In the annual Spring Festival Marketing Competition, how do the rabbit and I come up with thousands of tricks?

For brand marketing, the Lunar New Year as a marketing node brings consumers emotional support, cyclical consumption and expectations for promotional activities, making the eve of the Spring Festival, when the old year is not over and the new year is approaching, a golden time for companies to compete in creativity, cross-border and make a name for themselves. The author of the following article introduces a case of Spring Festival marketing for us, let's take a look.

This is the year people will talk about, and this is the year people will remain silent when talking about it.

In any case, the dark clouds filled with huge uncertainties will finally fade away, and another day will roll in. Compared with the past, the Lunar New Year is not only worth looking forward to in the atmosphere of family reunion, and letting the food stretch your limbs and body. The three years of experience have made the value of the New Year as the beginning of "getting rid of the old and welcoming the new" more precious and worth pondering.

For brand marketing, the Lunar New Year as a marketing node brings about emotional support from consumers, cyclical consumption, and expectations for promotional activities, making the eve of the Spring Festival, when the old year is not over yet and the new year is approaching, a golden time for companies to compete in creativity, cross-border cooperation, and make a name for themselves.

The difficulty lies in how to produce innovative marketing ideas without changing the proposition.

Jiang Nanchun, the founder of Focus Media, once mentioned a point in the Wenrou Yidao podcast: product differentiation is endless and there are always opportunities for product differentiation.

In this regard, marketing differentiation is actually similar to product differentiation.

Taking the Lunar New Year as an example, you can use the joint branding of products + zodiac IP to achieve the effect of breaking the circle and planting grass; you can also approach it from the direction of emotion and culture, combining keywords such as "reunion", "going home", and "family" to create a heartwarming image; if you feel that "homesickness" is too heavy, CNY marketing can even start from the social environment, seize "blind dates", "comparisons", etc., and use the contrast between people's imagination of long holidays and reality.

As a composition topic, the Lunar New Year has too many possibilities. Therefore, DaoFa sorted out 7 brands’ marketing cases about the Lunar New Year and tried to summarize their differentiated breakthrough points in the composition topic of “Spring Festival Marketing”.

1. Ten Thousand Ways to Express Love

1. "SATINE" x "Amul" x Jiang Wen's collaborative short film "Wanfu Jin'an 3.0 - Lord Rabbit Goes Home"

Jindian, Amul and Jiang Wen, the "genius" director who has not been active for a long time, directed and acted in the Lunar New Year short film "Going Home Rabbit" which was officially launched not long ago. The short film combines the myth of "Jade Rabbit Pounding Medicine" and the image of Rabbit God in the traditional culture of the north to tell a story about going home. As of press time, the #Wanfu Jin'an# topic has been read 4.16 billion times on Weibo and discussed 816,000 times.

The film continues Jiang Wen's wild imagination, the lines are full of Beijing flavor, and Jiang's tension and dry humor are also strongly reflected in the short film. The protagonist of the story seems to be Jiang Wen, but in fact it is the "Rabbit God" voiced by Jiang Wen himself.

The short film uses Jiang Wen, who is born in the year of the tiger, to replace the rabbit pounding medicine. It also adds symbols such as fireworks, Spring Festival couplets, and heavy snow to highlight the background of the story of "The tiger replaces the rabbit". In terms of setting, the giant rabbit god on the moon suddenly turns into a baby rabbit when he returns home. Then two lines that sparked countless discussions on social platforms are used to explain the reason:

“There’s a lot of gravity at home”

“All the children who come home for the New Year are good children”

For many people, this year will be a year of eager departure. Dining in, gatherings, travel... have become daily and necessary again. The Spring Festival is the time of the year when homesickness is strongest. As a long-term IP, "Wanfu Jin'an" has tried "Statue Museum" with the theme of recording major events of the year, and "Tiger Spirit", a warm micro-film focusing on family and friendship.

In this year's New Year's answer sheet, "Going Home for the Rabbit" focuses on the most ordinary "going home for the New Year". As a reference, the Rabbit represents all the people who are wandering outside. The reason why the Rabbit pounding medicine on the moon is huge is because "people who leave home will grow up on their own." But no matter how powerful they are outside, as the short film says, once they arrive at the doorstep, everyone is still the same baby.

