This article tells you what is hidden behind “customer needs”?

How to find inspiration from products and discover the most real needs of customers? The author of this article will guide you to find inspiration for products step by step from shopping behavior to customer needs. Taking Taobao APP as an example, the article analyzes and summarizes from the two perspectives of search and browsing. It is recommended for those who are interested in user needs, user experience, and products.

The previous article talked in detail about finding inspiration from the [market] dimension. In this article, I will focus on telling you how to find inspiration for products from [shopping behavior] to [customer needs]...

The so-called demand is that you just need it, and I just happen to be able to satisfy you... (Although the principle is the same, don't get the wrong idea)

So, find a customer group, understand what they "need", and then provide them with a solution or product, and you will make money.

Never say things like "You have nothing and no one needs you" because:

In this world, there will always be someone who needs you, just as you always need others. ——Yu Minhong

However, if you want to understand what customers really "need", I have to start with mobile Internet shopping habits. After all, knowing the customer's recent shopping behavior habits and concerns can help us find the customer's recent needs based on these details.

However, it is already 2023, and everyone’s Internet and shopping habits have changed dramatically compared to previous years. Where can we find inspiration?

In fact, if you want to understand the latest shopping habits and concerns of netizens, the easiest way is to refer to the page layout of the top e-commerce companies. After all, they have a group of experts who study consumer shopping habits every day. For us, it is enough to just "borrow power" from them.

For example, you can directly open the Taobao app on your mobile phone and find the secret through the page layout:

(PS: Taobao is used as an example here, and other platforms can be analyzed with the same idea.)

As shown in the figure, there are several modules on the Taobao homepage: Subscription, Recommendation, Search Box, and Browse Channel.

After entering the "Shopping" channel: follow, discover, short videos;

Therefore, from the perspective of the page layout module, the information here can be summarized into two categories:

A. Active demand: search box;

B. Passive demand: subscription, recommendation, attention, discovery, short video;

To summarize it further, from the perspective of netizens' underlying shopping logic, I can summarize all shopping behaviors into two keywords:

1. search;
2. visit;

You may still be a little confused after reading this. What is the use of finding these two key points?

Don’t worry, Mr. Fox will analyze the secrets for you in detail below…

01 Search

The so-called "search" can be divided into two situations:

a. Customers have clear needs and know what they want. They can directly search for keywords to find the corresponding products and choose to buy them.

b. Customers encounter problems but don’t know how to solve them, so they search for products and solutions.

(PS: This is the principle of the "demand table" we use internally to discover pain points, which will be discussed later)

But no matter whether customers search on Baidu, e-commerce platforms, short video platforms, or any other channels, they are all "looking for" solutions or products. You can understand this behavior as "active demand"!

The advantage of proactive demand is that customers know what they want, or clearly know their problems, and then look for solutions or answers.

The point is that as long as customers perform a "search" action, they will inevitably generate "keywords". Keywords are important indicators that can reveal user behaviors and ideas on the Internet, but this is ignored by most entrepreneurs.

In fact, we only need to use the keywords that customers search for to uncover their real needs and behavioral motivations, and then design products and services in a targeted manner.

For example:

The keyword is also "stop snoring".

a) Searching on e-commerce platforms tends to directly search for products;

At this time, you can also use relevant keywords to find the customer's segmented needs, such as different forms of anti-snoring products: sticky, sleeping, or breathing aids?

You can infer the search status or usage scenarios from the keywords.

For example: Search for "anti-snoring pillow"

This means that in addition to snoring, this group of people may also suffer from cervical spondylosis when sleeping, and need to use pillows to relieve neck pressure;

At the same time, these people do not want to use products such as braces, mouth patches or medications, as these products may make them feel insecure or uncomfortable. The key point is that they hope to solve the problem directly by changing their pillows.

Therefore, on the details page, you have to highlight that your pillow can perfectly solve this kind of problem, and you don’t need other auxiliary products, because other products affect your sleep quality and are not safe...

For example: Search for "anti-snoring ventilator"

This means that most of these people are seriously ill patients who need ventilator assistance. You have to know that people who snore severely may die from brain deprivation of oxygen at any time!

At this time, you need to prove how advanced your machine is, that it is imported from abroad, highly sophisticated, and safe. After all, for customers, this is a life-saving product, so it doesn’t matter if it’s a little expensive…

b) Search engine results are more inclined to understand information and find solutions;

Most of them do not have clear or recognized products, and you need to seek help from search engines or verify the feasibility of the solution.

