15 suggestions on how to create explosive products in 2023!

Once a product becomes a hit, it will bring its own traffic. How should companies make hit products in 2023, the post-epidemic year? The author of this article has studied many companies and summarized 15 suggestions on making hit products to help you make hit products faster and more accurately and achieve sales growth. I believe you will be inspired after reading this article.

In commercial activities, there are only two main entities after simplification - sellers and buyers. The bridge connecting these two entities is the product. After working hard on the product and making it a hot-selling product, the product will have its own marketing attributes and traffic. Users who purchase the product will become fans. Therefore, a hot-selling product means revenue and profit.

2022 is coming to an end and 2023 is about to come. The impact of the epidemic on life is gradually decreasing, and the economy is recovering rapidly.

2023 will be the first sprint year for all companies after the epidemic. It is crucial to acquire more users and increase sales.

It is even possible that the industry landscape will change.

The Granary New Chinese Products Research Institute has studied Xiaomi, Xiaomi's ecological chain companies, and hundreds of domestic and foreign companies, and has personally incubated a number of companies, summarizing a set of methodologies for creating explosive products that are easy to learn, use well, and effective.

This article will excerpt some of the content, hoping it will be of some inspiration to you.

01 About the User

1. User portrait

Before making a product, you must have a clear user portrait, including who (age, gender, occupation, psychological characteristics), what scenario (time, space) and what matter (what the user does in this scenario and what task needs to be completed). Only when you have a clear idea of the user portrait can the product definition be targeted, and the subsequent traffic marketing can also be targeted, and thus efficient.

Of course, user portraits are not only for product definition, they also have many other uses. In the process of making user portraits, we will collect a lot of information. Therefore, we have three requirements for user portraits:

First, explain the user portrait clearly.

Second, you need to find out which platform these user groups gather on and where they hang out. Only in this way can you carry out effective marketing actions.

Third, you need to be able to defend yourself and make products based on user portraits. The products should create barriers that make it difficult for competitors to imitate and make similar products.

2. User pain points

When users use a product, a key function is not solved, which makes users very painful. This is called a user pain point. For example, in winter, you must use a hair dryer, but using it too much will damage your hair. Damaging hair is a user pain point.

Some companies never care about user pain points. They just make whatever products they want. Once the products are made, they are difficult to sell. At this time, they can only spend huge amounts of financial resources to educate users, but the result is counterproductive. Users are not willing to be educated by businesses.

This is a big misunderstanding for companies when making products. Therefore, it is difficult to sell a product without pain points. Only by solving the user's pain points, users will be happy to accept it without having to educate them.

3. Angel users

Xiaomi's angel users are very famous. In order to thank the angel users, Xiaomi even made a special film called "Sponsors of 100 Dreams".

What are angel users? First, these people love to try and take risks. Second, they can actively participate in the creation of new products, tolerate the imperfections of the products, and help you spread the products after they are made.

Angel users are your dream sponsors. I think this concept is very interesting. In fact, once we understand the concept of angel users, it will be very simple to find them and where to recruit them.

Social media is very developed now, and it is easy to find angel users on social media. According to Barn’s experience, it is best to find KOCs with 5,000 to 50,000 fans. KOCs are called key opinion leaders.

Why not look for angel users with more than 50,000 fans? Because Internet celebrities are too big and too busy to cooperate with you, so these people are not easy to use, so KOCs with 5,000 to 50,000 fans are the most ideal.

4. Fan Economy

Companies with fans are very lucky, because they have a base of fans, repeat purchases, and very low marketing costs. For example, Apple, Xiaomi, Nintendo, Sony, etc.

Why do we need to engage in fan economy? If you study carefully, you will find that the difference between ordinary users and fans can be summed up in eight words: high-frequency links and emotional bonds.

First, because of the participation of fans, your products will be more targeted and the probability of you creating a hit product will be higher.

Second, fans will help you spread the word, your overall marketing efficiency will improve, and costs can be reduced.

Third, the number and amount of goods that fans buy from you every year are much greater than those of ordinary users. Not only do they continue to buy themselves, they also mobilize people around them to buy.

Therefore, fans can bring higher revenue, which shows how important fans are to companies.

5. Generation Z

Generation Z, represented by those born in the 1990s and 2000s, is gradually entering the workplace, and the purchasing power of the new generation of consumers is growing. The population of those born in the 1990s and 2000s in my country has reached 340 million, accounting for nearly a quarter of the total population of my country. The new generation is gradually becoming the backbone of the consumer market.

According to segmented data, those born in the 1990s and 1995s account for 51.4% of China’s catering consumers, and the number of Internet users born in the 1995s and 2000s exceeds 369 million. They love online consumption and have great influence and traffic in the mobile Internet.

The "new generation" has clear consumption concepts. They have a high acceptance of local brands, and their product demands are personalized and diversified. They are willing to pay a premium for product design and features, bringing unprecedented new opportunities for my country's consumption development.

With the rapid development of the digital economy and the increasing sense of independence among young people, consumers' individual needs will be further explored, and diversified and customized consumption will continue to be a consumer hotspot.

