Event planning results are poor? It’s time to change your thinking!

Students who work in planning know that online activities are not effective and are far from the expected goals. These are common problems in daily life. So how to solve this problem? The author of the following article will talk about the underlying logic of the activity model. Let's take a look!

Online activities are always ineffective or far from the expected goals. This is a common problem in daily work. There are many reasons for the conversion of activities, in addition to various factors such as gift selection and promotion rhythm. I have always paid special attention to the impact of activity models on conversion.

It is said that if the direction is wrong, all efforts will be in vain. The same is true for activities. If the design of the activity gameplay is not accurate enough, the conversion effect will also be quite different. This article will disassemble the activity model from the following perspectives.

1. The underlying logic of the activity model

If you want to understand what an "activity model" is, let's introduce a concept called "growth model" to help you understand the underlying logic of popular activities.

Whether you want to attract new customers, retain existing customers, or monetize your business, different activity models will bring different results. Based on my thinking in project practice, I have classified activity models based on growth models.

Let's first understand the AARRR and RARRA growth models. These two are very classic growth models. The early growth model emphasized AARRR. Later, as the value of retention in the actual growth of the enterprise became more prominent, the AARRR model evolved into the RARRA growth model. The RARRA growth model emphasizes the retention of platform users and is also the real feedback of the platform's effective users.

It is not difficult to see that no matter how the growth model evolves, the core content is still centered around customer acquisition, activation, retention, revenue, and self-propagation. The activity models derived from this are divided into three categories: new customer acquisition, retention and activation, and paid conversion .

1. New customer acquisition: mainly the old users bring new users model. The most common way to attract new users in the Internet industry is to use red envelopes to attract new users, and customers bring customers in the financial field, etc. All activities are designed around old users bringing new users.
2. Retention and activation: There are sign-in, testing, business development, card collection games, lottery, voice assistance, fun questions and answers, red envelopes, blind box games, etc. These fun and interesting small activities can enhance user stickiness.
3. Paid conversion category: There are bargaining assistance, group buying, limited-time flash sales, and a comprehensive strategy that combines multiple activities.

These activity models are the breakdown of each link of the growth model. No matter which type of activity model, it contains the action of users actively sharing. The design of user participation path and user sharing path in the activity is essential. The above three types of activity models are sorted out for easy understanding. In actual operation, combine the growth goals you want to achieve, select activity models efficiently, and apply them flexibly. Don't solidify your way of thinking.

If a company wants to achieve growth, attracting new customers, retaining existing customers, and converting existing customers into paid customers are essential operations in daily life. Next, I will combine my experience in running activities in the APP and WeChat ecosystem to sort out several commonly used activity model templates.

2. Analysis of the new customer acquisition model

The first model is the new customer acquisition model. Here we will sort out the paths of old customers bringing in new customers. Only by understanding the conversion paths of social activities can we better understand the overall operation chain and operate the project from a more macro perspective.

This is a very common social fission path. Platform existing user A sees the event poster with an event participation QR code on it. User A scans the code to participate in the event. Under the guidance of the event page, an exclusive event poster belonging to A is generated. User A posts the event poster to his own circle of friends. User B sees it in user A's social circle of friends and clicks to help A. When user A's friends help A complete the click-to-help task, the pop-up window on A's re-entry to the event page changes, prompting A to add WeChat to receive the benefits.

If A does not complete the task, he needs to keep sharing the activity to his own circle of friends and social groups. The more he shares, the faster he will complete the task. During A's sharing process, A's friend B thinks the activity is good, and user B also generates his own exclusive poster. Following the same logic, share the activity to the circle of friends, user C helps user B, and the cycle continues. In this way, a complete fission cycle path is created.

3. Deconstruction of the retention and activation model

The second model is the retention-promotion model. The retention-promotion model can be considered from the perspective of behavioral addiction. Users participate in activities and continue to participate in platform activities because of some interest incentives, which increases the activity of the platform. Here is a brief explanation of the logic of user addiction.

