The most profitable track in the private sector? 3 secrets to double the performance of the private sector of health products

As the public's health awareness increases, people's consumption concepts and ideas about health products have changed, and the status quo of the industry has also changed. However, many health product industries are too focused on sales, which leads to the "death" of private domains. So what is the key to doing a good job in private domains in the health product industry?

In recent years, as the public's health awareness has continued to increase, people's consumption concepts and willingness for health products have changed, and the entire industry has also shown a rapid upward trend.

According to statistics, the market size of China's health care products industry reached 298.9 billion yuan in 2022, a year-on-year increase of 10.4%, and is expected to reach 328.2 billion yuan in 2023.

But as far as the current situation is concerned, the industry's pain points are also very obvious:

Over the years, negative information has frequently appeared, and some health care product companies have engaged in false advertising, resulting in a decrease in consumers' trust in this category of products; health care products are no longer targeting a single elderly group, but more and more young people, and a single routine cannot meet market demand; due to the category itself, it is difficult to promote, customer acquisition is passive, and loss is also high.

Looking at the current health care product market, brands of all sizes are doing private domain business: DTC nutrition brand LemonBox’s private domain revenue exceeded RMB 100 million, with a repurchase rate of nearly 40%, becoming the top brand in the category; By-Health has accumulated more than 100,000 private domain users, with a private domain customer price 40% higher than Tmall, and sales exceeding RMB 10 million...

However, many health care product companies are too focused on sales, and when they do private domain, they only want to make money, which can easily lead to the failure of private domain. So, in the health care product industry, what is the key to doing a good job in private domain?

Combining the industry pain points and cases, I believe that in addition to ensuring high-quality products, the most important thing is to do well in three key points: building trust, creating a fission retention system, and creating refined services.

01 Build trust

For many years, the health care product market has been a mixed bag, with many health care product companies engaging in false advertising and exaggerating the functions of health care products, resulting in consumers having a bad first impression of health care products, either thinking they are "taxes on IQ" or "scams."

Therefore, health care product users have a strong need for trust. For merchants, quickly establishing trust with customers can largely determine whether the final transaction is successful.

Generally speaking, "establishing an IP" is the most effective way to build trust in private domain scenarios. Different IPs can be created based on the user profile and actual business needs of the enterprise.

For example: for health care products that produce children’s nutrition, you can create the IP image of a “child nutritionist”; for health care products targeting the elderly, you can create the IP image of a “health consultant”.

For example, we previously worked on an IP for a well-known health care product company and created an IP for a "body manager."

In order to make this image more realistic and full, we gave her the identity of a fitness coach with rich fitness experience. At the same time, she is also a fashion expert, good at communication, and likes to share her weight loss and exercise experience.

Of course, IP also needs specific content to support it. Good content is also the key to building trust, which involves how to write the specific copy.

Here is a copywriting formula for reference:

Product + scenario + problem solving

For example, the copy about "energy bars": I drove back to my hometown today. The food at the service station on the way was too bad, and I was in a hurry to go back to see my mother. I prepared more energy bars, which can not only control weight but also resist hunger. 6 bars are enough. The taste is good, I like the sesame flavor.

This type of copywriting not only introduces the product, but also involves one’s own life. It is best to add pictures to make it more authentic and believable. It would be even better if you could add a sentence like “I haven’t seen my mother for several years, so I bought her a gift.”

There are a few key points to note for daily operations:

1) When communicating with users, don’t put too much pressure on them, just express your sincerity. Nowadays, everyone has a few health care product sellers on their phone, and the most annoying thing is harassment. If you are sincere and neither humble nor arrogant, you will win the respect of customers.

2) When doing sales or activities, do not send all the content to customers in bulk, but send it in a targeted manner. Remember not to send private messages to customers, as this will disturb them. If customers feel that the content you send is irrelevant and useless to them, they will stop paying attention to you in the future.

3) In daily operations, you must interact with customers more often, like and comment. Normal greetings on holidays must be there, and gifts should be arranged according to the "importance" of the user to make the user feel warm.

Tips: Make sure every customer has a need, and believe that your product can definitely help your friends, so it is very important to eat it yourself. If your friends think that you don’t even eat your own food, how can they let me buy it?

02 Create refined services

In people's traditional concept, the elderly have relatively low health level and weaker immunity, and are the main consumer group of health care products. However, as people's pace of life accelerates, health care products are no longer exclusive to the elderly and the elderly, and more and more young people who are anxious about their health are joining the health care army.

Data shows that there are more than 15,000 types of health food products in my country, and the penetration rate among people aged 34 and below is over 30%. On average, each urban resident spends more than 1,000 yuan per year on health and wellness, and young consumers aged 18-35 account for as high as 83.7%.

