Xi'an and Harbin were on fire in the previous wave of social media publicity.
While the urban culture is attractive, they are also popular in the same place - the morning market.
Searching for the Northeast Morning Market and the Xi'an Morning Market, you can find 4w+ notes in Xiaohongshu, and under different food recommendations, everyone will mention these two places when describing the morning market. When you come here, you can feel the thick atmosphere of human fireworks and real life.
As much as the morning market, there is another place that attracts consumers' attention - the vegetable market.
Have you noticed that whether it is a morning market or a vegetable market, it is a presentation of simple scenes of life.
Here, you don't need to dress brightly and behave elegantly, you don't need to do enough research to find the best scene before going out, and you won't be scared by the expensive price tag and wonder if you are dazzled.
In the morning market and vegetable market, there are full of fresh vegetables, all kinds of snacks full of carbs, mixed with the cries of small vendors and the aroma of food just out of the pot, all of which tell us that this is a certain life.
*Northeast Morning Market, photo | The public account @ here is the Northeast
Looking back at business, the morning market and wet market are similar to the "food courts" and "supermarkets" in our shopping malls.
So why is it that most of these two formats in shopping malls are facing concerns about declining performance, while on the other side of the city, market culture is sprouting again?
Emotions & Emotions
Before answering this question, let's look at two words, "emotion" and "emotion." Do you think they're a concept?
Maybe you have a vague intuition that they are different, but you can't say why. However, understanding the difference between these two terms is crucial for us to look at the future of business.
Emotions are current feelings, including joys, sorrows, and sorrows, which are characterized by sudden onset and rapid disappearance. In contrast, emotions are long-term and stable feelings hidden deep in the heart, such as family affection and love.
In contrast, emotions are more cognitive, and emotions tend to come suddenly and their arrival is difficult to predict.
*Image from Unsplash
So, what controls our emotions and emotions?
This is where dopamine and endorphins come in.
Emotions correspond to dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the brain that is responsible for the brain's transmission of lust, feelings, excitement and happiness, and is also associated with addiction.
The secretion of dopamine represents the desire motivation of "wanting", which does not mean real pleasure or affection, and when we feel "cured" or "infected", it has nothing to do with dopamine.
Emotions correspond to endorphins, which can bind to morphine receptors to produce pain relief and pleasure with the same effect as morphine and opiates, which is equivalent to natural analgesics.
Endorphins are a type of delayed gratification that can be obtained in a state of tranquility, and its secretion is stingy and generally goes through a painful process to obtain.
*Image from Unsplash
In addition, dopamine secretion generally drops sharply after that, and people tend to fall into emptiness and anxiety, and the only way to eliminate this emptiness and anxiety is to repeat the previous behavior. However, because of the increase in the threshold, in order to get the same amount of dopamine as before, the dose must be increased, which is commonly known as "addiction".
Emotional Business vs. Emotional Business
In commercial marketing, "dopamine dressing" and "dopamine girl" have become the traffic passwords of online platforms, behind dopamine is emotional value, and behind endorphins can be called emotional value.
*Image from Unsplash
However, at a time when emotional business is widely mentioned, emotional business has not been taken seriously.
Behind the morning market and vegetable market vs food court and supermarket, it is actually a contest between the market and the mall, and behind this contest, it is actually a PK of emotional value and emotional value.
In the heart of the city, the mall provides consumers with a comfortable and eye-catching "beautiful" space, in which the spacious atrium, well-designed public areas and various shops stimulate people's dopamine secretion, making people want to participate in it, gain recognition and happiness.
And then by superimposing irregular activities to satisfy people's desire for novelty, so as to get full emotional value, and finally produce an addictive feeling of visiting the mall.
*According to the official website of Chaoyang Joy City
But when emotions are oversatisfied, people find that when emotional value overflows, it doesn't bring more happiness -
When you walk out of the mall with your shopping bag full, you feel the emptiness of material satisfaction, and when you participate in the lively activities carefully planned by the mall, you are left with a few deliberately posed photos with no aftertaste.
