How to build a private domain team from 0-1?

Nowadays, more and more industries and companies are recruiting private domain talents. Because private domain work is directly facing consumers, if a mistake or error occurs, it may cause a huge crisis. So how should companies build a private domain team? This article is for your reference.

The importance of private domain to current enterprises is no longer needed. For those enterprises that really want to do a good job in private domain, it is essential to form a professional team.

Compared with hiring a third-party team, although the initial cost of building a team yourself is higher, the employees will be more familiar and focused on their own products and tracks, and the dependence on external teams will gradually decrease, and the benefits will become higher and higher.

Therefore, many companies have begun to build their own private domain teams, but they will face many pain points: it is difficult to recruit talents in the private domain, and it is difficult to train and develop talents...

It just so happens that the golden March and April recruitment season is just around the corner. Today, based on past experience, let’s talk about these issues and how companies can build a private domain team from 0 to 1.

01Private domain talent dilemma: Why is it difficult to find private domain talent?

Nowadays, more and more industries and companies are recruiting private domain talents, and the supply of private domain-related positions is obviously less than the demand. According to the "2019-2022 Private Domain Talent Demand and Salary Survey Report" released by Jianshi and 51job, the year-on-year growth rate of private domain job postings in 2021 was 41.53%, and the new demand for private domain talents in 2022 is expected to reach 1.1 million.

Take one of our consulting clients as an example. A well-known domestic maternal and infant brand planned to recruit a private domain manager to be in charge of the entire private domain team at the beginning of its consumer strategy project. However, in the actual process, it faced many problems, such as:

Lack of experience makes it impossible to judge the level of job seekers; insufficient budget makes it impossible to attract outstanding talents; the talents recommended by headhunters are not very competent; ...

In fact, it is not difficult to understand why companies cannot find the talents they want. Based on my experience, I think there are several main reasons:

1. HR does not understand the business

We often hear many business leaders complain that HR recruited the wrong people, whose resumes looked good but were completely incompetent for the job and became a burden. The reason is that many HRs do not understand the private domain-related business at all, do not understand the strategy and architecture, and cannot correctly judge whether the talent is suitable for the company, resulting in the wrong recruitment.

2. The conditions offered by the enterprise are not competitive at all

Too many companies say they are eager to recruit talented people, but when they actually meet outstanding talents, the conditions they offer are really poor. Especially for traditional companies, they always want to spend little money to achieve great things, and the conditions for recruiting are extremely strict. It would be a miracle if they can recruit outstanding talents.

According to data, in 2022, the proportion of private sector jobs with a salary of more than 10,000 yuan will reach 50%, and the highest monthly salary of private sector jobs will reach 130,000 yuan. Only by showing sincerity can you reap rewards.

3. Geographical factors

According to the survey, the top five cities that pay the most attention to private domains are Guangzhou, Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, and Hangzhou, which means that the corresponding private domain talents are also concentrated in these cities.

Therefore, if the city where your company is located is not attractive, it will be more difficult to recruit scarce private sector talents, especially managers. Not being able to choose the best is like choosing a "general" from a group of "dwarfs". You can only choose the right one.

4. Outstanding talents prefer new consumer brands

In the past two years, various new consumer brands have continued to emerge. Compared with traditional companies, these brands are more pursuing speed, like self-iteration, and attach great importance to private domains.

This kind of environment is undoubtedly very attractive to private domain talents. Not only does it provide greater room for development, but it also makes it easier to produce corresponding data and results.

Although it is difficult to recruit people, it does not mean that we have to lower the requirements for the position. On the contrary, we should set strict standards. Because private domain work is directly facing consumers, a mistake or a mistake may cause a huge crisis. So what standards should we use to recruit people?

02Job Requirements Reference

The first step in recruitment is to set job responsibilities as the basic threshold for recruitment. The following are the job responsibilities of common positions in private domain teams for reference.

In business practice, we have concluded that a standard private domain team usually includes the following positions: 1 person in charge, content group (1-2 people), planning group (1-2 people), operation group (1-2 people), 1 data analyst, and 1 product selection group.

Image source: Super User Growth

As the scale of the private domain expands, appropriate supplements can be made. Below we will talk about the work and responsibilities of each position in detail.

