Source: Liang Jiangjun (ID: liangjiangjunisme)

A few days ago, I chatted with the founding team of an electronics consumer brand. They showed me their company's new generation product and enthusiastically explained the design ingenuity. "Is it selling well?" When I asked this question, their faces darkened, and they said, "Except for one product that went viral before, we've invested more resources in other new products and improved performance, but consumers just aren't buying..."

After talking with several new consumer companies, I've noticed that many new consumer products are facing similar problems: they initially broke through with a hit product, but later couldn't incubate another hit, and most product lines became as useless as chicken ribs.

When hit product sales hit the ceiling and new products fail to take over in time, anxiety sets in. I call this phenomenon "hit product backlash."

Why Do You Suffer from Hit Product Backlash?

I believe there are two main reasons:

1. You've Defined "Hit Product" Incorrectly

1) A hit product is not the same as a big single product

In the past, many FMCG category leaders adopted a big single product strategy, such as Wanglaoji in herbal tea, Xiangpiaopiao in milk tea, and Yangyuan in plant-based protein drinks.

But a hit product is by no means equal to a big single product; hit products have genes that big single products lack.

For example, Warner Bros. President Horn pursued a hit product strategy, and Warner's most successful hit was "Harry Potter." But do you know how "Harry Potter" came to Warner? One day, a British woman bought a copy of "Harry Potter" in a bookstore, intending to give it as a gift to her family. After reading it herself, she found it so good that she recommended it to her boss. Her boss was a partner of a Warner executive, who became a die-hard fan after reading it and strongly urged Warner's top management to buy the copyright...

Soon after, "Harry Potter" became popular, and the adapted films sold well.

"Harry Potter" represents what a true hit product is: Besides sales, the biggest characteristic of a hit product is winning word-of-mouth. In "Harry Potter," you can see shadows of many hit products, such as Apple's iPhone 4, Lancôme's小黑瓶 (Advanced Génifique), Tencent's WeChat...

So, a true hit product can capture the market without relying on traffic and maintain consumer relationships with minimal advertising costs.

2) A hit product is not the same as a product that goes viral

In 2019, Proya launched "Bubble Mask." In just one month, sales of the Bubble Mask exceeded 1 million boxes, and total sales over three months surpassed 300 million yuan, even breaking Taobao's monthly sales record at one point.

But this hit product quickly faced widespread skepticism online. Their marketing claimed "the dirtier your face, the more bubbles" and "bubbles are toxins expelled from your face," but the foaming principle was merely the volatilization of fluorine compounds, and excessive use of these compounds could irritate the skin.

Later, the Bubble Mask was not only taken off the shelves but also turned from a hot-selling hit into a black mark on the brand's history.

Many viral internet products cannot be equated with hit products. Because products that suddenly go viral often create gimmicks rather than solve consumer needs.

If the biggest selling point of the Bubble Mask is the bubbles, then consumers aren't there to care for their skin but to play with bubbles; if the biggest selling point of Answer Tea is "divination," then consumers aren't there to drink tea but to have their fortunes told.

Treating product gimmicks as product selling points has the biggest problem: it shifts consumer motivation. When consumer motivation points to "entertainment experience" rather than "solving needs," they will quickly abandon you after "checking in."

2. There Are Only Temporary Hit Products, Not Eternal Ones

In 2015, Yangyuan's Six Walnut revenue was 9.1 billion yuan, with net profit of 2.6 billion yuan. Just as everyone thought a 10-billion-yuan big single product was about to emerge in the plant-based protein drink market, Six Walnut began a downward spiral.

Six Walnut's sales were mainly concentrated during gift-giving occasions like Spring Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival. The outbreak of the pandemic at the end of December 2019 dealt another heavy blow, and by 2020, net profit had fallen to only 1.5 billion yuan...

There are only temporary hit products, not eternal ones. Even a strong big single product like Six Walnut, after 10 years of rapid growth, couldn't withstand the impact of consumption upgrades and the pandemic.

Besides external environmental changes and the times eliminating us, the hit product strategy most fears encirclement by competitors.

In recent months, I've noticed that many coffee brands have started to "Saturnbird-ize."

Saturnbird was able to lead a new trend in the coffee industry because it pioneered two things: freeze-dried coffee powder and mini cups.

Freeze-dried coffee powder isn't a new technology; it's just that before Saturnbird, no one had applied this technology to cold-brew reduction. Once a new technology is validated by the market and the barrier to entry isn't high, competitors will quickly follow.

The mini cups that made many coffee fans scream are even easier for coffee players to copy. Not only brands like Luckin, Lian Coffee, and COSTA followed suit, but even Starbucks, swallowing its pride, launched its own "Sui Xing Cup."