Therefore, there are more and more types of health care products now, and the target groups are becoming more and more refined. The health care products that were targeted at middle-aged and elderly people in the past are outdated, so companies need to create different services and conversion strategies based on your different users.

How to do it specifically? There are three steps.

The first step is to establish the brand style.

First, be clear about your user group and create a corresponding brand image and style.

For example, many brands have launched "healthy snacks" for young people. Unlike the traditional health food ingredients that need to be steamed, boiled, stewed, or simmered before consumption, young people prefer "ready-to-eat after opening the bag".

The appearance of the products has also changed to soft candies, jellies, drinks, etc., and the taste is similar, making young people feel that they are as burden-free as eating snacks.

There are even brands that have started looking for idol stars to endorse their products, targeting young people. This breaks the impression that traditional health products prefer middle-aged stars.

The second step is to label your users and improve their user portraits.

If we can understand users' consumption habits, product usage and consumption, we can more easily judge users' current needs and reduce unnecessary marketing interruptions.

The best way is to tag. Use more tools to enrich the user's tags as much as possible.

Taking the DTC nutrition brand "LemonBox" as an example, they do it this way: after the user enters the private domain mini program, they need to first complete a 3-5 minute "personal nutrition questionnaire" survey to fully enrich the user labels.

From the four dimensions of basic information, nutritional goals, living habits, and physical condition, we can understand the user's health status and clarify the user's physical improvement needs in order to provide more scientific solutions.

After the survey is completed, in addition to a detailed report, the brand will also develop a nutrition plan for users as a nutritionist to facilitate conversions directly within the mini program.

The third step is to develop conversion strategies based on stratification.

Users can be divided into three categories: low price sensitivity (high consumption), high price sensitivity (strong demand for discounts), and medium price sensitivity (strong demand for efficacy).

Then formulate speech strategies for these three types of users, such as:

For the low price-sensitive group, the focus is on the time control of the return visit. The content mainly revolves around the output of professional content, service value output, and emotional value provision; for the high price-sensitive group, price comes first, and discounts come first. Feedback to operational actions means reducing the frequency of operations, ensuring that the activity is notified as soon as possible after it is launched, and the content focuses on completing the packaging of value perception with discount value; for the medium price-sensitive group, the return visit time also needs to be controlled to establish their awareness of the brand and category, and induce conversion over a long period of time.

As the saying goes, "Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will never be defeated in a hundred battles." When facing different users, of course we must make an effort to understand them and provide the right help in order to establish trust and long-term relationships.

03 Build a fission retention system

Many health care product brands have encountered such a dilemma:

Due to category restrictions, health products cannot be promoted through many channels, and customer flow is heavily dependent on offline stores or online platforms. Moreover, for merchants who lack customer management, user loss is serious and it is difficult to retain users, which increases operating costs.

While we need to do a good job in the private domain, we must also pay attention to the public domain. Only when the public domain continuously provides traffic can the private domain continue to operate.

Brands can set up traffic-generating touchpoints around multiple platforms such as official accounts, video accounts, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, etc., covering all platforms (if conditions permit), and establish strong links with users through these touchpoints.

After introducing users into the private domain, how to attract customers at low cost? Or even retain them for a long time? The most common way is fission, which can bring in a large number of new customers in a short period of time.

Taking LemonBox as an example, two fission activities were designed within the mini program.

1) Invite with gifts: Encourage old customers to attract new customers to complete the first order conversion through discounts. After the old customer sends an invitation, the invitee will receive a 20% discount first order experience coupon. After successfully placing an order, the inviter will receive a 30 yuan cashback.

2) Gift-giving activities: Old customers can directly receive LemonBox-related products, or they can receive customized gifts by filling out a health questionnaire. The recipient’s health information can be filled out by the gift giver, or the questionnaire can be forwarded to the recipient to fill out personally, creating more touchpoints between the recipient and the brand.

In addition, there are different forms of fission gameplay such as group buying, bargaining, distribution, and lottery, which can also have a good drainage effect in the private domain, but it requires a good path design, a clear budget, and consideration of risks.

When it comes to private domains, user retention and retention are also very important. Therefore, LemonBox uses membership points and WeChat after-sales service to improve user retention.

On the one hand, a 30-day check-in activity was launched, and users can set a daily reminder time. The nutritional tips after each check-in also allow users to continuously enrich their cognition and feel the brand's dedication.

After completing the check-in task, you can get "lemon value" points as rewards. More "lemon value" can also unlock exclusive discounts, shipping discounts, priority delivery and other membership benefits. These gameplays are all directly referenced by brands.

Final Thoughts

The above are the key points for the health care products industry to develop private domains, from building trust, to developing refined operation services, to fission and retention systems. The core is to start from the health needs of users and grasp their demands.

Author: Yan Tao San Shou WeChat public account: Yan Tao San Shou