1. Person in charge of private domain operations

This plays a key role in determining whether private domain traffic operations can be rapidly promoted and successful.

As the person in charge, he needs to have a strong recognition and confidence in private domain traffic and be willing to promote and participate in it. The professional requirements are that he needs to be familiar with the Internet and have social thinking and user thinking.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Responsible for the overall promotion of the project and the management and arrangement of team work.
2. Responsible for coordinating internal and external organizations and resources of the company to promote the smooth implementation of the project.
3. Responsible for controlling and evaluating the standards of each work module in private domain operations, such as copywriting content and activity plan review.
4. Responsible for the analysis of project data, and timely adjustments and improvements based on actual conditions.

【Assessment indicators】

1. Sales data, user activity, and super user ratio generated by private domain traffic.
2. After an enterprise launches a super user plan, the number and activity of super users become important parts of the assessment.

2. Copywriting

This is a very important position in the execution position, because private domain operations involve a lot of content, including long content, short content, event copywriting, product copywriting, etc.

The purpose of copywriting is to build user trust and promote transactions. Therefore, you must find an editor who has copywriting experience and preferably some marketing thinking.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Responsible for the operational planning, writing and publishing of the overall content output of WeChat (group).
2. Responsible for the writing and modification of product copy in WeChat.
3. Responsible for helping planners write and revise event and promotion copy.
4. Responsible for counting data such as likes, comments, and interactions on the content in the Moments.

【Assessment indicators】

1. Average number of interactions with your content.
2. Efficiency of content (number of review revisions).
3. Familiarity with IP.
4. The number of intended consultations generated.
5. The copy directs traffic to the mini program.

3. Planning

Planning sounds like giving advice and thinking of ideas, which may be the impression of many people for a long time. However, the planning team responsible for private domain traffic is mainly responsible for guiding the planning of adding users, as well as the planning of user activity and sales conversion.

Planning is not just about coming up with an idea, but about implementing the idea and formulating a plan based on the actual situation of the company's resources.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Responsible for regularly planning marketing activities for Moments, WeChat groups or holidays to increase user stickiness and create sales conversions.
2. Responsible for planning and implementing plans to guide users to add WeChat.
3. Responsible for submitting activity theme planning, formulating processes, writing activity plans, coordinating content and community operations to achieve the purpose of the activity.
4. Responsible for the follow-up, supervision and data feedback of the implementation of the event, and submitting a summary and review report after the event.

【Assessment indicators】

1. It mainly guides the number of fans added, the number of activities per month, the number of participants and the sales generated by the activities.

4. Customer Operations

This position mainly involves two types of work: operation and maintenance of the community and answering inquiries from private domain users.

We may think this is a bit like customer service work, but I think there is a big difference. In the past, customer service work was to answer whatever the user asked, but the requirement for private domain customer operations is sales-oriented customer service. He needs to find sales opportunities based on the user's questions and sell the product.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Responsible for answering various questions from WeChat private chat users.
2. Responsible for the operation and maintenance within the community.
3. Responsible for interacting with users by liking and commenting on their Moments.
4. Responsible for timely updating and synchronizing Moments and WeChat group information (can be omitted if there is software).
5. Responsible for designing standard interaction and communication scripts for different user scenarios.
6. Responsible for guiding users to complete sales transactions and providing consultative sales.

【Assessment indicators】

1. Service time
2. Label completeness
3. Private chat interaction ratio
4. Intention and transaction volume
5. Response speed

5. Data Analysis

This position is very important because it can identify problems and patterns from the operations that have already occurred and continuously optimize and adjust the operations.

Data analysts are not only responsible for collecting and organizing data, but also for analysis. However, in the early stages, operations managers are often the only ones who can do this.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Summarize and organize daily data.
2. Analyze and summarize data trends.
3. Provide reference guidance and suggestions.

【Assessment indicators】

1. The main assessment is whether the analytical suggestions provided are reasonable and effective, and whether other data in various aspects have improved after the operations team adopted the suggestions.

6. Product selection specialist

This position is very important when platform-based companies are doing private domain business. The quality of product selection not only affects the sales volume of the day, but also affects the activity of users.

However, for retail companies, there will not be many product types, and this position will not be particularly important. It can be held concurrently by a copy editor or planner.