2. Pepsi-Cola: Bring the Fun Home

Also as a long-term IP, PepsiCo's 2023 "Bring the Joy Home" teamed up with Happy Twist @Eat Fish Director Studio and actor Li Xian this year to launch the brand's first pure comedy micro-film. In this year's micro-film, there are no classic plots and narrative techniques such as "station, crowds, deserted room, parents waiting, the moment the child returns home, the world suddenly lights up" in the reunion narrative, but only the simplest and most direct happiness.

This time, "Bring the Joy Home" creates three nonsensical hilarious short stories from the three perspectives of father-son love, first love reunion and brotherhood. Although the characters and stories are different, each small unit revolves around the template of "the protagonist returns home - discovers the problem - tries to solve it - a reversal occurs - an unexpected happy ending".

For long-term IP, the key factor to maintain vitality and competitiveness is not only continuity in the time dimension, but also the ability to keep the brand fulcrum unchanged under the rapidly changing surface and connect the IP content. For Pepsi, this fulcrum is "family culture."

"Family culture" is not just between parents and relatives. In the more than ten years of development of "Bring Love Home", the core of content creation has gradually expanded from "family culture" to the concept of "neighborhood" - a relatively fixed, daily natural and social cultural environment around you. It is also the starting point of everyone's life.

Just like in the past, when people lived in a community, they would naturally know that there would be a fruit and vegetable market every few streets, which delicious and small restaurants would be hidden in a few alleys, and where the old men and women would dance square dances in the evening.

In this exploration of neighborhood, interactions between people are more frequent, closer, and more in-depth.

However, the unstoppable acceleration of society is gradually dissolving the existence of "neighborhoods", just like the alienation and strangeness that the protagonist felt at the beginning of the short film.

Here, Pepsi-Cola cleverly provides a solution: forgetting is the norm, but the happiness that Pepsi-Cola brings to everyone in memory is the unchanging exception.

3. Coca-Cola: “Time changes, but the beauty of reunion remains the same”

Different from the story-based TVCs in the above two cases, Coca-Cola's Lunar New Year film for the Year of the Rabbit, "Times Are Changing, but the Beauty of Reunion Remains the Same," is simple in form, with a heavy sword without a sharp edge and great ingenuity without being elaborate.

Both stories are based on the theme of going home. "Go Home Rabbit" focuses on "no matter how big a home is, it can accommodate you", "Bring Love Home" emphasizes finding "nearby", and this short film by Coca-Cola cleverly changes the perspective, making the protagonist no longer a wanderer returning home, but a loving mother holding the center line tightly.

In the short film, the old rabbit sets out from his hometown with a tray of handmade dumplings and stands in front of the high-rise building where his children live, with a look of bewilderment on his face, wondering "how did the world become like this?" It feels that what is far away is not the length of time, but two or three things that have changed.

Strangeness brings discomfort, confusion breeds inferiority, and a table of exquisite meals makes oneself and dumplings seem redundant and out of place. When problems arise, it is the beginning of the brand's output of brand value: there is no gap between family members, a hug after a long separation can close the distance again.

Of course, a bottle of classic Coca-Cola is indispensable.

As mentioned earlier, although both films start with the theme of "going home", this Coca-Cola film cleverly switches perspectives. "It is said that God cannot be everywhere, so he created mothers." However, when the mother finds out that her child no longer needs her and can move forward independently, the mother will also be sad.

By showing the fragility behind strength, the film lowers the threshold for empathy. There is not a single line of dialogue in the entire film, but every scene says: love is the most positive resonance between people.

2. Bottle plus rabbit, different brands have different preferences

The biggest super symbol of the Lunar New Year is the animal sign that rotates every year. The zodiac IP, which comes from the classic cultural matrix, has no cognitive barriers in understanding the content and is a rare cultural consensus in the communication circle environment. In addition, the rabbit has a wide range of rich images in various cultural works. As a highly operable cultural gold mine, there is a large blank area for brands to play joint names and be creative.

Nars and Peter Rabbit jointly launched a nationwide flash exhibition tour, Fila and Anthony Rabbit jointly launched a series of co-branded tops, Haidilao specially invited Miffy to join the company and opened a co-branded theme store...

