Some thoughts for May 2023!

This article is the author’s personal summary of one month’s experience. It is divided into ten points to describe thoughts on copywriting, operations, marketing experience, etc. I hope that after reading it, readers can also try to summarize their own monthly experience, and perhaps they will also gain a lot.

1. The copywriter should write without any sense of copywriting

Sir Sheng Jiahua said that copywriters should write without a sense of copywriting, and should not always think about how to make the copywriting moving.

We should not let the audience think that this advertisement is good or this copy is good. Instead, we should let them think that this content is good, this product is good, and feel that this brand is like this.

What we really want to serve is this product and this brand. If people just read the copy, or just praise the copy, then it seems like putting the cart before the horse.

To be honest, I haven't heard managers of big advertising companies say this for a while. It's really good. Copywriting is supposed to serve brands, not creators.

2. Innovation that meets user needs

No matter what we do nowadays, we always say that we need innovation and differentiation, but after saying it over and over again for a long time, it seems to have changed: innovation for the sake of innovation, and differentiation for the sake of differentiation.

For example, when making a product or holding an event, why do we need innovation? To be different from others, right? Why do we need to be different from others? To form a competitive barrier, right? What is the key to a competitive barrier? Is it innovation?

I think you have to think about this like this: innovation is a demand from your own subjective perspective. Is innovation the demand in the user's mind? No, what the user wants is "better", which is the real demand.

If what you make is very innovative, but it does not meet the needs of users, it is useless. Therefore, whether it is innovation or differentiation, the key is to start from the user's perspective and work hard around "better".

3. Content quality is fundamental

One very obvious observation this year is that the traffic distribution of Douyin and Xiaohongshu is changing visibly.

As far as Douyin is concerned, more emphasis has been placed on natural traffic, while commercial traffic is gradually narrowing and does not have as much support as before; and Xiaohongshu is taking a further step in standardizing commercial grass-planting notes, cutting commercial traffic, and suppressing businesses that take advantage of the situation to grab commercial traffic.

To put it bluntly, both platforms are finely dividing commercial traffic and content-based traffic, and are trying to balance the commercial and content nature of the platform. The purpose is simple and reasonable, which is to make money, and to make money continuously.

Content quality has always been their foundation. Whether it is Douyin or Xiaohongshu, it is always a content platform, and only secondarily a marketing platform.

This is true for the platform, and for the brands and merchants on the platform. If you still only pursue quick marketing like in the past, you will find it increasingly difficult to do so this year.

4. Copy, Copy, Copy

Many people are asking what the secret is to creating popular articles on Xiaohongshu and what methods are there?

For the very few people out there, my advice is to create with heart, polish your original work, and work hard on your content.

For most people, my advice is to copy, copy, copy. All the results and methods you want are in the copy. You should read more popular articles, not a few times a month, not once a week, but every day. Go to Xiaohongshu every day to read dozens of popular articles carefully, analyze their topics, titles, covers, content structure, video scripts, etc., and save them in the material library.

Copy when you should copy, imitate when you should imitate, innovate when you should innovate, and extend when you should extend. This is true for Xiaohongshu and Douyin. Whether it is the bottom, the waist, or the top, this is an ironclad experience.

5. Collect “complaints”

When creating content, you can actually find opportunities from the "complaints" of thousands of netizens.

Working 996 is a complaint, new employees starting out as chores is a complaint, friends not being able to borrow money is a complaint, boyfriends not understanding romance is a complaint... Wherever there are complaints, there are points of resonance and points of explosion.

You can collect "complaints" and then develop content based on them. You can amplify "complaints" and be a caring mouthpiece; you can ridicule "complaints" and trigger resonance; you can help solve "complaints" and be a value transmitter...

Complaints are everywhere, and if they are endless, then content opportunities will also be endless.

6. Successful Cases

Many successful marketing cases are used as cases because they just happen to meet a certain theory of the narrator. It is not because it uses this theory that it is successful, but because it succeeds first, and then it is deduced to this theory, so of course it fits perfectly and makes sense no matter how you say it. Of course, the same applies to another marketing theory, and it is definitely a perfect fit when deduced backwards. The core is that it succeeds.

Even if it is the same operation, what if it fails? That is not a success case, but a failure case, and it is not a failure of theory. They will attribute it to the failure of a certain operation. It is still reasonable to use reverse reasoning, first determine a conclusion, and then find the basis.

Therefore, for a marketing case, no matter whether it is a success or a failure, what is important for us is to read more, analyze more, relate it to our own business, and accumulate experience; rather than simply listen to what others say, because basically what others say is reasonable.

7. Overestimate the speed of learning and underestimate the difficulty of success

When it comes to unfamiliar areas, we often underestimate the difficulty of accomplishing something and overestimate the speed of learning.

Just like the now popular Douyin live broadcast and Xiaohongshu recommendation, many job seekers can start talking big right away, saying what they should do and what they should do, and they have a lot of sets of words to say. If you don’t understand them, you will really think that what they say is great.

But those who understand can quickly tell that he doesn’t understand or is unfamiliar. Sometimes companies also make this mistake, when they want to enter a new field, they don’t think of hiring an external person who understands the field, but instead they think of promoting someone from within.

There are many reasons, but the results are often unsatisfactory. Unfamiliarity is unfamiliarity. Wasting the team's time and financial resources is a small matter, but losing the market opportunity is not worth it.

8. If there are too many rumors, no one will believe the truth

Former US President Barack Obama said in a speech at Stanford University: "If you spread enough rumors and plant enough conspiracy theories in a country, people in that country will not know what to believe."

Today's Internet comment section is such a vivid and naked portrayal. Every time a major social event occurs, some media and "Internet celebrities" will have a party. It doesn't matter what the truth is. What is important is to incite emotions and the continuous super traffic.

Some even resort to rumors and fabrications to gain more traffic, shamelessly. If there are too many rumors, no one will believe the truth . There are more and more examples now.

9. Knowledge, Insight, and Courage

As I grow older, I believe more and more that you can't just bury your head in learning knowledge and skills, you also have to improve your knowledge and slowly develop the courage to deal with things.

Knowledge determines your lower limit, insight changes your outlook, and courage determines your upper limit. As Kazuo Inamori said, "In order to survive, people must master a variety of knowledge. However, just knowing this knowledge is almost useless, and knowledge must be upgraded to insight. However, this is not enough, and you need strong determination and the courage to not be moved by anything."

mutual encouragement.

Author: Mumu Old Thief

Source: WeChat public account "Mumu Laozei"