For example: Search "What is the most effective way to stop snoring"

This indicates that this group of people do not accept any of the known methods to stop snoring, or have no idea about them at all, and hope to find a better product to solve the problem of snoring.

Most of these people have almost no idea about solutions, so you just need to tell them through content that it will be absolutely OK if they choose my product...

For example: Search "Can anti-snoring spray cure snoring?"

This shows that this group of people have a certain understanding of products such as "anti-snoring spray", but they don't know the specific effects and need to verify them.

For this group of people, you first need to verify the feasibility of the product, the product principle, and various effect feedback and customer feedback...
Imply that this type of product is ok, and the other party will pay for it for you!

Behind each keyword, there are different groups of people and needs. Their usage scenarios, demand levels, solutions, and product quality requirements are completely different. You need to use experience to infer the "real needs" hidden in the customers' hearts.

What’s more important is that sometimes customers themselves may not be able to express it clearly because they basically don’t understand the industry, technology, and solutions. Most customers are just looking for a “feeling” when deciding which product to buy.

• If you think this product is reliable, buy it;
• If you think the merchant is right and the person is nice, you will buy from him;
• If you think other buyers’ reviews are useful and the quality is good, you will buy it;

In short, you have to prove that your product is worth buying.

How to prove it?

Just focus on the customer status you infer from the keywords. If that doesn't work, look for inspiration through the demand form...

02 Visit

In addition to searching for solutions directly when encountering problems, many merchants overlook an important shopping behavior: "shopping"!

Back to the real world, we all know that when we are "bored" we go shopping...

The same is true on the Internet. When people are "bored", they will open various apps and "browse" around.

People don’t just “shop” on shopping apps. In fact, when you watch short videos, open various communities, and Weibo, you are actually “shopping”. It’s just that sometimes your purpose is not to buy things, but to kill time. When you happen to see something good, you may place an order immediately. In essence, this is shopping.

Therefore, various forms of e-commerce have been extended, including: community e-commerce, live broadcast e-commerce, short video sales...

The essence of all content e-commerce is to use people's boredom to open various apps and sell products while "browsing". This is a sales method that is worth paying attention to. You can see that the Taobao mobile app directly makes "browsing" a channel, and then branches out "articles" and "short videos" to understand how important this is!

Therefore, "shopping" is the second largest form of product sales besides "search" shopping, also collectively referred to as "content e-commerce."

However, you have to understand that shopping does not necessarily mean buying. The prerequisite for making the customer's brain want to "buy" is that you have to first attract the user's "attention" and then make the customer "moved". This is the so-called "planting grass"!

Therefore, the key point of doing "browsing" business is: create content and attract attention!

However, while attracting attention, you also have to understand the real needs behind your customers’ content...

For example:

When bored people see a beautiful woman dancing with her hips twisting in a live broadcast room, it attracts a lot of attention and there are a lot of onlookers, but it is not certain how many people will buy a lace dress if the beautiful anchor recommends it.

Because most of the people watching beautiful women shaking their buttocks are poor and bored men, it would be good if 1% of them gave you a small tip.

If a beautiful woman shows her succulent potted plants in her home through a live broadcast or video, even if she doesn't say she wants to sell them, many people may actively ask if they can buy them and how much they cost per plant...

Because the people attracted by this are all those who are interested in succulent potted plants. They are interested in your products and attracted by them. When they see beautiful women with succulent plants, men are attracted and women are attracted by them...

Therefore, before you choose to do content e-commerce, you must first design your own positioning, monetization methods, and the needs of the crowd or their focus. If you don’t even know what the other party is concerned about, how can you create content to attract the other party’s attention, so that he will be interested in your products and finally be willing to pay for you?

Trying to earn money from “shopping” customers without positioning is like selling lace dresses to losers, which is ridiculous...

at last

1. No matter whether you do business with "browsing" customers in the form of text, video, or other forms, you need to pay attention that the attributes of the people on different platforms are different, the styles of expression are different, the focus and values ​​of the people are different. You must position your own people and platform attributes in advance. Just like Douyin, Kuaishou, Taobao, Xiaohongshu, and Bilibili, the short video expression methods of each platform are different. You must have a "willing to give up" mentality and cannot be greedy and "take them all."
2. Customers' "searching" and "browsing" are two different shopping behaviors, but they have "commonalities" in some cases, such as interest points, needs generated by recent focus points, etc. If you can understand this article thoroughly and combine the two in one dish, wouldn't it be wonderful to have two flavors of one fish? !

Author: Little Fox

WeChat public account: Fox Loves Nonsense