【Job Responsibilities】

1. Choose products that are suitable for promotion and sales of private domain traffic.
2. Plan your merchandise in advance.
3. Optimize product selection criteria from sales data.
4. Plan and arrange the promotion rhythm of products.

【Assessment indicators】

1. It mainly depends on the order volume, average order value and sales volume.

The organizational structure and job responsibilities given above are mainly for reference. The situation of each company is different and needs to be adjusted according to their own private domain needs.

03How to evaluate the core competencies of talents?

Through the above, we have preliminarily clarified the responsibilities of private domain positions. This step can basically filter out most candidates who do not meet the requirements.

So how do we evaluate the true core capabilities of talents when we communicate with them in the next step? Or, if we have already successfully recruited them, how do we evaluate their performance during the probation period? In this regard, I take private domain operations as an example and divide them according to job level and years of experience, as follows:

1. Primary operation of private domain (1-2 years)

For ordinary job seekers, entry-level operations is a relatively easy field to enter. Although the starting salary may not be high, there is enough room for growth. You can evaluate it from four aspects:

1) Data statistics and analysis capabilities

Junior operations require exposure to a variety of data, which must be collected and compiled on a daily basis. It is necessary to examine which indicators to focus on and the strategies for responding to data changes.

2) Content production capability

Examine whether it is possible to collaboratively produce various types of materials, such as community content and circle of friends content; at key nodes, whether relevant activity content can be proposed, and based on a simple analysis of the data, suggestions for improvement can be made.

3) Execution capability

Check whether the daily fixed tasks can be completed smoothly, such as tagging, group building, community sop preview and release, circle of friends release and user private messages.

4) Whether you can use tools skillfully

You need to be proficient in using WeChat for Business. If the company has purchased SCRM tools, you need to master them quickly in a short period of time.

2. Senior private domain operations (3-4 years)

Senior operators are already familiar with the industry and processes, and basically do not need to do any execution work, but are more responsible for the design and implementation of the plan. They can be evaluated from four aspects:

1) Planning ability

Able to formulate activity plans based on operational goals and user characteristics, and complete activity planning including product selection, pricing, and rhythm design.

2) User operation capabilities

It is necessary to have an in-depth understanding of the user life cycle, continuously maintain activity, and propose targeted solutions based on project operations.

3) Traffic generation capability

Mature private domain operations can independently divert brand public domain traffic to the private domain, including path design, interest point design, material preparation (graphics and text), personnel arrangement, traffic acceptance and retention, etc.

4) Demand analysis capabilities

The user insight is required to be independently completed. Through collecting user insight information from e-commerce platforms, collecting user circle of friends, conducting user surveys, and analyzing competitors' private domain operation experience, a private domain operation plan is formulated based on user insights and operation target needs.

3. Private Domain Operation Supervisor/Manager

This type of position is very rare in the current recruitment market and is the object of competition among companies and headhunters. The salary requirements are not low, so it is necessary to carefully identify them.

Basically, at this level, you have extensive experience in professional capabilities, business strategies, and team management, and can speak fluently to the interviewer. I won't talk about background checks, but we can evaluate from three aspects:

1) Solution implementation capability

The person in charge of the private domain often needs to consider his comprehensive capabilities. For example, a marketing campaign may involve official account content, corporate microblogs, mini programs, communities, event planning, etc. The person in charge needs to review and control the general direction.

If you are not familiar with a sector, it will be difficult to grasp the whole plan, and a plan will inevitably face obstacles if it wants to be implemented. Therefore, when asking about specific case experience, you should pay attention to the weak links and consider them comprehensively.

2) Data analysis capabilities

As the person in charge, you should be very sensitive to data, because each data indicator provides instructions for the next operational action. You need to clearly understand the key indicators involved in each touchpoint and the meaning of each indicator so that you can provide guidance.

3) Team management ability

Team management is a skill that managers must consider. What we need to evaluate is whether we can promote the growth of employees. Because private domain operations are emerging positions, many tasks cannot be borrowed, so managers are needed to lead learning and progress.

Final Thoughts

There is actually no standard answer to recruiting, only whether they are suitable or not. What others use well may not be good for you. It still needs to be tailored based on your own business.

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