When your innovation is no longer "new," the charm of the hit product is gradually disenchanted by incoming competitors.

For the hit product pioneer, it must either run fast enough to capture the market before competitors catch up, or continuously innovate and keep launching the next hit product; otherwise, it will fall into the quagmire of homogeneous competition and lose its first-mover advantage.

So, I've always believed: What matters is not having a hit product, but having the ability to continuously incubate hit products.

How does the ability to continuously incubate hit products come about?

From 2013 to now, Xiaomi has incubated over 300 Xiaomi ecosystem companies. The products of these companies span a wide range, but strangely, we can always easily recognize them as Xiaomi products.

Although Xiaomi only invests in ecosystem companies without controlling them, it heavily participates in product development. Taking product design as an example, Xiaomi ecosystem companies must follow the same set of product design principles:

First, maximize rationality: form should match technology, reliability should match aesthetics, and design should match usage scenarios;

Second, minimalism: what can be done or not done, definitely don't do;

Third, natural and not abrupt: meet the needs of most users, strive to be versatile in every decoration style;

Fourth, in simple design, add a little "sexually cold with a bit of flirt" active small element to give the product spirit, but this soul element should not exceed 5%;

Fifth, don't self-indulge, don't show off skills: if encountering immature new technologies or new features that will confuse users or add trouble, decisively cut them, or even stop the entire project;

Sixth, eliminate the manual: when designing products, assume users won't read the manual, and guide them through design semantics so consumers understand how to operate at a glance.

Product design is only part of Xiaomi's requirements for ecosystem companies; there are also guiding principles for product development, quality, and other areas. This ensures that Xiaomi ecosystem products not only present a unified style but also guarantee the probability of hit products being born.

Companies that can continuously incubate hit products all have their own methodology. Let me introduce a few hit product development approaches:

1. Simultaneously Hit Pain Points, Itch Points, and Sweet Points to Increase the Chance of Becoming a Hit

User needs can basically be divided into three types: pain point needs, itch point needs, and sweet point needs.

  • Pain point needs are urgent functional needs;
  • Itch point needs are important but not urgent needs;
  • Sweet point needs are interesting needs that bring surprise.

Suppose you want to climb the world's highest mountain—Mount Everest. When climbing, you will inevitably bring your hunger-resistant big brother—compressed biscuits.

When climbing Everest, you must quickly replenish a lot of calories and maintain physical strength, so compressed biscuits must first meet the needs of high calories and easy absorption; this is a pain point.

As climbing consumes more and more physical strength, climbers cannot carry heavy food, so the portability of compressed biscuits is very important; this is an itch point.

But compressed biscuits generally don't taste good. If there were a compressed biscuit that, on the basis of hunger resistance and portability, also had a chocolate-like taste, or even the same biscuit eaten by mountaineering god Reinhold Messner, it would not just be a biscuit but also a spiritual totem inspiring every climber.

When a product can simultaneously hit consumers' pain points, itch points, and sweet point needs, the probability of becoming a hit increases.

I think the Dyson hair dryer is a product that does well in simultaneously satisfying pain points, itch points, and sweet points.

High airflow and quick drying are rigid needs for most consumers, but using high-power hot air can damage hair. Dyson's selling point of "no hair damage" solves this pain point.

If a hair dryer has high airflow but also high noise, consumers will feel irritated; that's an itch point. Dyson's hair dryer with the same 1600-watt power has high airflow but only produces airflow sound.

And Dyson's bladeless design and rose gold color give the dryer a high-class look, providing consumers with a dessert.

2. Turn Long-Tail Needs into Hit Products

Facing a group of serious fitness enthusiasts, do you think there is a common pain point among this group?

The common pain point among these people is not actually how to lose fat faster, but how to prevent muscle loss during fitness. Under Armour found this mass pain point under the long-tail need and developed quick-dry compression technology fabric. Fitness clothes made from this fabric tightly wrap your muscles and preserve heat, preventing muscle loss.

By satisfying the big pain point of this small group, Under Armour took the tech-fabric compression fitness wear to the extreme, gained massive spread among fitness enthusiasts on social media, and successfully entered a broader market from the long-tail demand market.

Not all companies have the strength to win-take-all; using extreme products to serve the long-tail needs of a small group is also a hit product development strategy.

On Douyin, many KOLs have accounts dedicated to teaching photography, but photography is already a red ocean with fierce competition. If you still enter from a large category, it's hard to break through the competitive encirclement.

Photography expert Cai Zhongyang discovered people's need for mobile photography. His Douyin account specifically teaches how to take good photos with mobile phones, only teaching mobile photography, and attracted over 5 million fans in just over two years.