In addition to co-branding, some brands also choose to play tricks on packaging. Packaging that carries information is also a kind of information itself. For brands, as the easiest free exposure channel, using rabbit as the theme and being creative on packaging can be high-profile, using the form of artist co-branding and limited edition collector's edition to create a high-end brand image and tone; or it can be heartfelt and sensational, using bottles and supporting copywriting to touch consumers with content and communicate with warmth through humanistic care.

1. SK-II x White Rabbit, from SK-II to SK Rabbit

Not long ago, the international high-end skincare brand SK-II teamed up with the national candy brand White Rabbit to renew its iconic product, the Fairy Water, and present a New Year's cross-border surprise - SK-II x White Rabbit 2023 New Year Limited Edition Fairy Water.

DaoFa has summarized the three main purposes of brand collaboration in the past:

1. Capture consumers’ attention, spark social media topics, and increase brand awareness;
2. They serve as each other’s channels, attracting potential consumers, broadening the user base, and stimulating sales;
3. By leveraging each other's strengths, new brands can quickly establish brand awareness and old brands can be renewed.

Although some people think that SK-II, as a luxury cosmetics brand, has lowered its brand tone by co-branding with the affordable national milk candy brand White Rabbit Milk Candy, from a cultural perspective, in the minds of today's young consumers, affordable national milk candy is not the primary positioning of White Rabbit. Because strictly speaking, they have not experienced the era of "seven pieces of milk candy make a cup of milk".

In the past few years, White Rabbit has frequently collaborated with other brands to create products that cover taste, touch, smell and other senses: it has teamed up with Maxam to launch a toffee-flavored lip balm; it has collaborated with the Smell Library to launch a toffee-flavored perfume and a series of peripherals; and it has also collaborated with COACH to become a luxury design element...

This series of renewal efforts by White Rabbit have made young consumers more inclined to view the rabbit as a cultural element with trendy and fashionable attributes.

Here is another concept to add: secondary brand association. That is, brands gain some user cognition that they do not have or need to strengthen at present through binding with other entities. CK, an independent business consultant and the chief author of CK Business Logic Research, once shared "Failure or high conversion, what is the underlying logic of brand co-branding" in the Daofa Light Sharing column. He proposed that "when users see this brand, they will stand with whoever and appear with whoever, and they will associate the characteristics of this "whoever", that is, the third party, with the characteristics of the brand."

During the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, SK-II launched the "Kasuga Doll" magic water. The milky white bottle with a bun-shaped Kasuga doll bottle cap is full of vitality and cuteness, and it is full of girlishness. During the Chinese New Year of the Rat, SK-II collaborated with Disney's classic IP Mickey Mouse to launch the Mickey Mouse Limited Edition Magic Water. The classic IP brought cultural bonuses; the collaboration with Andy Warhol increased the brand's aesthetics and artistry...

After reviewing SK-II's more high-profile marketing activities in recent years, it is found that the co-branded partners selected by SK-II mostly have the following characteristics: wide recognition, cultural or artistic attributes, and close to the preferences of young consumers. From these points of view, the concept of fashion and trend of White Rabbit just fits the concept of co-branding of SK-II over the years.

2. Daily Fresh launches the "Year of the Rabbit Love Bottle"

Daily Fresh joined hands with spokesperson Tang Wei and autistic children to launch the "Year of the Rabbit Love Bottle" Spring Festival special packaging with the children's colorful Year of the Rabbit paintings, calling on the society to pay attention to the autistic group. At the same time, an online exhibition of autistic children's paintings was launched on social media, and the "2023 Together to Draw Extraordinary" interactive applet was released, promising to donate part of the proceeds from the Year of the Rabbit special packaging, and users helped autistic children to carry out painting education and other courses.

While other brands are racking their brains to come up with creative ideas around the New Year, Daily Fresh gave us another idea: the misalignment of event content and marketing nodes.

It's not that no brand has ever thought of caring for autistic children, but most of them were carried out on Children's Day, Autism Children's Care Day and other occasions. Daily Fresh boldly chose the Lunar New Year as the time point for this marketing campaign. The resulting contrast makes the public, who are bombarded by the festive atmosphere, feel unique.

At the same time, if we think about it carefully, the issue of caring for autistic children is not completely unrelated to the Lunar New Year. During the New Year period with the themes of reunion and well-being, the plight of vulnerable groups is more likely to gain social empathy.

