteristics of online KOLs and KOCs, gradually expand to the second and third battlefields (products).

In this process, through the stratification of users' sales data, we find the original users with high potential, high consumption and high repurchase rate and make good data storage to prepare for the later customer conversion and referral.

3. Reach out to the right people repeatedly

From single products to series products, the essence is to expand the category space and expand the category boundaries. In this process, we should do a good job in category value management and user operation. Activate and repurchase the original users. Constantly return to the origin to form the repurchase and word-of-mouth communication of old users, and then amplify from one ripple to another.

Public relations focuses on the category to create category value, and offline focuses on the original channels to achieve secondary and multiple touches on users. In addition, in the vacant price space, defensive brand preparations should be made (depending on the company's foundation) to effectively prevent low-end price competition.

Author: Houshan Guest House

WeChat public account: Laogao Business and Brand (ID: PPD6977}