Another example from the restaurant industry: there's a restaurant called Hu Da on Guijie Street in Beijing. While many restaurants attract customers with large and comprehensive menus, Hu Da Restaurant seized the needs of crayfish connoisseurs, developed various flavors of crayfish, and deepened and refined the long-tail need for crayfish.

As crayfish became popular, Hu Da Restaurant has opened three consecutive branches on Guijie Street.

In a market environment segmented by vertical categories, creating a national hit is increasingly difficult. Finding the most common pain point in long-tail needs and turning long-tail needs into hit products is also an approach.

3. Big Hit Products Drive Small Hit Products to Increase Success Rate

After a variety show ends, a long block of ads usually plays. But Zhejiang TV didn't do that; after airing the variety show "Running Man," they directly transitioned to a new program without a break. Before the audience could react, they were led to the next show.

This strategy uses big hit products to drive small hit products, creating a slide effect. Users slide from one hit product to the next like a slide, increasing the success rate of incubating hit products.

Marvel released a movie called "Ant-Man," which few people had heard of at the time. But they embedded many small easter eggs in the movie.

For example:

Plot elements related to Marvel's hit movies were integrated into "Ant-Man," successfully piquing the interest of Marvel fans, and "Ant-Man"'s box office was eventually boosted.

SKII has a patented ingredient called Pitera. Their Facial Treatment Essence (神仙水) became popular thanks to this star ingredient. Later, they added this ingredient to a mask and told everyone that the mask contained the same Pitera as the essence. Riding on the popularity of the big hit product, the "Ex-Boyfriend Mask" quickly became SKII's new hit.

Big hit products driving small hit products requires weaving a huge network of relationships, using the power of the big hit to introduce new products to the same group of users and quickly push them into new hits.

4. Hit Products Aren't Thought Up; They're Tested

In the past, everyone's hit products were thought up by slapping their foreheads.

Video platforms wanting to bet on a hit movie would consider dimensions like production team and actor lineup to judge whether the work could become a hit, then allocate most funds to a potentially popular work.

A clothing store owner judging which clothes will be popular next year relies entirely on experientialism from years in the industry, buying a batch of clothes in advance and storing them in the warehouse. If the bet is right, they make a fortune; if wrong, the goods just pile up in the warehouse.

Betting on hit products based on experience is like buying a lottery ticket. Although it may bring explosive success, it can also lead to total failure.

There's a Finnish game company called Supercell. They typically develop 10-20 new games simultaneously, spend years testing, and finally discover one hit.

With the advent of the internet, the difficulty of testing hit products has decreased. Companies can use big data to make more granular judgments about consumer behavior.

Before Pepsi launches a new product, their R&D center uses big data to judge consumption trends, then conducts actual interviews with consumers, combining big data and small data to guide product production.

Unlike betting on hits, their hit products aren't thought up; they're tested.

Incubating hit products is a probability problem, not a judgment problem. From a probability perspective, identifying key variables that affect hit product generation in advance and continuously optimizing these variables can increase the probability of hit products appearing.

5. Don't Necessarily Treat Hit Products as Main Revenue; Learn to Use Hit Products to Build a Business Chain

In 2009, Real Madrid introduced Cristiano Ronaldo for $125 million, which was considered a sky-high price at the time. But later, Real Madrid calculated that Ronaldo brought in over $600 million in revenue.

For a football team, star players are the team's "hit products."

People often think the role of star players is to help the team win; winning teams have higher attendance and sell more tickets. Thinking like that is too naive.

The president of Real Madrid once defined the club, saying: "Real Madrid is not a sports organization, but a 'content provider.' Real Madrid provides entertainment content, which is why people like to watch us."

Because of this vision, Real Madrid has always been the most profitable club in football. Real Madrid's way of making money isn't from tickets contributed by star players, but from broadcasting rights fees, merchandise like jerseys, and endorsement shares brought by star players.

Real Madrid relies on hit products to derive an entire business chain for profit.

Do you know how variety show production companies make money? The first reaction is advertising fees; top variety show sponsorships cost over 100 million yuan, but the actual situation isn't necessarily so.

For example, although Miwei's "The Big Band" (乐队的夏天) seems to attract 100-200 million yuan in advertising, when you deduct production costs like celebrity and guest appearance fees, platform screen fees, and promotional expenses, it might just break even.

The real money-making part of "The Big Band" is likely short-term endorsements with signed artists and offline tour ticket sales. The show seems to be Miwei's hit product, but hit products don't necessarily bring the most direct revenue; the business chain derived from hit products is the real profit point.

Conclusion:

Making a hit product by luck may not be so difficult, but if you can't have the ability to continuously incubate hit products, you will lose in repeated gambles with luck.

Are you "watching" me?