Critical Marketing (full draft)

--The original published in the "Sales and Marketing" Management edition of the April 2009 issue

At the end of July 2008, Jack Ma, the chairman of Alibaba's board, sent an open letter to all the group's staff, shouting, "The next winter will be longer than you think!" more cold! More complicated! " August 2 says "The world has entered the most complex and difficult period since the Second World War".

The International Finance Institute (IFC) recently projected a negative 0.4% growth rate for the world economy in 2009, at least for the first time since 1960, with growth in developed countries falling to a negative 1.4% per cent.

CNN reported that China's gross domestic product has fallen to its lowest level in 5 years. Since the August 2007 credit crisis in the United States, nearly millions of families have been repossessed by banks for failing to repay their loans. The US government injected nearly 3 trillion dollars of liquidity into the financial system. 700 billion dollar bailout plan launched ...

The unusually severe financial crisis has emerged in every aspect of everyday life. But it is such a crisis that more and more savvy businessmen see this opportunity to "move closer" to the network ...

Taking online shopping as an example, according to the recent survey of Internet habits and consumer behavior of Chinese netizens, the 2008 China online shopping market transaction scale exceeded 100 billion yuan, an increase of 130%; more and more users began to use search engine search business information, user comments, This information affects the user's final consumption decision to a great extent.

The information interaction based on the WEB2.0 platform has a strong guiding effect on the potential consumers ' propensity to consume, and it has a certain influence on the profit of the merchant. Here, the marketing model that we are increasingly concerned about is defined as "commented marketing".

The basic concept of critical marketing

"Comment" in the "Cihai" annotation "The general name of the newspaper speech, a genre of newspaper and Speech, a commentary on an event. ”

This annotation has been badly adjusted since the advent of WEB2.0. Because WEB2.0 provides the public with the space to make speeches, so that all kinds of comments are no longer a publication of the patent. More and more people are gradually starting to use the network platform for their own right to speak, exchange information on this shared platform, exchange feelings, so that a variety of different values to maximize.

As a more and more active market operation mode, it is based on such a situation, although it has many similarities with the traditional marketing means, but it also has its own characteristics, simple can be summarized as follows several aspects:

1. Definition: Based on comments as a method of the market objectives, goods, customers, business tools and market feedback and other basic elements of the review and discussion of the formation of the marketing model

2. Objective: To understand the rationality and market value of marketing object, method and means and market orientation through comments from different directions and angles.

3. Role: Multi-directional, full vision, objective evaluation, adjustment of marketing objects, methods and trends

4. Characteristics: multi-directional (customers, intermediaries, experts, businessmen ...) Interaction, grasp the dynamic market trends, in the dynamic adjustment of marketing objects, methods and means

5. Advantages: One can cater to the customer's preferred psychology, through different comments to provide customers with the choice of goods and market comparison methods and data, improve the user's business and to buy goods trust, enhance the purchase of confidence and determination. Second, the enterprise can maximize the timely understanding and mastery of their own product market satisfaction and consumer goods orientation, timely adjustment and improve their own goods and market positioning.

6. Methods: Self-criticism, expert reviews, media reviews, customer reviews ... For different markets can choose a different method, not only can choose a single fist attack, focus on breakthrough, but also can choose multiple combination boxing, siege won.

The current status of critical marketing

The base of the critical marketing has the typical Web2.0 characteristic, the website value which he relies on is reflected in the user's comment and the interaction greatly.

In the traditional marketing model, the application of advertising and product introduction is the most popular, through this information, the user to the conclusion of the product to the difference, because each user according to their own experience, judgment, perspective to see a commodity inevitable loss of bias, there is a kind of elephant feeling, this is precisely because when a new thing appears, No one can quickly establish enough discernment ability to carry on multidimensional observation in a short time, which brings the opportunity of development to the comment-type marketing.

We try to increase the extension of the word, and then we find that words such as advertising and product introductions are also displayed in a new perspective, as they are all part of the commentary. From this we draw a conclusion--comment is the important link that the marketing is indispensable, take this as the link, make the product from the design start to the user's final use all links are interlocking, form the most perfect marketing structure. This perfect marketing structure is based on the WEB2.0 platform, otherwise there will be a lack of information dissemination of the broad, interactive information is not full of embarrassing situation.

At the same time WEB2.0 platform on different categories of products, users of the need for comment is also very large differences, as businesses must be accurate grasp, targeted deployment, we can see the following success stories:

1. Online book-Shopping system-when, excellent Amazon, this type of commentary marketing focus on the content of the product, the content of the impact on consumers is very large, therefore, the reader book review for a new book purchase has helped;

2. Consumer-to-consumer Web Site-Taobao, he is concerned about the user's most concerned about the goods at the same time, fully consider in the network environment users of businesses, businesses to the user's mutual trust, and launched more based on the user, business comments launched marketing, that is, the use of diamonds, Emperor- The Crown Buyer sellers reputation to ensure mutual trust between the two sides, greatly enhance the efficiency of the transaction, should be said to be the ultimate application of critical marketing;

3. Electronic consumer goods successful sellers-Jingdong mall, the focus of electronic consumer goods is novel, fast price changes, users in the actual use of the process of repair, these before the purchase is not known, so the detailed user experience, very good product prices launched by the commentary-style marketing to create their own miracle, It is particularly important to note that buyers of electronic products have a very high degree of concern about comments.