The differentiated brand output creates a sense of disharmony and contrast in the public's perception, thus standing out in the homogeneous market competition. When the public generally believes that the New Year should be a time for family reunions, happiness, and making dumplings together, Daily Fresh calls on everyone to pay attention to the vulnerable groups in society, stirring up emotions in a way that goes against public expectations, while conveying corporate values ​​and deepening consumers' key perceptions of the brand.

3. Starting from New Year Customs

1. Balabala×Chen Fenwan joint series

balabala has teamed up with Chen Fenwan, a top domestic paper-cutting artist born in the 1990s, to launch a New Year joint series. Taking paper-cutting art as a starting point, combined with national trends and traditional customs, the zodiac rabbit is integrated with paper-cutting art, actively exploring the integration of traditional culture and new design forces, and focusing on the two perspectives of "inheritance" and "innovation" to delve into different aspects of national trends. The cooperation between Balabala and Chen Fenwan is committed to exploring more novel ways of expressing local culture against the background of New Year customs, and digging deep into the cultural connotations behind the national trend IP.

Children's clothing is characterized by the separation of users and buyers. Children themselves have neither the concept of dressing nor the need for trends and fashion. Balabala is really targeting young parents who pay for clothes for their children. As more and more young people become parents, their pursuit of aesthetic consumption will naturally extend to the children's clothing purchased for the next generation. They must not only be comfortable and easy to wear, but also look good and not cliché.

In recent years, national brands have taken on a new look, time-honored brands have been renovated to become trendsetters, and new independent brands have emerged one after another. These phenomena are clues to each other, pointing to the frequently mentioned "national tide" culture, such as the Suzhou Museum co-branded series, the Monkey King co-branded series, the Dunhuang series, the Forbidden City Baoyun Building co-branded series, etc. In the past few years, balabala has clearly been working towards the national tide, and is committed to launching classic children's clothing works with traditional cultural elements.

The national trend of piling up symbols is only a flash in the pan. Consumers expect national trend brands to re-create traditional elements, not just "Chinese style packaging". Balabala obviously understands this truth. Treating national trend as IP requires returning to traditional culture and combining it with the expression methods preferred by current consumers. Find a unique expression method for the brand based on the culture, rather than being led by the "trend" on social media. In other words, it is about focus and long-term.

2. Bananain 2023 "Red Project"

Clothing brand Bananain released a new New Year TVC "Wish You All the Best". The film is shot from a first-person perspective, and through the narration of brand spokesperson Zhou Dongyu, it restores the different problems that people of different identities will encounter. By giving a red dress, we wish the elderly to be accompanied, adults to be understood, children to be respected... I wish everyone all the best in 2023.

Bananain, which advocates "redesigning the basics", focuses on the traditional custom of "wearing red for the New Year" in this CNY marketing. As the basic color of the Lunar New Year, red represents good luck, joy, and good wishes. On this basis, Bananain further refines the good wishes represented by red, making the specific problems that each individual may encounter a footnote.

For consumers who may have encountered frequent changes and difficulties in recent years, they may prefer "If happiness is too difficult, then I wish you peace" rather than the general "I wish you happiness."

The former is an indiscriminate narrative that weakens the individual and is based on the reality of encountering new problems every day. The latter, with a sense of reality that acknowledges the existence of problems, appears to be more sincere when the blessings are issued against the backdrop of the problems.

At the same time, this is also the golden rule for brands to output brand value and care. The sense of authenticity and sincerity makes users feel understood and cared for.

4. Analyst Comments

For consumers, the Lunar New Year has two sides, A and B. One side is about reunion with family, and the other side is about self-entertainment and self-satisfaction. These two points have also become the basic starting point for major brands in this CNY marketing.

The change in marketing trends is closely related to the overall environment. In recent years, more people have lived alone for longer periods of time, are more eager for non-utilitarian connections between people, want to see the world, and miss their families more...

As a microcosm of social psychology and environmental changes, the brand content and product forms released in CNY marketing reflect the changes that occur every year to a certain extent. This is also the value of reviewing CNY marketing. We can see how each brand combines category characteristics and brand value, keenly and accurately perceives the emotional changes of the audience on a fixed theme, and how to form emotional resonance among the hundreds of millions of users covered under the topic of the Spring Festival, accumulating potential for long-term growth.

Author: Daofa Xingyan

Source: WeChat public account "Knife Skills Research Institute (ID: DigipontClub)"