"Who + 5 What" Principle of Fast Consumer Package Design

In marketing practice, "fast consumer goods" is a concept of colloquial marketing. Fast-moving consumer goods in the general sense include food, beverages, cosmetics, daily chemicals, tobacco, etc., to distinguish them from durable consumer goods such as home appliances, home appliances, and clothing.

The FMCG industry is currently the industry with the most intense competition, the highest relative profit margin, the largest sales volume, and the fastest development speed. This industry is closely related to the daily lives of consumers, directly affecting the Lazarin food and drink.

Due to the wide range of customers in this industry, the short cycle of purchase, consumers are very concerned about the practicality of the product, and are easily influenced by objective conditions (such as advertising, promotion, location, time, etc.) at the time of purchase, resulting in rapid The uniqueness of the marketing strategy of the consumer goods industry also determines the commonness of the industry in marketing. Such as: attach importance to the management of the supply chain in order to enhance the competitiveness of enterprises; efforts to reduce costs; attention to advertising and promotion and so on.

In the narrow sense, a package refers to a container or wrapper of a product. In addition, the label is also an integral part of the packaging, appearing on the packaging or integrated with the packaging. Packaging refers to a series of activities that design and produce containers or wraps (taken from Philip Kotler's Marketing Management). Nowadays, the protective function of packaging is weakening, and the promotion function is gradually strengthened. Packaging has become an important tool for business promotion. Many marketers refer to packaging as the fifth P. This shows that packaging plays an important role in modern marketing.

The design principles of packaging have been frequently mentioned in many books and papers, but they are all imaginary things such as what color balance and coordination are. In this article, based on his own practical experience, the author briefly summarizes some of the peculiar principles of FMCG packaging design, and dutifully calls it: Who + 5 What principle. Among them, Who focuses on satisfying the individual needs of consumers; 5 What focuses more on accurately communicating information. Only if "Who + 5 What" is done is it a successful packaging with both form and spirit.

The so-called "Who" refers to: Who's the purchaser? This is the basis of packaging design. Because marketing is to meet the needs of consumers, packaging as a means of marketing, of course, we must first study the consumer's consumption motivation and psychological characteristics. For example, the packaging of sanitary napkins is very different from that of mosquito coils.

Maslow, an American psychologist, divides people's needs into five levels:

Physiological needs

2. Security needs

3. The need to belong to love

4. The need for respect

Self-actualization needs

It can be seen from the above that almost all fast-moving consumer goods have to meet the needs of the first and second levels. Therefore, the value-added function of the packaging becomes weak, and the utility function is enhanced. In the design process, the physiological and safety needs of the consumer should be the starting point.

In addition, the psychological characteristics of the target consumer group are another important factor that must be considered. Successful commodity packaging not only enhances visual effects, but also awakens the emotion and association of target consumers. For example, in the drawing of food packaging, do not use blue or green color. The use of orange, orange and red is easy to make people connect to the Harvest, maturity, resulting in consumers' appetite to promote the purchase of the action. Just as in real life, consumers generally pick supplements that are packaged in warm tones, and cold-colored packaging products do not need to be seen to be detergents.

In addition, the target consumer group's gender, age, income level, ethnicity, beliefs, and cultural characteristics are all factors to be considered.

Since "Who" is the "god" of packaging design, its "form" is the "5 What" to be introduced below. The so-called 5 What refers to:

1. What's this?

2. What's the name?

3. What's the use?

4. What's the different?

5. What benefits does this bring to the consumer (What's the advantage)?

These five elements are either expressed in words or expressed in color, but they are indispensable. The first three “What” are the most basic information that a package needs to convey. Because consumers do not have time to discern when they visit a supermarket, a product must at least allow consumers to understand it at the very least. It is the product (use value) that the consumer needs. For example, vinegar and wine are bottled. If you don't specify what is inside, you will have a joke.

The last two "What" are the basic means of product differentiation. To differentiate a product from a competitor, it must first be differentiated from the packaging. Coca-Cola’s ice cream took full advantage of this strategy when it was first publicized. It first distinguished itself from competitors in color, and then differentiated in terms of capacity. In the end, it took a fraction of the advertising fee and captured a substantial market share.

In addition, as the quality of products is severely differentiated, it is very important for the interests of consumers. Like Shu Lei's "double care", Shun's "accurate dandruff does not hurt the hair," clearly marked on the packaging to market segments to meet the needs of consumers.

In short, packaging is not perfect, but I believe that as long as the "Who + 5 What" principle is followed, adding a designer's full imagination, a successful package is still not difficult to achieve.

Author Ren Shusen Source: China Management Communication