In today's terminal-dominated market, promotions are like a swamp that must be crossed to boost sales, hiding one trap after another beneath a calm surface. Step in the right place and you pass through joyfully; step wrong and you sink in, trapped. Originally intending to create a promotional peak to intercept competitors, we find that after everyone digs three feet down to build their own peaks, the land becomes a swamp full of traps, and we ourselves are mired in it, unable to stop.
So, with more and more promotions from the same industry and increasingly severe homogenization, where is our promotional swamp? And what must we do to find a solid stepping stone within it?
Swamp One: Gifts That Don't Understand the Customer's Heart
The role of gifts can be divided into two types: one is to entice repeat purchases, and the other is to cater to customers' desire for small bargains to stimulate impulse buying. However, some companies fail to grasp customer psychology when choosing gifts for purchase-with-gift promotions, inadvertently making two mistakes:
Emphasizing price over value, failing to meet the strongest consumer need. Gifts are not about being expensive but about being loved by customers. Human psychology is strange: for a typical housewife, a 3-yuan drink is less appealing than a 2-yuan cooking oil, but for young people, a 2-yuan oil is far less effective than a 1.5-yuan drink. The choice of promotional gift is not about cost but about selecting what can touch the hearts of different consumer groups. To find a good stepping stone in the promotional swamp, we must tailor gifts to different consumer mindsets.
Gifts as a windfall, not a driver for repeat purchases. McDonald's gift promotions, like buying a burger to get a backpack or toy, have made some kids go to great lengths to collect all the toys, even "taking away more than they eat." But some companies only think about getting more people to buy early, never considering how to encourage multiple or repeat purchases.
For example, for rural women around 25, urban women around 35, and elderly around 60, what kind of gifts would make them repeat purchases? One is a combination of household items they want, like a set of kitchen hardware. Another is a series of children's toys; when a child has a "Prince" and wants the "Princess" to match, consumers usually choose to buy again. Therefore, selecting a gift that whets their appetite based on consumer psychology is the best choice for purchase-with-gift promotions.
Swamp Two: Promotions Following Habits
Following habits is the main cause of industry homogenization. Many people are impatient when planning promotions, relying on experience and habit rather than seeking differentiation from promotion targets, channel types, or countermeasures. Facing competitors' consumer purchase-with-gift promotions at various distribution points, we often habitually counter with a better gift promotion. In fact, using a promotion that offers benefits to distributors to encourage them to push more can also boost sales.
Of course, besides differentiating by promotion target, we can also start from channel types and countermeasures. A beer company noticed this when planning promotions: in the catering channel, they used a "win on opening the bottle" promotion to delight waitstaff and consumers; in the distribution channel, they used a "collect prize numbers for glassware or beer exchange" promotion to satisfy both consumers and channel partners. This way, different channels catered to different interests, stimulating purchases and boosting the enthusiasm of channel partners and promoters.
In promotional countermeasures, I once, when competitors had a gift promotion and our company had no promotional resources, used the psychology of "face" by sending salespeople to major distribution points to squat and promote, effectively blocking the competitor's gift promotion—distributors couldn't very well push the competitor's products in front of our salespeople. Details determine success or failure. Different channel types, promotion targets, and countermeasures can all be avenues for innovation. Breaking out of existing experience frameworks and seeking new breakthroughs based on human psychology is key to successful promotional innovation.
Swamp Three: Going It Alone
A successful promotion requires considering many aspects: how to reduce costs, increase credibility and appeal, and minimize brand damage or even enhance brand value. But perhaps due to a "one-man-show" mentality, some promotions are limited to a single method.
Single method, not integrating other sales tools to enhance influence and credibility. "A good chess player seeks the overall situation; a poor one seeks individual moves." The biggest shortcoming of some promotions is not lack of creativity or good staff, but insufficient momentum. Putting up a sign in a store saying "buy one get one free" or "cash back of tens of yuan"—methods that have long numbed consumers—is considered promotion communication. Putting a small price reduction image on a DM flyer buried among countless others is considered advertising. This approach is a last resort for small companies with limited budgets, but for well-known brands, does your promotional information really reach most of your target consumers? Do you often see that when more consumers come to buy the promotional product, the event has already ended? Therefore, when planning promotions, shouldn't we incorporate advertising, PR, and personal selling to achieve better results? When helping a friend plan a promotion on a county town's commercial street, I used mass media to target customers with promotional information, used targeted flyers for soft-sell articles from an investment perspective, used TV news to broadcast the signing ceremony of the old county party committee selling the land to the company for the commercial street to boost a positive image, and invited experts to lecture on real estate investment tips, combining prepaid discount promotions with PR and advertising. The houses were sold out before construction even began, because the momentum that influences consumers to follow trends was truly unleashed.
Going it alone, ignoring cooperation. Promotions cost marketing money, whether in resources or brand impact, and should be carefully considered. Joint promotions with brands of similar tier are one of the best ways to reduce marketing costs, but many companies avoid seeking partners because of the hassle, preferring to reduce promotional impact and harm brand development rather than cooperate with outsiders.
Why be so rigid? When Supor and Arawana's joint promotion "Good Pot, Good Oil" and "Good Oil, Good Pot" achieved great success, we can learn from and innovate on that. Recently, while discussing Spring Festival promotions with a netizen on a clothing brand forum, we talked about a "Holding Hands with Lover for the New Year" plan, which seemed very interesting.
As Spring Festival approaches, how should promotions be conducted? Discounts? Gifts? Neither is new. Why not combine with Valentine's Day (February 14, which falls on the sixth day of the lunar new year)? Then partner with a flower shop and a chocolate company for a joint promotion: anyone buying clothing from that brand above a certain amount can have a beautiful rose or chocolate delivered on Valentine's Day as specified, and those spending more can get both (or receive them early). At the same time, in promotional communication, encourage people to send roses to their mothers to make them happy and surprise their fathers, or give friendship chocolates to office colleagues to improve relationships. Correspondingly, the flower shop and chocolate company will give customers who buy a certain amount a tie or coupon from the clothing brand. This way, everyone is happy: promotional information spreads quickly, sales increase, brand image is enhanced, and consumers feel cared for.
Swamp Four: Short-Termism, Neglecting Loyal Customer Cultivation
Is the purpose of promotion to steal customers from competitors, reward existing customers, or stimulate new customers to buy? Even promotion planners might not be able to answer. In reality, while complaining about consumer disloyalty, we never treat loyal customers differently from ordinary ones. We do a hundred promotions a year just to get more people to buy within a certain period, and loyal customers always enjoy the same discounts as everyone else. Isn't this short-sighted promotion worth reflecting on?
Getting a consumer to buy 100 yuan of your product in one day is a promotion, but isn't getting them to buy 10,000 yuan over a year also a promotion? For products that encourage repeat purchases, especially high-ticket items, giving a membership card after the first purchase, offering appropriate discounts regularly, and providing extra benefits during promotions, plus surprising them with gifts when they reach a certain spending threshold, or telling them they can add 20 yuan to get a product that others need 100 yuan for—wouldn't that make customers more loyal to your brand? Companies that can use such methods should combine temporary promotions with long-term ones; the effects will show over time—use temporary promotions to grab competitors' customers or attract new buyers, and use membership cards to guide loyal customers to buy long-term. With both approaches, why not? Mobile companies even give me, a silver card member, gifts at Christmas and free movie tickets. After watching the movie, why can't we learn from that?
Only with meticulous work can we cultivate deeply, and only with deep cultivation can we find the entry point. To find a solid stepping stone in the swamp of promotions, we must, while following the crowd, take the time to find our own path.
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