1. Introduction

With the innovation and progress of technology, the social media marketing system has gradually become the mainstream marketing approach. More and more food brands have started to create official accounts and engage in live streaming and short video marketing, ranging from well-known food enterprises to small and medium-sized merchants. At the same time, people are gradually shifting their focus from offline shopping to online purchasing.

Three Squirrels is a leading online leisure food brand in China, focusing on nut products. It rose rapidly through e-commerce channels and has now become a leading company in the nut industry, serving over 170 million consumers. Moreover, it has expanded to offer a full range of products.

According to research, enterprises should focus on the degree of customer active participation and interaction to increase customer retention rates and build emotional connections between the brand and users [1]. Current research mostly focuses on a single platform or a single marketing method. Therefore, this article will combine multiple data sources to explore how to optimize brand social media marketing, providing new ideas for enterprise practice.

2. Implementation of social media marketing for three squirrels

2.1. Full-chain operation centered on consumers

The 4C marketing theory proposed by Lautenberg explains the marketing chain of Three Squirrels. This theory focuses on consumers, cost, communication, and convenience, advocating that enterprises should center on consumers' needs and deeply understand their core demands, thereby achieving a shift in the marketing focus from product function orientation to consumer demand orientation [2].

Firstly, Three Squirrels invited well-known bloggers on social media to visit the factory for traceability and launched a series of videos titled "Squirrel Factory" on their official account to showcase the production process of nuts to consumers, allowing them to intuitively understand the entire process from raw material procurement to production and processing. This transparent supply chain management model effectively enhances consumers' confidence in product quality. In terms of inventory management, the company adopts a strategy of quantitative procurement and dynamically adjusts the quantity of goods based on current sales data. This scientific inventory management method not only avoids product backlog but also ensures market supply while ensuring that consumers can purchase freshly produced products. The three squirrels have considered the supporting services particularly thoroughly. Customers will receive a snack accessory bag in their package, which includes thoughtful items such as wet wipes, unboxing tools, and garbage bags, allowing consumers to enjoy snacks more comfortably. This detailed design has become an important highlight in improving customer satisfaction. In addition, Three Squirrels has achieved fast delivery and precise delivery in logistics and distribution, providing professional customer service support in the after-sales service process to ensure a timely response to user issues. By continuously optimizing the user experience, the brand has successfully accumulated a large number of loyal customers. According to research, loyal customers can bring long-term high sales and high profits to businesses, and can save the cost of acquiring new customers [3].

2.2. Helping to form a digital operation matrix through platforms

Three Squirrels utilizes various platforms for live streaming and product promotion. Live streaming is an indispensable sales method for e-commerce enterprises, which also requires companies to possess independent live streaming capabilities [4]. On platforms such as TikTok and Taobao, through detailed explanations and comprehensive demonstrations of products by anchors, customers can gain a more intuitive understanding of the products, thereby further enhancing customer trust. In addition, various promotional activities such as buy one get one free and flash sales are launched in the live streaming room. These exclusive purchasing benefits in the live streaming room can effectively attract customers to stay and enhance their purchasing desire. Furthermore, Three Squirrels also invites celebrities to join the live streaming room, leveraging celebrity effect to drive the popularity of the live streaming room and attract more customers to enter, thereby promoting product sales. Three Squirrels has also brought marketing into the film and television industry, frequently featuring these products in popular dramas, attracting fans to purchase the same products featured in the dramas through product placement advertising, which has achieved excellent promotional effects. Product placement advertising refers to integrating representative brand logos or products into movies or TV dramas, thereby enhancing brand exposure [5].

2.3. Interactive marketing promotes brand building

Interactive marketing refers to designing businesses based on user evaluations of products to improve consumer satisfaction. Firstly, Three Squirrels personalizes their brand IP by creating personalized IP images such as " Xiaomei", "Xiaoku", and "Xiaojian", which are integrated into product packaging, online customer service, animation (such as the 3D animation of "Three Squirrels"), and other scenes, shaping the brand image of a "warm snack partner". The core value of IP image lies in quickly establishing emotional connections with people [6]. At the same time, the brand operates an official Weibo account to interact with fans daily, enhancing the emotional connection between the brand and customers.

In terms of cross-border marketing, Three Squirrels actively engages in cooperation and has successively linked up with Dunhuang Museum, virtual idol Luo Tianyi, and others. The cooperation with the Dunhuang Museum integrates traditional cultural elements into product design and marketing activities, launching a series of nut gift boxes with rich cultural heritage, attracting many traditional culture enthusiasts. The collaboration with Luo Tianyi leverages its high popularity among Generation Z to accurately reach young consumer groups and further expand brand influence.

In addition, the official Weibo account of a company is an important medium for companies to release corporate culture, brand dynamics, marketing activities, and service information to the public and target audience through the Weibo platform [7]. The cost of Weibo marketing is very low, but it has a large audience [7]. So, Three Squirrels focuses on user interaction in Weibo marketing, enhancing user engagement through likes, shares, topic discussions, and other methods, transforming them from passive recipients to active disseminators, thereby enhancing marketing effectiveness. The brand also incentivizes users through welfare programs, such as"the Owner's Beautiful Life Carnival "and the "Zero Yuan Cultural Shirt" event launched by "Squirrel Town", which require users to generate posters and invite friends to help expand their reach. This "official endorsement+acquaintance socialization" model not only enhances the credibility of the event but also attracts a large number of users to participate, ultimately achieving the marketing goal of low cost and high dissemination.