As we feel depressed and unsatisfied, we find that emotional value can no longer lead to more happiness because the dopamine threshold has been raised to the point where it can no longer be easily satisfied.
And what is the market?
The market is not only the fireworks of life, but also a microcosm of human society.
Here there are every step of the city's development history, and there is a common experience of the life of the surrounding residents. The stalls we pass by at random may be the small shops where my mother often took us to eat when we were children, and the aunts and uncles who sell vegetables have long understood our preferences and daily life in conversations again and again.
*According to the official account@lookon see outside
Under the interweaving of various rich scenes in the market, social relations and value identity are constantly established, and at the same time, emotional value is generated. Although the process of generation takes a long time and is difficult to test again and again in the development of the city, it makes it long and healing.
It can be seen that the increase in the threshold after emotional satisfaction has appeared in all kinds of people in society, and how to get long-term stability and satisfaction after addiction is a problem that needs to be paid attention to in the future.
In an era where keywords such as "involution", "hollow heart disease", and "lying flat culture" are staged in turn, the emotions represented by dopamine are no longer able to meet our demands, and the emotions brought by the endorphins behind "stable happiness" will continue to relay to meet our higher-level needs.
So, is it only the market that can bring emotional value?
The answer is no, because many commercial brands and projects have also started their own exploration on the way to explore emotional value.
Emotional Branding vs. Emotional Branding
Let's take a look at the development of the brand first.
In recent years, taverns have developed faster than we imagined, and what was thought to be a small force in the booming night economy has now become the leader of the "tipsy economy".
According to the "Insight Report on Alcohol Consumption of Young People", the post-90s and 95s have great potential for alcohol consumption, and their consumption number and per capita consumption level continue to grow.
However, we found that behind the development of the industry lies the addition and transfer of consumption places. In the past, traditional nightclubs and karaoke were the main ways of night entertainment, and people released the stress of life under the stimulation of loud music and alcohol.
But nowadays, after the working day, most of the places where friends meet will choose some taverns, where everyone drinks and eats something together, there is neither loud music nor overcrowded crowds.
What's behind this shift?
First of all, it is the upgrading of people's health concept, and the concept of drinking is more rational.
In nightclubs, if you don't drink it, it always seems that you can't fit into the atmosphere. Nowadays, the concept of "moderate drinking" and "healthy drunkenness" is constantly mentioned, and people only want to achieve a slightly drunk state, and the choice of alcohol tends to be some healthy low-alcohol drinks, such as wine, wine, and beer.
Most of the taverns that offer all kinds of low-alcohol drinks coincide with the consumption direction of healthy drinking, and a healthy lifestyle has become one of the growth engines driving the development of the tavern industry.
Secondly, the most prominent attribute of the bistro is "social".
"Jumping into the Sea" is a prominent example, and it is called the "Community Tavern". Through diversified activities and the sharing and linking of different community content, "Jumping to the Sea" has captured the emotional needs of this wave of Dachang youth after work, and has become a social habitat for many Dachang people.
*According to the public account @ Huang Donghai Channel
The anxiety in life, the KPIs and labels at work have brought heavy shackles to the workers during the day, and when they walk into the tavern after work, the relaxed decoration and atmosphere seem to be loudly declaring at the first step that people step in, "life is an experience", and the acquisition of emotions is important.
Clubbing is a fast-paced rush of dopamine production, but when the music stops and the sun rises, everything is as fragile as a bubble.
The social interaction in the tavern requires a few nights of talking, telling their stories in the glass and changing the lamp, slowly getting to know each other, endorphins are gradually secreted in tears and smiles, and feeling "healed" in the drunkenness.
Perhaps there are many reasons behind the rise of taverns, such as "wine with stories", "public spaces with scenes", etc., but this is also the spread of "emotional commerce" brought about by emotional needs.