4. Comprehensive category Comment website----watercress, he to people's daily life Leisure type Item: Books, music, movies, etc. provide a comprehensive platform for comment, the main direction of the review is content as the main body, because the current user time is very valuable, with the help of other people's experience to choose their own viewing content is far more real than the new film Conference.

To borrow a theory from Professor Lang Ping, in his "nature" there is such an exposition (although the contents of the book is not flattering, but the preface is worth reading), access to information channel changes: The 70 's people are reading newspapers, 80, listen to the radio, 90 watch TV, the new century to surf the internet, Google it after 2005. We come to the user procurement path changes: The 70 's plan procurement, 80 generation of money can not buy, 90 market procurement, the new century telephone procurement, now online to see comments to purchase.

The classic case and operation method of the critical marketing

The choice of the hotel industry case, is because of the hotel industry commentary marketing is commendable, not only the collection of comments done very well, but also for the review of the collation, classification, analysis, tips have raised a new height.

The consumption of hotel products is very different from the various kinds of consumer products mentioned above. Hotel industry has a typical characteristics of the tertiary sector, is the experience of consumption, and the experience of a single hotel in the user's life may also be once, this experience users will be very important, and experience is the people of the beholder, benevolent, So it makes sense to synthesize the real experience of more users.

Reviews in the hospitality industry include hardware, software, and features, as a consumer's focus on the service is also high on the basis of the hotel's infrastructure, and the display of the perimeter features is more likely to facilitate purchasing decisions, even in developed countries. The world's largest tourism search engine kayak as an example, it not only launched the user's comments, but also hired industry experts on the hotel in-depth reviews, a full range of introduction to enable consumers to quickly generate trust.

From the history of Hotel reservation way: First go to where to count, to the destination to find a hotel to stay, then become by telephone booking, 800, 400 telephone number has become a reservation hotel synonymous, but because of the limitations of telephone information, the network quickly become an indispensable means, But smart users quickly found that the information on the network is often only a good deal, thus, the rapid response of E-commerce platform on the homeopathy launched a review of the hotel's coup. The reason for this change is mainly due to the consumer's attention to the hotel from the price to the direction of value, the value of the excavation is based on WEB2.0 platform.

Take a look at www.qunar.com--, the largest tourist vertical search engine in China, has done a very good job of commenting on the hotel, taking the Shanghai International Hotel as an example.

First, he searched 7 different online booking sites for more than 50 reviews of the Shanghai International Hotel, the network to the fullest possible information to the user, which allows users to understand the hotel multi-directional to get rid of a single site due to the limitations of the user group and one-sided comments not comprehensive objective problems;

Second, when he was presenting these comments, it is not the full text of the user's long speech (this is because for the users who want to read the whole comment can be easily read through the original website), but according to their own sufficient experience in the hotel industry, the original according to the user's most concerned about the price, facilities , location, transportation, services, catering 6 aspects of the interception, as most of the hotel users often get the 6 aspects of the information is very detailed, they will pay attention to most of the 2-3 they care about, when you see according to the comments of other users summed up the praise and the non-praise of the statistics, The original focus of each keyword is highlighted, and their purchasing decisions are easier to make.

Finally, taking into account the user's personalized needs, he will be a number of users stay in the hotel attention of the above 6 main features are also refined, display, such as: International Hotel is the city of Shanghai, the first boss of the International Hotel is the former Shanghai Beach Green-Yuesheng, These popular words, which are often mentioned in user reviews, are also shown to facilitate decision making by letting other users know about the hotel's relevance.

This is exactly what the search provides to users, and the real value of critical marketing is the quickest help for people searching for hotels on a vast array of Internet. They also have more to choose from when choosing a hotel.

Comments on Marketing Application considerations

I. Basic principles:

1. User principle-user-centric, which is almost the core of all marketing methods, but in the process of critical marketing, but also, must undergo a comprehensive, detailed research, really understand what users want to know what information? Just as we mentioned in the content of the comments, business reputation reviews, comprehensive comments, and so on, only really meet the needs of users of the review is the most effective way to expand.

2. Information principles-to ensure the comprehensiveness of information, in the process of displaying comments, in order to obtain more comprehensive information, can stand in a multidimensional perspective to examine the center of the review, so that users in the process of reading information themselves to draw the correct conclusions.

3. Tool principle-with the continuous promotion of commented marketing, users will get more and more information, they have no way to judge, the merchant should be based on the collected users of the real focus of the operation of the tool to help other users quickly understand the relevant comments, make decisions.

Ii. Risks:

The benefits of critical marketing are beyond doubt, and some of his risks have been leap, that is, the amount of negative information generated, and the processing of this information to be very cautious:

1. To determine the source of information, whether this information is the real consumer or competitor;

2. For consumers to put forward the negative information, business to seriously face, do not do delete, and to do update, and clear to make a reply, what time will be in what manner of these upgrades, which for the user's confidence in the business is also helpful, of course, make the commitment must be honoured, Otherwise, the outcome will be more disastrous;

3. For negative information from competitors, to analyze the actual situation, because the competitor's product disadvantage is that his product is superior to you, at this time, for the product improvement and upgrade will play an accelerated role.

In short, the critical marketing in modern marketing is a very good trading interaction, mutual promotion of means and methods. This is in the past to solicit customer opinions, network surveys, questionnaires and other feedback of a new form of networked applications, this web2.0 platform for the sharing of openness, transparency is the past any kind of market feedback can not match. Especially in this cold winter, the successful application of critical marketing in the WEB2.0 platform is a good thing for every business.