1. Trigger. External triggers, such as the theme of the event, the creative copy of the event, the location of the event display ads, the page design style, etc., guide users to participate in the event. Internal triggers are more about the user's deep desire or needs. For example, the game attributes of the event itself can satisfy some fun that users cannot experience in daily life.
2. Action. To motivate users to take action, factors include the ease of operation of the activity itself, whether the process is smooth, whether the steps are concise, whether the cost of understanding the activity is low enough for users, etc. Behavior = motivation + ability + prompts, a trinity that can make behavior happen. Motivation can be felt directly, ability can be objectively evaluated, but prompts are often hidden. Prompts are also a key link in guiding users to take action. This series of actions of motivation + ability + prompts is actually a set of standard processes for building habits.
3. Variable rewards. There are three main forms of variable rewards in the addiction model: social rewards, prey rewards, and self-rewards. Social rewards come from the feedback of social relationships, prey rewards come from the user's pursuit of unknown rewards, and self-rewards come from the desire for individual pleasure. Many activities will have gift rewards, and some will also set up tiered rewards. Continuous check-in activities can get different rewards for a certain number of consecutive days. All of them are positive feedback to users.
4. Investment. It is definitely not enough to just make users addicted, users also need to invest in it. Increase the sunk cost of users for the platform or product and increase the continuous participation of users.

Retention and activation activities require you to accumulate some gameplay suitable for the platform, summarize and think more, and finding the right method is the most important thing.

4. Analysis of the paid conversion model

The third model is the paid conversion model. Let’s use the group buying model to explain it, which is similar to the bargaining model.

Assume that the user shares the activity through an app or mini program, and the first user to participate in the activity pays 1 cent as the group leader to initiate a group purchase. The activity is shared to WeChat groups and Moments, and the sharer's friends see the group purchase activity he sent out and think that the activity offers good discounts. Maybe a product originally priced at 399 yuan can be purchased for only 100 yuan after group purchase, and the person who received the share decisively chooses to participate.

When the number of people in the group is sufficient, the group leader becomes eligible to join the group and can purchase at the group price. During the process, the person being shared can also change his role to become the group leader and take the initiative to invite more friends to join the group.

This was originally a simple activity, but as more and more group leaders participated, the user base of the entire activity continued to increase, and the exposure of the activity became larger and larger. With the help of the distribution ability of the group leader, more users participated.

5. Analysis of the new user acquisition activity page

Finally, let’s disassemble a prototype of a new user acquisition activity page to deepen our understanding of activity planning.

This activity page is a prototype of an activity where old customers bring in new customers. The page consists of four parts.

1. Circle 1 represents clarifying the theme of the activity, letting users know what the activity is about.
2. Circle 2 shows the benefit incentives of the event, which can motivate users to participate and share, and let users know what they can get by participating in the event.
3. Circle 3 displays some marquee and ranking effects of the event. This information is intended to create a popular effect of the event and guide users to participate in the event.
4. Circle 4 displays the QR code for the activity and adds guidance. The share button guides information and is part of the call to action section of the activity page, telling users to act quickly.

If you observe the sharer's activity page carefully, you can see that 1234 is laid out on the activity homepage according to a certain logical structure. When users see this page, they will not feel that each section is independent. It is also designed with user experience in mind and in a reasonable layout.

So when you design the page, don’t limit your understanding and give full play to your imagination. This activity mainly helps the platform achieve the goal of attracting new users, and for users, they can get prizes by completing the corresponding tasks. Therefore, the entry point of the activity is to use gifts as a bridge to connect brands and users.

The activity page incentivizes user participation based on benefits, and also adds a marquee effect, dynamic display of page rankings, QR code guidance, and sharing button guidance, combining many elements.

If you want to plan an online event well and achieve the desired goals, there are many things to consider behind it, in addition to deep insights into users, there is also the flexible application of activity models.

Author: Hu Xianwu; Official Account: Wenli Marketing Notes