The development of the industry reminds us that in the era of high material and physiological needs, nightclubs can bring us rich emotions, so more and more nightclubs with high investment in decoration and equipment have been developed, wanting to stimulate people's dopamine through appearance and bring emotional satisfaction.
However, the satisfaction of dopamine needs to be gradually improved, and the relatively fixed building of the nightclub cannot be changed often, and the investment in activities and the cost of decoration determine its fixed presentation over a period of time.
It's not that it's harder for people to be satisfied, it's just that it's harder for them to be satisfied only by the emotions that dopamine brings.
The growth of endorphins brought about by a healthy lifestyle and more authentic social relationships is the source of our sense of contentment.
*Day and Night Poetry Wine Tea Art and Culture Bistro Diagram | The public account @ first store knows early
The timing of the emergence of the "emotional card" of the tavern just hits people's spiritual needs, how to make people understand "what kind of life they should live" in social interaction, and how to create such a scene, is the question that emotional business is trying to answer.
Emotional Items vs. Emotional Items
Similar to the transformation of the brand industry, commercial projects are also experiencing a lack of emotional value after the emotional value is full, and in this situation, there is a transformation of the project from "core area Internet celebrity" to "community surrounding healing system".
It is an indisputable fact that business has always sought to take root in the core area of the city. The "Internet celebrity economy" has always been a continuous catch-up in space creation, investment promotion and operation, and promotion activities.
Driven by this promoter, each project hopes that its space can attract the largest number of target customers to check in, and once the project opens, it can successfully attract a group of people who are at the forefront of fashion in each city, then the space is half done.
Subsequently, China Merchants continued to dig out Internet celebrity brands in the market, hoping that there would always be a few brands in its field that were active on the popular list of Xiaohongshu.
Promotion is to strive to introduce all kinds of celebrities and IP activities to stimulate customer flow. And this kind of high-traffic pictures brought by celebrity resources or traffic IP can often make project colleagues take turns to promote in the circle of friends for several months.
Of course, the integration of Internet celebrity trend elements with their own project space in the physical and spiritual levels is relatively thorough, and there are several domestic projects that do "young power".
Whether it is COSMO Chengdu, TX Huaihai or THE BOX facing outward, they all have achieved the Internet celebrity trend in three aspects: space, brand and event.
*COSMO成都
*TX Huaihai | Youthful Center
*THE BOX outwards | According to the public account @ Business Vision
Here, there is a space with a personalized design that changes frequently, the freshest brands and trend-setting products of the moment, and a nearly non-stop youth event 365 days a year...... Walking in these projects, the air is full of the smell of "youth".
It is true that the creation of a sense of scene and the continuous outing of colorful activities, when people walk into the project, or just search for relevant event information on the Internet, you can feel the rapid secretion of dopamine, and the emotions are instantly stimulated, hoping that you can join this "young carnival" in the next second.
*According to the official account@THE BOX faces outward
But when "youth" is no longer a new word, and various parties and market activities begin to repeat some themes, the fatigue of addiction appears.
At the beginning of exhaustion, people do not immediately abandon these spaces and projects, but hope that they can come up with more, better and fresher ways to play.
But the emergence of requirements does not mean that solutions can be born in the next second.
The operating logic of the business is to hope that the design and playing method created by the project will be applicable for a long time. But in these dopamine-stimulated emotional businesses, it is clear that constant change is the way to deal with it, but at the cost of high creative and economic costs.
It's not that these projects aren't fun, it's that the "fun" we want has been upgraded.
While there was a lot of talk about the online celebrity business on the top of happiness, another kind of project emerged - the healing business around the community.
"Community business" was a word that was reluctant to be mentioned in previous business plans. Everyone wants to be defined as a city business, and the next level is a regional business.
However, some projects do not reject this title, and even take pride in doing a good job in "community" business, such as "Jade Bird Collection" in Hangzhou and "Sanwu Yiyi" in Xi'an.
