In today’s digital marketing era, Xiaohongshu, as a lifestyle sharing platform, has become an important position for brand marketing. This article delves into the logic of Xiaohongshu’s grass planting, analyzes its differences from traditional marketing, and proposes how to achieve a transformation path from content to business through Xiaohongshu.
Philip Kotler said in Marketing Revolution 4.0,The most influential thing about your views and choices in this day and age is the F-factors – Family, Fans, Follows, i.e. family, friends, and the people you follow.
1. The logic of Xiaohongshu’s grass planting
Xiaohongshu Notes What is the difference between grass planting and traditional marketing?
In a word, traditional marketing is to cast a wide net and hard promotion, and Xiaohongshu grass planting is to accurately delineate trust and pay.
Xiaohongshu is a subversion of the subjective or passive nature of channels, content forms, and information received. Rather than forcing ourselves to make choices, we are more willing to actively screen independent choices.
Freedom is the pursuit of human nature.
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The difference between the two is mainly reflected in six aspects:
1. Realism:The pursuit of realism is “don’t look at the advertisement, look at the curative effect”, and no matter how carefully polished the advertising slogan is, it is not as good as the “easy to use” sentence of the witness. The main focus of the life scene-based display is the truth, and the reproduction of real scenes can hit the pain points and empathy of the public, so it is said that “gold cups and silver cups are not as good as the reputation of the people.” ”
In terms of content, it has richer creative subjects and diverse forms of expression.
2. Trust:Who will you trust more if you say yes to a friend? I believe that you, like me, will undoubtedly choose friends, because merchants care about their own interests, and friends represent the same position as me.
According to the data, 59% of Xiaohongshu users are willing to share their product experience, and 60% of users believe in the consumption experience of ordinary consumers.
The brand’s usage scenarios are more life-oriented and easy to be trusted by consumers.
Brands understand consumers, and they also have more opportunities to understand the brand in depth, and the interaction between the two can more accurately explore potential pain points and provide solutions to problems.
Because of the concern for their own needs and feelings, users are more willing to trust “people who can represent them” in the decision-making process. Therefore, compared with blunt advertising information, users are more willing to believe in the true sharing of other consumers, and the information conveyed in similar needs and familiar life scenarios can make users feel more “secure”.
3. Decision-making power:The trust network established by KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders) and KOCs (Key Opinion Consumers) represents not only efficient communication speed, but also the most important impact on consumer purchasing decisions.
When we buy an item, traditional e-commerce is optimistic about the review rate, and Xiaohongshu planting grass is to make the praise rate a “visual” content, and there is an emotional bond bonus, making it easier to conclude a transaction.
4. Short path and low cost:The path from product design to transaction is shorter, and there is no need to verify it through advertising for several months or even a year, and it may only take a few days to complete the complete link from product design to transaction.
Even before mass production or before the product is launched, it can be optimized and adjusted in time to better meet the needs of consumers, with lower trial and error costs and lower advertising costs.
5. High explosion, strong growth:The wide range of communication and rapid fermentation of word-of-mouth bring about the growth of transactions, and will show S-shaped leapfrog growth in a short period of time, which can enable brands to quickly occupy the market and occupy the minds of consumers.
Similar consumers are brought together by content, making interaction more convenient, authentic and effective; Through interaction with content, consumers will also be encouraged to share and disseminate more, so that content and participants will show “blowout” growth.
6. Long-term value:Continuously drive search, influence, exposure, and deals for brands. The impact of grass planting on the mind is long-term, not only can you see the direct transformation of ROI in the short term; In the long run, for good products, Xiaohongshu users will spontaneously generate a large amount of UGC content, bringing long-term value to the brand.
Long-term value is the most valuable characteristic of a brand, and the continuous performance of the brand makes the brand live longer and better.
Taking the BeBeBus stroller as an example, the entire process from pre-listing to closing is in line with the above 6 advantages of Xiaohongshu grass planting.
The baby stroller of the mother and baby brand BeBeBus began to plant grass before the new product was launched, “taking the first step” according to the user’s real suggestion feedback, quickly calibrating the selling points and communication points, and iterating the product in a targeted manner. Conduct user research before the product is launched, quickly calibrate the selling points and communication points according to the real suggestions of users, and iterate the product in a targeted manner, so as to significantly increase the probability of “new products that are explosive when they are launched”.
By reorganizing the target group, usage scenarios and communication perspectives of the product, tapping potential groups and finding opportunities for more people, BeBeBus’ new stroller has become the hot-selling TOP1 of new e-commerce in just 7 days since its launch, and has become the TOP1 of daily sales in stores in half a month, with sales exceeding 4.5 million in a month, becoming a big hit.
The three elements of Xiaohongshu’s grass planting lie in the expression of people, scenes and content, and then the sense of trust determines the transformation ability and effectiveness of grass planting.Compared with traditional marketing, it is faster, more convenient and more efficient.
The series of people, scenes and content also makes the brand more humane, closer to consumers, and more down-to-earth.
2. Methods of planting grass
How to make content have marketing genes?
The manifestation of Xiaohongshu’s grass planting is content marketing, and what should be done is to strengthen content and weaken marketing.
But there is another contradiction here, the content accounts for too much to achieve the effect of marketing, and the marketing proportion is too large and will be disgusted by people, so the perfect combination of content and marketing is the focus and difficulty.
There is such a saying in the marketing circle“Selling products is not as good as selling lifestyle”, Xiaohongshu’s slogan “Your Life Guide”, is there some inspiration?
