Image source @ Visual China
Text | Slightly larger reference, the author | Xiao Aoi, Zhichao, editor | field
01 grass traps
From 1.88 million followers to 1 million followers, it took only a few days for the shop blogger "Cow Road".
What made him overturn were two videos of KFC shop visits. For the first time, he complained about KFC's fried sauce noodles in the video: the price of 26 yuan is too expensive, the noodles over the water are "almost meaningless", and the fried sauce is "not edible". Subsequently, he promoted the old Beijing fried sauce he had brought with him.
After a bit of belittling KFC fried sauce noodles, Niu Dao promoted his own fried sauce.
Using shop video to attract traffic and then bring goods to monetize is the survival of many internet celebrity bloggers, although controversial, but in general, it also makes sense. But the beef road did not stop here, the second visit to the store, the same bowl of fried sauce noodles have a completely opposite evaluation: "26 yuan is really not expensive", "(noodles) is still steaming, a look is just cooked."
As for the fried sauce that was rated as "unpalatable" last time, this time it has also become: "This little sauce is awesome."
Such a "Sichuan drama change face" has triggered strong dissatisfaction among fans. Under pressure, Niu Dao posted an apology video, insisting that he had no interest in KFC. But regardless of the truth, viewers can no longer trust a web anchor with inconsistent remarks. While the young man used the checkpoint to show his attitude, he left a message in the other video comment areas he later updated, "The tunnel in your mouth is everyone's guide to avoiding pits" and "Cow road, kneel for brother".
The world's bitter internet celebrities plant grass, for a long time.
The main source of income for influencer bloggers is "advertising". Usually, in order to enhance the effect of content dissemination and avoid the needs of platform control, many bloggers have made advertising "soft" and turned to real evaluation, store visits, etc., a false move.
A 25-year-old Shanxi girl, Que que, has learned to identify various types of advertising grass information on Internet platforms. For example, if a restaurant appears in the visiting video of different internet celebrity bloggers, and the lines are basically the same, she will judge: this is an advertisement for internet celebrities and grasses run by the merchant, and the authenticity of the information is doubtful.
"I would never go to this kind of shop and don't want to be harvested by advertising," she told "Slightly Larger Reference." Compared with the Internet celebrity planting grass, she is more willing to follow the advice of her friends when choosing consumption projects, "not necessarily more professional, but at least real".
In today's growing internet celebrity grass growing industry, reality has become a scarce thing.
A marketing company engaged in shop exploration services revealed that at present, many short video paid shops are filmed according to the script formulated in advance, and customers can customize the blogger's evaluation, which is almost no different from the traditional advertising shooting process. The reviews presented in the video have nothing to do with the blogger's personal real experience.
On some grass planting platforms, the process of planting grass is more concise, and marketing companies will provide bloggers with ready-made copy, and bloggers only need to click to send.
"The routine is too obvious", Liu Qian, a 28-year-old new mother, once wanted to get information on postpartum recovery on the grass planting platform, but she quickly found that this was not an easy learning program. Most of the copywriting content is similar, and it ultimately points to the sale of body shapewear.
In the local life field where major Internet companies have successively entered the market, the trend of Internet celebrities planting grass is even more magnificent.
It's a big cake. According to Analysys Qianfan data, as of the first half of 2021, the transaction scale of the local life-to-store business market has increased fivefold compared with the same period in 2015, reaching 528.76 billion, with a year-on-year growth rate of more than 20%. iResearch expects the local life services market to reach 35.3 trillion yuan by the end of 2025.
Chart: Local life-to-store business market transaction scale
Since 2021, the big factories have successively accelerated the layout of local life services, intuitively adding relevant entrances to the App and launching functions about eating, drinking and having fun. Local life services are the areas where these content platforms have lacked accumulation before, and the highly related content of exploring stores and planting grass has become the most suitable traffic entrance.
Many users can feel that in some shop exploration videos, they can also directly find coupons and other consumption entrances. The shorter the path from being planted to consuming, the shorter the window of time left for consumers to think, and the higher the completion rate of orders - after all, in essence, watching short videos and planting grass by the way creates a typical impulse consumption scene.
02 The Power of Reality
In the virtual Internet world, real power is needed.
Beijing girl Tian Tian, she is the "food guide" in the circle of friends. Friends know that she is professional, and often throws in various questions to ask, for example, what is the recommended roast duck near the east of Guomao? Which is the best old Beijing copper pot shabu-shabu? Which steakhouse has the most mood? Is the kebab shop that has been popular lately worth eating? The friends who are "planted" by her are always willing to continue to communicate with her after the meal.
Tian Tian will also share her real personal consumption feelings with public reviews. In response to the questions of netizens on the review, she will also try to reply, for her, this is a thing that can bring satisfaction.
Just as everyone will refer to the rating of Douban movies when they go out to see movies, in the field of local life services, dianping is also forming similar store selection coordinates.
The folk standard that circulates among foodies is that if you want to taste the most characteristic local food in a strange city when you first arrive, a small restaurant with a score of about 3.5 on the public review is worth trying. It may be a place that locals visit more often, as local diners tend to be more picky about service and reluctant to give too high a score.