"Jade Bird Collection": From the perspective of block design, the project does not have too prominent language, but is integrated into the cultural atmosphere of Liangzhu, and blends with the large roof next to it to form a unique force that can calm people down.
From the perspective of the brand, there is no deliberate pursuit of Internet celebrities and trends, and around the square where people gather, the popular KFC and the literary coffee shops appear together to meet the real daily needs of the community.
Some of the activities planned by the promotion side also call members to ride bicycles and fly kites together, so as to establish a living community that empathizes with the project.
The "Sanwu One One" project is transformed from the old factory building of the towel factory, TA is different from some other factory renovation projects, or literature or trend, but the flower, bird, fish and insect market and business are vividly integrated together, half of the world's fireworks, half of the natural life.
Who can not admit that raising flowers and small fish, and teasing kittens and dogs is not a desirable life?
People can buy a few pots of flowers at the aerial flower market on the second floor of the project, and the fish and insect market downstairs to see if there are any favorite pets, and drink coffee and eat Yunnan food when they are tired. It's shopping malls, but it's also life.
Vulgarity is elegance, and the market of flowers, birds, fish and insects is not a high-level aesthetic expression in life.
*Photo according to Xiaohongshu @ Planning Aid Station
Extending the entire project around the surrounding community and community, some people will wonder if they are narrowing the customer base.
But in fact, the "periphery" is often not a physical property, not the actual distance, but the distance of the human heart.
Through the community link and the creation of the community, the distance between people and the project and between people is narrowed, and the project and the surrounding culture are continuously infiltrated. With a sense of cultural identity, it's not so easy to leave.
This type of project is a bit like a "market center" for a group.
Not gorgeous, not noisy, but unpretentious, but precious. Endorphins increase during small activities and wandering through the project's streets, and emotional connections are constantly formed. The business of emotional value is about making people heal in the "everyday".
Three meals a day, fireworks in the world. The hustle and bustle is not unnecessary, but it is not everyday.
Our daily life is the smell of food wafting from the kitchen, the greetings of relatives and friends, and the vitality of the newly blooming buds on the windowsill.
*Image from Unsplash
These are the places where our emotions depend, and emotional business is to use commercial space and content to create such a place for us, where we can experience urban and regional culture, and feel the grass and trees of life, after all, companionship is the most affectionate confession.
Write at the end
Emotions and emotions are indispensable to each and every one of us, they make up who we are today, and they also shape what kind of life we can live in the future.
The short-term pleasure brought by the secretion of dopamine cannot be replaced, and endorphins, which make people feel satisfied and healed for a long time, are also good medicine for our spiritual world.
The development of business is diverse, and there is never a single answer.
Dopamine-dominated emotional commerce has spawned many successful cases on both the brand side and the project side, and it has also made people feel a sense of pleasure that cannot be replicated in the moment of emotional fullness.
In the future, what will be important to emotional business may not be how to perpetuate this happiness, because when we see the essence of emotional business, we will find that this addiction is not sustainable.
It's about how to achieve "continuous innovation" and "low-cost innovation" in emotional business. It is unrealistic to talk about business in isolation from revenue, and innovation and investment are not fully linked. In the future, the development of emotional business, creativity and benefits will also be drawn.
*Image from Unsplash
The emotional business led by endorphins is still in the early stage of exploration, and "fireworks" and "relaxation" are the classification directions of some brands and community building. No matter which direction you start from, the end point is a long-term healing model for life to bring to society.
However, just as the secretion of endorphins needs to go through some pain and struggle, the exploration of this emotional business road is destined to be difficult, requiring the synergy of brands, projects and consumers.
How to show the cultural core of the city, how to express emotions through space, brand, and activities, how to deeply link communities and communities, and how to grasp the psychological and life changes of "fellow travelers" during this period are all questions that need to be answered slowly in the future emotional business.
Although the road is far, the journey is coming. The future of emotions and emotional business still needs our joint efforts to build.