Why is Hema’s marketing so addictive?

Nowadays, good marketing is undoubtedly a crucial step in building a brand. This article takes Hema as an example to explain Hema's marketing methods in detail, which can provide a good reference for operators. Let's take a look.

Use conflict to update brand image. In the era of attention involution, anxiety is common. It is said that brands need to play with memes, but it is easy to fall into the maze of talking to oneself. It is not easy to really trigger interaction or even resonance.

Returning to the essence of marketing, the test is actually very simple: the ability to tell stories. Literature is like looking at mountains, and you don’t like flatness. The same is true for brand marketing. Just as the marketing master Ye Maozhong said in "Conflict": first-class marketing creates conflict.

A story without conflict is at best a narrative. So how should marketing evolve from brand narrative to brand story?

Good at capturing emotions, measuring trends and being good at benchmarking, Hema has multiple labels. What kind of "conflict" codes can we see by disassembling this "brand portrait"?

1. The unique brand narrative of the lucky draw "mistake" and the lively and interesting play

How should the brand story be told so that it can be truly remembered?

HEMA has set an example with its unique brand narrative rules: seizing the topic’s triggering points and leveraging attention flow.

From the perspective of brand narrative, HEMA gave up straightforward narration and instead took the initiative to grasp the sense of "conflict" that goes against common sense, so as to maximize the input-output ratio.

Under the key issue of "conflict", Hema communicated with consumers through content, showing the profound strength of its brand characteristics. How to turn decay into magic?

The first keyword is the "drama queen" personality, and the key action is the "rollover-style lucky draw." Hema has done a good job in social media marketing, and every Weibo post seems to be a joke, but what continues to cause a frenzy is its unconventional lucky draw action.

Last summer, Hema held a "free water" lottery, "how much weight you weigh, how much water you get!". Life is unexpected, Weibo became a carnival scene for the zoo's official V. The netizen who won the lottery gave the chance to Yunnan Wildlife Park. Amy, the giraffe in the park, weighed 960 kilograms... Seeing Hema "suffering from its own actions", "no words can be said", forming the first "conflict".

The charm of the lucky draw drama continues - Hema will show the follow-up of the prize redemption and go to the warehouse to take real photos of 960 kilograms of drinking water. The intuitive visual impact allows us to feel the shock of this overturn and realize the second "conflict".

In addition to the 960 kilograms of water delivered in 2022, Hema also delivered "30,900 kilograms of watermelon" in 2019. It also comes from the "dare to think and dare to do" with no upper limit on forwarding.

The story-telling rollover lottery has become Hema's "traditional art". In the summer of 2023, Hema once again held a lottery to give away melons, and exchanged insults with netizens in the forwarding area, constantly creating "conflicts" with unexpected rollovers.

Hema keeps its word and dares to draw and give away gifts, maximizing the "dramatic conflict" from impossible to possible, and opening the traffic valve with a sense of contrast.

The second keyword is "net sense", from copywriting to peripherals, focusing on real life insights. In Hema, oysters without love brains are popular. What is the inevitable relationship between love brains and plump quality? Nonsense copywriting has the mental ability to make people remember it at a glance.

The saying that people are not in love is not groundless. Hema also explained in small print: every spring and summer, oysters become lean and have less meat due to reproduction. Hema's oysters use the time they spend in love to absorb nutrients, so they are plump and delicious.

Not only that, Hema also has pigs that "run in winter and swim in summer", tree tomatoes that "taste a bit weird", Laoshan Shuimian apricots that "seem to have traveled back to the heyday of the Tang Dynasty", and bagels that are "a must-have for breakfast"...

The vivid expression of selling points and the rich details make the brand story more complete. The inspiration close to life cleverly eliminates daily fatigue and brings interesting adjustments in a fresher way.

This also reminds people of the once popular IKEA copywriting. The common point is that it breaks the one-sidedness of talking about products, stands at the height of resonating with people, and expresses the human touch and the taste of life.

Hema’s all-round “meme creation” also establishes its youthful persona very firmly.

When the brand logo was nicknamed "butt face" by netizens, HEMA even applied for the "butt face" trademark (but was rejected); when consumers lamented the happiness of living in "Hequfang" (the area where HEMA can deliver), the name of HEMA's Weibo fan group was also named "Hequfang".

This summer, Hema participated in ChinaJoy for the first time as a retail brand by "cross-border products". The "1.8-meter-high yellow croaker" doll given as a gift at Hema's event went viral on Xiaohongshu, and was once sold for 666 yuan.

With the dual blessing of carnival and hot memes, people are obviously more willing to actively participate in the waves of brand stories, integrate into them, and create small waves.

The wonderful leverage of "conflict" triggered a screen-sweeping storm and transformed brand narrative into a brand story.

2. Store upgrades and joint innovations to increase stickiness and surprises

Marketing is not just about “planting grass” for the brand at the time, but also about “planting trees” of long-term value. The importance of brand innovation is thus highlighted.