Pictured: Dianping scored 3.6 Xiao zhu hotel in Longwu
Computer scientist Bob. Metcalfe proposed the idea of "network effects" in the 1980s, arguing that the value of networks grows exponentially as the number of people joins increases. Later generations called it "Metcalfe Theory".
When the "Metcalfe Theory" is applied to platforms with review functions such as Taobao, Douban, and Dianping, it gathers the real power of ordinary people on the Internet.
03 Blind box
Planting grass itself is a beautiful thing.
The power of the Internet to connect everything once made the early days of "planting grass" very pure. Young people enthusiastically share their discoveries with strangers good things and good shops, as long as they can play a reference and help role in other people's consumption decisions, it is enough to support them to continue to "generate electricity". Platforms such as Dianping, Douban, Zhihu, and the early 55BBS were all concentrated places where young people were happy to be planted.
Until the Internet celebrities entered the field of "planting grass", this wind direction changed.
Unlike ordinary people's cautious attitudes towards personal real evaluation content, influencers have become part of the new marketing model, and they play an emotionless advertising machine in the name of planting grass. After all, in the era of big data, fans are no longer real people for them, but only data and traffic, and their chips to charge advertisers.
Sparrow now basically does not watch the food exploration content in the short video. She has worked in brand marketing and knows that this is mostly a "collusion" of advertising marketing. For example, the popular store content in the short video platform now, a variety of "19.9 yuan package", "5 yuan meal" low-cost goods drainage, the purpose is to attract users to the entrance of the order, and then develop consumption habits.
Pictured: Screenshot of a food blogger on a short video platform
"I have a lot of doubts about these effects", Que Que mentioned to "Slightly Larger Reference", she has many friends around her who have purchased similar coupons or packages, but are often reminded to remember after expiration - this is a typical drawback of impulse consumption, and completing the purchase is basically equivalent to completing the consumption. Physical consumption is fine, users can receive express delivery, forming a complete purchase. But for coupons that need to take time to experience offline, being forgotten is the most normal destination for it.
More often, when Sparrow and her friends need to go out to dinner, they are still accustomed to opening public reviews to see, choosing a restaurant that meets expectations, "has formed inertia."
But planting grass is still a good business. As long as the traffic is large enough, merchants are willing to try. According to the person in charge of the MCN agency, at present, on the head short video platform, the head master can visit 80 stores a month. And food exploration shops based on local life, almost every video can receive ads.
The end of influencer traffic is the live broadcast room. This makes their relationship with their fans more naked. Most Internet celebrities are also accustomed to becoming TV shopping anchors in the live broadcast room, mechanically reading the scripts provided by the merchants, performing exaggerated performances, encouraging users to plant grass, place orders, and complete traffic harvesting.
In the face of interests, many Internet celebrities are only left with "human design" and lose their true humanity.
They themselves live in the filter, that is, the "drama theory" mentioned by Goffman in "Self-Presentation of Daily Life", and the Internet celebrity bloggers adopt a series of methods and techniques in order to maintain the ideal image in the minds of mass consumers.
These techniques, of course, have nothing to do with "reality". For consumers, the biggest problem caused by this set of gameplay is that the follow-up shop has become a "blind box". Before completing the consumption, the user only sees the gorgeous packaging box, as to whether it is a limited edition or a garbage that is ugly and can't bear to look at, it all depends on luck.
Young people, who have long been used as traffic harvesters, are trying to escape this situation.
It's easy for young people to believe what they see or hear, but once they find themselves deceived or taken advantage of, their departure will be more determined – the "cattle road" overturn is the most typical example. In the past two years, Internet celebrities have frequently fallen into the whirlpool of public opinion because of filters and false grasses, and because they stand on the opposite side of "real", they have been spat on by young people on various social platforms.
When Internet celebrities become a component of the marketing business, more and more Internet celebrities frequently overturn the car on the issue of filters and personality, and the true evaluation of ordinary people has a higher reference significance and value.
Such a return to basics is also the inevitable development of history. After repeating something fake 1,000 times, even if it is perfect, it can be tiresome because its core is cold and profit-driven. And the real thing is repeated 10,000 times, even if it is flawed, it has its own power, because it is changeable, vivid, and rooted in real life.
"Will also look at the content of the Internet celebrity shop, try to buy a group purchase", Que Que told "slightly larger reference", many netizens bought a low-cost package with goods from Internet celebrities, like to run to the public reviews to write reviews, but also bad reviews, "basically are the real voice of ordinary people, and if the internet celebrity propaganda is too big, everyone wants to write out the real experience, can not let the people behind it step on the thunder." ”
These real presentations from ordinary users, removing the influencer filter, is the true color of the Internet grass, is the real "Chinese do not cheat Chinese" - internet celebrity bloggers are now popular to hang this sentence on their lips, but for many people, this is obviously just a line written on paper.
The establishment of a world of real information is never an easy task.
In the general trend of internet celebrities planting grass gradually being played badly, the real power is destined to be seen by more people. As users spontaneously provide more and more real information, they eventually come together and build trust. It's invaluable.
Because, in any commercial company that needs to connect with people, user trust is a coveted asset. It is fundamental to all stories and can be the beginning of countless new stories.
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