Overseas Brands That Create Panic And Sell Anxiety

"No matter how you look at it, it looks like an IQ tax product. How can such a product become a super hit item?"

Luo Yonghao once said at a press conference that according to a British survey and test, the average number of bacteria carried by a mobile phone is 10 times that of the toilet!

There is indeed some scientific basis for the statement that "mobile phones are dirtier than toilets".

Mobile phones are one of the items we come into close contact with every day. Bacteria and viruses can easily spread to the surface of mobile phones through contact. In addition, mobile phones are placed on various surfaces in public areas, such as desktops, public transportation, dining tables, etc. These surfaces may be contaminated by bacteria and viruses brought by other people. These contaminants can be transferred to the phone through contact.

It makes sense that your phone needs to be cleaned regularly!

But how much do we consumers spend to clean our phones? Will anyone pay 80 US dollars, more than 500 yuan for this?

This is a bit magical!

The case we are looking at today, PhoneSoap, is one of the most successful projects in the American entrepreneurial reality show Shark Tank.

How to persuade the public to buy a dispensable, non-essential product, PhoneSoap cleverly uses fear marketing as a promotional point. We use this case to interpret the consumer shopping process and the principles behind fear marketing.

PhoneSoap is a brand that specializes in mobile phone disinfection equipment. Founder Dan Barnes accidentally learned during a trip that his cell phone was dirtier than a public restroom toilet seat, and learned that cell phones were potential vectors for spreading bacteria and viruses. This prompted him and his partner Wes LaPorte to develop a convenient and easy-to-use mobile phone disinfection device that can effectively eliminate bacteria and viruses on the surface of mobile phones.

The PhoneSoap device looks like a small box with an internal compartment that holds your phone. Users simply place the phone into the compartment, close the lid of the device, and turn on the device. The UV light built into the device will automatically start to radiate the surface of the phone, killing bacteria and viruses. At the same time, the device is also equipped with a charging function, which can charge the mobile phone while disinfecting it.

This product appears to be a solution to a potentially serious hygiene and health problem.

But the question is, will consumers pay the bill? If you want to clean and disinfect your mobile phone, wouldn’t alcohol wipes with negligible cost work?

At the beginning of the business, the founder appeared on the entrepreneurial reality show Shark Tank to seek financing. During the show, several investors also questioned whether this type of product could be accepted by the market.

"Most consumers are relatively lazy and I'm not sure they're going to spend money on such a small issue," said investment guru Robert Herjavec.

However, several investors still believe that PhoneSoap is a product with great potential.

One of the investors, Cuban, believes that although the prospects of the 2C market are doubtful, in the 2B market (medical institutions, etc.), the business value logic of purchasing this type of equipment to disinfect and sterilize the mobile phones of mobile customers is completely established.

The queen of TV shopping, Lori Greiner, is a firm believer in the huge potential of this product in the 2C market.

"I want to take this product, promote it on my TV shopping show, and sell it for hundreds of thousands of dollars," she said.

PhoneSoap, which eventually received investment from Lori Greiner, proved to be a popular product. In Lowry's TV shopping show, sales exceeded 250,000 units in a single day at its peak. During the epidemic, PhoneSoap unsurprisingly exploded in sales, and even in 2022 after the epidemic has passed, annual sales will still be as high as 13 million US dollars.

The success of PhoneSoap is not only due to its unique product. The professional marketing team behind it knows very well what message to send to persuade consumers to buy such a dispensable, non-essential product.

On TikTok, PhoneSoap produced a video series called "How germy is it?"

To get a better sense of how dirty hand dryers in public places are, the PhoneSoap content team went to several restrooms at gas stations, movie theaters, and stores and placed a petri dish under the hand dryers to collect samples. Then put all the petri dishes into the incubator for bacterial culture. After 3 days, take out the petri dishes and observe the bacterial growth.

It is highly not recommended to watch it after a meal, the bacterial spots growing wantonly are shocking and disgusting to the naked eye!

"How germy is it?" This series of videos has received massive views. So, what is the purpose of the PhoneSoap marketing team creating this series of videos? What's the logic behind it?

This kind of content creativity is a very typical fear marketing strategy, aiming to drive sales of products or services by stimulating people’s inner feelings of fear and insecurity. This tactic typically exploits people’s concerns about potential threats, risks, or unpleasant experiences to evoke an emotional response and inspire purchasing behavior.

Generally speaking, the consumer shopping process can be summarized into the following stages:

Awareness stage (Problem or need recognition): In this stage, consumers will learn about the existence of problems or risks through various channels (such as advertising, word-of-mouth, social media, etc.). Only when needs are awakened can consumers actively search for information and consciously find solutions to meet their needs.

Research stage (Information search): Once consumers realize they have a need or want to solve a problem, they will begin research. This stage involves collecting and comparing information about various products or services, such as price, features, quality, brand reputation, etc. They may look at product reviews, browse product descriptions, and compare options from different brands or merchants to help them make decisions.

Evaluation of alternatives: In this stage, consumers evaluate the information they have gathered and weigh various options.

Purchase: Once consumers have completed their evaluation and determined the best option, they make a purchase decision.

Post-purchase behavior: After the purchase is completed, consumers will evaluate and experience the purchased product or service. They may provide feedback, write reviews, or interact with brands or merchants. This may influence their future purchasing decisions and brand loyalty.

The PhoneSoap marketing team uses fear marketing strategies to target the "awareness stage" or "problem identification" part of the shopping process.

This series of content uses very intuitive and visually impactful experimental presentations to inspire people's inner fear and uneasiness, emphasize the seriousness of the problem, and prompt consumers to feel the urgent need to solve the problem.

The before-and-after comparison of the growth of bacterial spots in a petri dish is intuitive and disgusting, and is very effective in triggering unpleasant emotions such as fear and anxiety in the audience.

Just imagine, if most consumers are not aware that the environment around them is full of bacteria and lurks health risks, how can they be willing to pay dozens of dollars for a seemingly useless mobile phone sterilizer.

In the fear marketing strategy of the PhoneSoap marketing team, a clear scenario (public bathroom) is given, and the before-and-after comparison is used to make consumers feel unbearable potential risks and harms, in order to guide the audience to purchase.

Routines, they are all routines!