Lifestyle is your content, and scenes are your booth.
Many notes only show the lifestyle and attitude of bloggers, and the product exists as a background or tool, even if it does not mention the selling point of the product, there will be many fans asking, which fully stimulates people’s subjective motivation
Rather than bluntly emphasizing product effects, Xiaohongshu grass planting marketing is better to tell users “I will make your life better”. Only by communicating with users in a life-oriented way can they arouse their association and pleasure with products and a better life, and appear in people’s field of vision as friends can truly enter users.
We all know the characteristics of users on Xiaohongshu, most of whom are young users in the fields of fashion, beauty and life aesthetics, and have good expectations for life and life. By carrying out marketing activities on Xiaohongshu, brands can accurately reach these specific groups and increase brand exposure and awareness.
The content of Xiaohongshu is independently produced by users, so users share real experiences and experiences. By cooperating with users, brands will make their content closer to users’ daily life scenarios, making it easier for users to actively accept and explore.
Therefore, marketing on Xiaohongshu needs to be guided by good content, so what is good content?
At least the following five criteria are used as brand references:
1. Authenticity and Trustworthiness:Even marketing content must be authentic and reliable on Xiaohongshu, and good content should give users real experience and effective opinions, which can make other users have a sense of trust and increase their goodwill towards the brand and products.
2. Creativity and Uniqueness:The content should be creative and engaging enough to focus users’ attention and make them interested and resonate. Good content should not only visually increase the attractiveness of the content through high-quality pictures and creative design, but also pay attention to the practical value, emotional value, emotional value, aesthetic value, functional value, etc. of the content itself.
3. Useful value for “me”:Good content should be useful to users, such as providing practical purchase advice, makeup tips, fashion matching, etc., to meet the needs of users. Cleverly integrate the brand’s core values and image into it, allowing users to recognize and favor the brand when reading or browsing content.
Sometimes the value may not be direct, not necessarily reflecting the value of the product, but through the relevance of the value of the content itself.
For example, a vlog note recording personal life, the content display revolves around women’s independence, complexion, and mental state, and will use or expose the brand’s products in life scenes.
4. Storytelling and Emotional Connection:Good content usually has a story, and strong storytelling content often represents fast dissemination, and being able to tell an engaging story is easier to pull into the relationship with users, thereby further generating emotional connections.
The most important thing in storytelling is to have a sense of object.
You are communicating with users like girlfriends and friends, so you need to use the context of sharing to write notes to be more authentic and convincing, and the message you convey will make people identify and resonate.
You need to know who you’re talking to.
If you want to write emotional notes, you must have a description of specific things and details, and resonance exists in these descriptions of details.
5. Associate with users:The content should be relevant to the interests and needs of the target group, resonate with them, and increase the likelihood of content dissemination.
The popular content that can really stand out often has a secret weapon –Connect with users.
Behind the content of each popular note is one or several motives that make the audience willing to take the initiative to open your notes, and the strength of the motivation is the close relationship between the content and the audience.
The focus of content creation should be on how to make the content and users relate.
Let people find out that the content of your notes is relevant to him, that he cares about and knows well.
Efficient marketing is not only to “reach” users, but also to stimulate user interest, trigger user actions, and lead consumer trends on the basis of insight into life trends.
3. Good business that grows
How to run the path from content to business?
Xiaohongshu grass planting is divided into 4 growth cycles:Introduction period, growth period, maturity period, renewal period.
- Product introduction period: it is necessary to find the correct positioning, verify the correctness of the product’s selling points and communication strategies, and focus on “product pair, crowd pair, communication right”; It is necessary to quickly grab the first batch of seed users to detonate quickly.
- Product growth period: quickly penetrate the target group, quickly seize the target track, use the most efficient method to enhance the brand’s voice, and quickly penetrate the core group.
- Product maturity period: expand precise new groups, open up new scenarios and new selling points to increase increments.
- Product renewal period: develop the second growth curve of products, gain insight into iterative strategies, pay attention to the consumption interest characteristics of multiple groups, and find new sales growth.
So how should it be done?
From landing to practical operation, the brand’s product content grass planting marketing needs to go through four steps:
The first step is to find the unmet needs of consumers, and then do product iteration and innovation.For example, as a consumer goods company, you can gain insight into new consumption and user pain points from Xiaohongshu, and then carry out product innovation to meet the new needs of consumers;
The second step is to have “good content” to share with consumers after the “good product” comes out, conveying the product concept and product function.For example, Xiaohongshu’s KOL\KOC original content has uniqueness and texture while also conveying new consumption concepts;
the third step is to have “good products” + “good content”, and then use “good tools” to amplify and reach the right circle audience; For example, dandelion platform, spotlight platform, French fries, Lingxi platform, and Little Red Star.
The fourth step is to form a good reputation and consumer feedback after audience consumption and experience, so as to continue to feed back the product itself.
From the first step to the fourth step, and back to the first step, from product marketing to brand precipitation, a healthy and good positive cycle has been formed.
If a brand wants to truly plant products into people’s hearts, the core is to return to the consumer itself, establish a communication mechanism between users, give full play to the value of “people influence people”, conform to the communication method of “people influence people”, find core users, and accurately reach them in content and advertising. Consumers like to share real things on Xiaohongshu, as well as get valuable content and enjoyable experiences here.Fully understanding “people” can improve the quality and efficiency of brand grass planting.