02 About the product

6. Competitive product analysis

Whether you are in the same field or making the same product, you need to analyze your competitors regardless of your market share. Leading products can prevent themselves from being surpassed, while lagging products can be improved.

There are three benefits to doing competitive product analysis:

First, understand the value points of competitors and form your own points of difference. Competitors are already very successful, and their value points have been accepted by users. If we make products according to their value points, we will always be behind them. At this time, we need to find a value point that is different from theirs to differentiate ourselves.

Second, understand the experience and problems of competitors, absorb their experience and avoid problems. Successful products have both advantages and disadvantages. We absorb their advantages and improve their disadvantages, so that our product quality will be better.

Third, understand the user portraits of competitors and calibrate your own user portraits . Since they are competitors, their user portraits must overlap with ours. We analyze their user portraits and then compare them with our own. After comparing the two, we can calibrate our own user portraits.

7. Product Definition

Product definition is the process of converting user needs and market opportunities into written statements of product features, functions, parameters, pricing, etc. These statements will become the basis for subsequent research and development, design, production, and marketing.

From this definition, we can see that product definition is very important. It is the prerequisite for whether a product can become a hit. If the product definition is done wrong, the subsequent links will be meaningless.

When defining a product, there are three points to pay special attention to:

First, we should not miss any category elements, and convert unmet needs into potential elements. Category elements are the dimensions that competitors compare with each other, or the dimensions that users consider when purchasing such products. Some category elements have been mentioned by competitors, but some have not been mentioned yet, so we should find them all.

Second, we will put typical products with the same price and performance in the forefront of the industry. Some products are of the same price, and some are of the same performance. When we are complete, we will even put typical products at the forefront of the industry and put them on a table with our own definition. When we compare them, we can see them clearly at a glance.

Third, you don’t have to be all-encompassing, just one or two strong value points are enough. When you compare with competitors and define your own products, you don’t need to be the best in the industry in every category element, because this will be very costly and expensive, and there will be many problems. You only need to choose one or two dimensions to be the best in the industry.

8. Strong value points

Today's consumer market is a red ocean. No matter what product you are looking for, whether online or offline, there are countless products, and users often find it difficult to choose. Therefore, homogeneous competition has no way out.

How to stand out from the homogeneous products? The answer is to have a strong value point.

As the name suggests, strong value points are the biggest highlights of your products that we have selected from different category elements in the product definition table. We call them strong value points.

Strong value points are the biggest reason for users to buy, and are also the key point for us to defeat our opponents in seconds when competing with our competitors, so strong value points are very important.

A strong value point must meet four conditions: have real value, be perceptible, be significantly different from competitors’ products, and be easily spreadable. If these four conditions are not met, it is not considered a strong value point.

9. Product Pricing

There is logic in product pricing, but many bosses make decisions on a whim when it comes to pricing, as long as the price is slightly lower than that of their competitors. In fact, this is a wrong pricing behavior.

There are three things to keep in mind when pricing your product:

First, understand the costs of each link including production, circulation, and after-sales.

According to the total cost, calculate the price bottom line clearly, and it cannot be lower than the cost. Some people may wonder why the bottom line is calculated incorrectly? Because there may be some hidden costs in your costs, which many start-ups tend to ignore. For example, when selling products on e-commerce platforms, there are big promotion discounts, which are costs. In addition, after your products are sold, there are returns and exchanges, after-sales services, etc., which are all costs.

Second, clarify the upper and lower limits of core users’ psychological expectations.

Pay attention to the upper and lower limits of core users' psychological expectations, especially the upper limit. You cannot break through their upper limit. Many students set prices that are too high, exceeding the upper limit of user cognition, and then they may not buy.

There are also some situations where there is a lower limit, such as maternal and child products, baby products, and beauty and cosmetics products. Sometimes, if you exceed the lower limit of user cognition, users may feel that your product quality is not good and they cannot trust it.

Third, what is the price range of competitors? Should we fight to the end or find an opportunity?

We need to understand the prices of our competitors and decide whether to stick to the same price or find a price gap that no one else is occupying. This depends on the actual situation.

10. Design the optimal solution

Industrial design has always been the weak point of domestic brands. Many companies see that other people’s products are good, so they take it for reference, or see that other people’s products are good, so they take it for reference, and in the end, the whole thing ends up being a mess.

In fact, finding the right design method can save time and effort. If the following three conditions are met, the optimal design solution can be achieved.

First, the design should be consistent with the product definition. The product design should be done according to the product definition. Don’t do it arbitrarily.

Second, the design must take into account the process cost. If you have a budget of 100 yuan and design a process that costs 1,000 yuan, there is no point in such a design.

Third, there must be a unified design standard. With a unified design standard, the company's recognition will be enhanced and it will look more beautiful.

11. Core Technology

Science and technology are the primary productive forces, and only with core technologies can there be a moat. This is something that all entrepreneurs understand. However, sometimes some companies have weak R&D capabilities and do not have any core technologies to show off. What should they do at this time?