Content marketing is a key part of HEMA’s brand barrier construction, but the real moat from a brand perspective is obviously more than that.

Looking deeper, the in-depth integration of business and marketing has also built a second "moat" for the brand's uniqueness.

As the pioneer of new retail, Hema has diversified offline store formats, including Hema Fresh, Hema Outlet and X Member Store, which provide consumers with different levels of shopping experience.

In September of this year, HEMA once again subverted itself and opened its first high-end supermarket Premier Black Label store in Shanghai, covering an area of ​​more than 6,000 square meters.

The new store model also brings a comprehensive upgrade in its internal configuration: Australian Coles 8-hour stone-baked bread, the same Sugarfina candies that Hollywood stars eat, a "Water of the World" area that collects hundreds of drinking water types... 50% are imported, focusing on Western "top products", but more "localized" than traditional boutique supermarkets.

Interestingly, although it is positioned as a high-end supermarket, Hema said: "We focus on 'high-end but not expensive'. Citizens can enjoy high-quality goods and high-level services, but only need to spend less money!

" Experience is king, high-end and affordable, this is also an impressive cognitive "conflict".

Looking at the brand collaboration at the level of "making friends", Hema can also be called a social butterfly. In the current hot joint marketing, Hema has already made outstanding achievements in this field.

As a platform-based enterprise, HEMA has fully leveraged its supply advantages. Instead of simply matching “LOGO×LOGO”, it has demonstrated the characteristics of the joint venture by promoting new products from different dimensions.

In collaboration with the green plum wine brand Meijian, we launched the "Crab Meets Meijian" dish, which not only satisfies the taste buds with its freshness, but also solves the problem of homogeneity in seasonal marketing with its limited innovative gameplay of 1+1＞2.

In a more daring attempt that is similar in form and spirit, HEMA has cooperated with Disney to launch the "Three-Eyed Purple Rice and Taro Green Rice Dumpling", which cleverly combines traditional green rice dumplings with international IP, giving it a whole new level of creative imagination.

We can see that these collaborations are not just a fusion of brands, but are more based on product innovation based on mutual understanding. The inspiration of the collaboration brings limited taste surprises and enhances the product strength.

The essence of consumption is the game between supply and demand. Through the joint venture of Hema, we can also see the deeper essence of joint marketing - interest-driven consumption is no longer for simple "needs", but more personalized "wants".

In addition to delicious food, Hema will also guess what kind of products consumers want, and at the same time provide channel support for joint partners. This has become the "secret" of Hema to maintain a sense of surprise.

3. The growth anxiety of the hit product manufacturing machine behind Hema’s “Moving Mountains”

From the perspective of brand competition, Hema has taken the concept of "conflict" to the end.

Recently, Hema's "Moving Mountains" campaign, which uses "Mountain-Moving Prices" to open up new markets, has attracted much attention. The "mountain" being moved is obviously Sam's Club.

The business war started with a piece of durian Thousand Layer. Originally priced at 128 yuan/kg, durian Thousand Layer is one of the most iconic and popular super items in Sam's Club. Therefore, durian Thousand Layer became the "target" of Hema, and Hema lowered the price of the same product to 39.9 yuan/470g.

Not limited to durian thousand layers, HEMA has continuously expanded its "moving mountains" categories with the strategic proposition of "more, earlier, more affordable", and gradually expanded it to dairy products, fruits, beef, mutton and other daily necessities.

The crude price war is directly reflected in the labels of the product details page of the APP. If you search for "移山" in the Hema App, you can see many products with the blue "移山" banner.

Unlike general price wars, Hema’s price marketing comes like a storm, directly hitting competitors.

Some bloggers even revealed that HEMA even set up a "Mountain Moving Delicious Bus" in front of Sam's Club to accurately intercept offline traffic; it transformed the Ultraman theme store to attract customers from Sam's Club. The incident once became a hot topic on Weibo.

HEMA maintained a high-profile style and vigorously promoted its products, mastering the marketing principle of "conflict" and once again gaining huge attention and traffic.

Looking deeper, this business war is certainly not just an overt price war. Behind it is actually a more intense supply chain competition with international giants.

This business war is not only about competing for shelf space, but also about testing the ability of enterprises to integrate resources. This is also a path to cultivate basic skills. Within Hema, organizational and supply chain changes that are invisible to the outside world have already started.

Looking deeper, Hema, which constantly creates "conflicts", needs to solve the brand growth anxiety in the stock market game. When competition enters the deep water zone, every step of market expansion is to snatch food from the tiger's mouth, which requires a different approach.

If the essence of Hema's "moving mountains" is to capture the new urban middle class, then after the conflict narrative attracts attention, a better shopping experience is the key to changing the situation.

The brand's strengths in youth cannot be separated from HEMA's in-depth understanding of the "conflict" brand story. However, it is obviously not enough to reshape the retail world with this. I am afraid that HEMA needs to bring more multi-dimensional efforts and innovations.

Author:yummy

WeChat public account: Shock Copywriter (ID: SHOCKCW)