If you can’t find the technology internally, look for it externally. There are four common sources of technology:

First, the accumulation of supply chain technology. Find a supply chain with technology and cooperate with it to solve technical problems.

Second, cross-border technology transplantation. Transferring technologies from other fields, such as 3D printing SensElast technology, can be used in clothing.

Third, military technology is transferred to civilian use. Now a lot of military technology has been transferred to civilian use.

Fourth, cooperate with universities and research institutes. Universities have a lot of technologies, but they cannot be turned into products. Enterprises can cooperate with universities.

03 About Marketing and Channels

12. Channel selection

When a startup makes a product, they usually put it on all channels, thinking that opening one more channel will sell one more product. This behavior is wrong.

At the beginning, you must find the channel that is easiest for you to reach and gain a firm foothold. You must first have revenue and a basic base. This is very important.

When looking for channels, you should find the channels that suit you. The methods are as follows:

First, user matching. It is best if your core users are close to or the same as the main users of the channel. If your product is a technology product for boys, it will not sell well on Vipshop.

Second, category matching. There are many channels, such as online and offline, such as JD.com, Tmall, Xiaomi, and Youpin. You need to see what category this product is suitable for.

Third, pricing matching. Different pricing means different platforms. For example, if you want a high premium, you can choose a platform like Dewu. If you want cost-effectiveness, you can choose a platform like Xiaomi Youpin.

Fourth, fund matching. You need to calculate the cash flow cycle, as different channels have different settlement cycles.

13. Product IP

Products always come first and are the starting point of marketing. When we make products, our goal is to turn them into IPs. The advantages of turning products into IPs are as follows:

First, products have emotions, and emotions can be spread. IP has the potential to spread autonomously. IP can give products a soul and emotions, because emotions are spreadable content and emotions are spreadable.

Second, make the product social. Social is a kind of currency. Products are a very powerful social currency with the power of communication. When we make products, we need to make them bring their own topics and consider the aspects of product exposure in the future.

Third, products have interactions, and interactions have emotions. Product interaction is not something that all products can do, but we should try to make this interaction better, because interaction generates emotions.

14. Scenario Marketing

New retail is a revolution of scenes. Scenes are time plus space, and scenes are situations and interactions. Only scenes that can trigger users’ emotions are the real entrances to traffic.

Retail equals customer flow, the number of people entering the store every day, plus conversion rate, which is a probabilistic thing. In fact, the core rule for improving conversion rate is to choose explosive products and use them to increase the overall conversion rate. In all Xiaomi stores, you will see rainbow batteries at the checkout counter. They are purely products that increase gross profit and related sales.

If we don’t do offline retail, do we need to apply it in specific scenarios?

The answer is of course. Because customers do not buy products, but the satisfaction after buying products. Only in a beautiful scene can the satisfaction of users be experienced and expressed.

Online e-commerce companies engaged in new retail, such as Youpin's Selected E-commerce, NetEase's Yanxuan, Pinduoduo and Yunji, all have the same attitude. We need to reflect more scenarios on them.

Whether you are doing online or offline, you must integrate the product into your scene. Users do not buy products, but the satisfaction after buying them. Only scenes can express the good feelings of users after purchase.

15. Marketing methods

How to achieve effective communication? Event ignition, creating hot spots, and joint marketing are two good entry points.

First, event-driven marketing. Event marketing is a very popular marketing method at home and abroad in recent years. It integrates news effects, advertising effects, public relations, image communication, and customer relations. It creates opportunities for new product promotion and brand display, establishes brand recognition and brand positioning, and forms a marketing method that quickly enhances brand awareness and reputation.

For example, Luckin Coffee signed Gu Ailing, launched new products, opened pop-up stores, etc. during the Winter Olympics, attracting the attention of users.

Second, hot spot marketing. Hot spot marketing is a very common marketing method.

After acquiring Mead Johnson milk powder, Durex released a picture of a little Durex and a fork, meaning that if the little Durex didn't help you block the child, we will help you raise it and we will be responsible for raising it. For an ordinary acquisition event, most companies would just issue a press release, but Durex would create a hot topic and add points to itself.

Third, joint marketing. Brand joint marketing has become a common marketing method nowadays, but the threshold is high. Both joint enterprises need to have a certain reputation and attract users' attention after launching joint products.

In April, Luckin Coffee and Coconut Tree Group launched a co-branded Coconut Cloud coffee series, which sold 660,000 cups on the first day of its launch. The goal for this year is to sell 100 million cups. A few days before the launch, Luckin's Coconut Cloud Latte dominated WeChat Moments and the Internet, and remained popular.

Fourth, content marketing. Content marketing is a daily marketing method that uses social platforms such as Weibo, Douyin, and Xiaohongshu to get closer to fans.

It should be noted that content marketing cannot be too official or hypocritical. It must be relaxed and creative, just like Lao Xiangji’s daily “cluck, cluck, cluck…”, Erke’s crazy subordinates, and Luckin’s muttering.