3. Problems of food brands in social media marketing strategies

3.1. Single marketing approach

Currently, food brands' marketing approaches on social media are relatively limited. Most food brands nowadays leverage the assistance of some well-known top food bloggers to expand their influence or create visually striking and short-form video content for marketing to stimulate consumers' desire to purchase. These approaches can achieve a temporary promotional effect and attract a large number of consumers, but when consumers frequently encounter similar content, they will no longer find it novel, and their desire to purchase will decrease. Therefore, in the long run, the marketing advantages of these approaches are not obvious [7]. At the same time, some brands also create brand-exclusive IPs or collaborate with other well-known brands, such as Three Squirrels' launch of "Three Squirrels' Journey to China" and Holiland's collaborations with popular brands like Heytea and Liuliu Mei, to enhance brand interest and attract consumers. However, IP empowerment has a short heat cycle, and a large number of brands follow suit, leading to a high degree of homogeneity in the market for IP-collaborated products, making it difficult to highlight the unique features of brand products and reducing consumers' freshness and desire to purchase.

3.2. False marketing methods marketing trust crisis

Trust plays an important role in establishing relationships between businesses and consumers [8]. If consumers do not trust the seller, they will not choose to purchase online [8]. Many businesses attract consumers through false advertising, such as making false or misleading statements about the functions, ingredients, efficacy, and other aspects of their products, misleading consumers. So, with the increase in false advertising, consumers no longer easily trust sellers. Safety is also an important factor that people consider when making online purchases [8]. Many businesses use low-cost, high-return raw materials that are harmful to people's health to increase profits. The lack of food safety assurance can affect people's purchasing decisions and experiences. According to research, positive and heartwarming online interactions can help users perceive the value of products and enhance their willingness to purchase [9]. At the same time, negative reviews will reduce consumers' trust in the product. If there are too many negative reviews of the product, it will make consumers feel that the product is unreliable and afraid to use it.

3.3. Low purchase conversion rate

Purchase conversion rate refers to the percentage of buyers who make direct purchases on online shopping platforms of the total number of visitors [10]. Many consumers tend to browse product information on various platforms in advance and then choose to purchase offline. As a result, the number of visitors exceeded the number of visitors. This is because the user's credit is insufficient, and consumers are afraid to purchase and use products purchased online. Some businesses increase consumers' trust and desire to purchase their products by brushing positive reviews, displaying false product reports or brand authorizations, and showing some untrue product photos. As a result, many consumers have purchased products that do not match the promotion, causing more and more consumers to no longer trust the products on online shopping platforms. Consumers tend to choose products themselves in offline stores. At the same time, some online shopping platforms have cumbersome operation steps, requiring multiple jumps to enter the product page, filling in a large amount of information after adding purchases, and the payment process requires jumping to third-party platforms with multiple steps. Some buyers who are afraid of trouble may not be willing or able to operate, so they choose to purchase from physical stores.

4. Solutions

4.1. Expand marketing scope and enrich marketing methods

Enterprises should enrich the flavors of their products to meet the tastes of consumers from different regions and ages, so that every consumer can have the best consumption experience [6]. Taking the food industry as an example, the main consumer group for many brands is young people aged 20-30, without paying attention to middle-aged and elderly people who can also consume [6]. So, each brand should increase product flavors based on regional differences and the preferences and needs of different age groups. Brands should collaborate to develop new marketing models both online and offline, so as not to lose potential users who do not like online purchases [6]. Secondly, brands can combine the concepts of health and environmental protection to keep up with the times, such as launching the "low sugar, no additives" series and promoting health knowledge, or carrying out public welfare activities such as agricultural assistance to enhance brand favorability. Finally, the official brand account can also create scenario-based content, such as "Student Party's fast and healthy breakfast pairing", "Essential products for staying up late", etc., using short videos to showcase food consumption scenes to attract consumers to purchase similar products.

4.2. Utilizing the celebrity effect

The celebrity effect refers to the phenomenon of using well-known, influential, and attractive people to enhance the visibility of something and attract widespread attention [11]. Celebrities from various industries, such as writers, national politicians, and national politicians, have high social visibility and a good reputation. Borrowing the aura of celebrities, products will be more easily trusted and favored by consumers [11]. Based on the psychological mechanisms of celebrity effects, such as attention, halo, trust, and imitation effects, celebrities are encouraged to showcase and recommend products to attract audience attention and imitation [12]. For example, having film and television stars recommend a daily snack on variety shows can trigger a psychological path of "attention, love trust imitation" among fans, thereby increasing the company's visibility and product sales. However, when selecting celebrities, one should be cautious and choose those who match the target audience, have a positive image, and have a good reputation. Different groups have varying levels of affection and acceptance towards celebrities. Choosing the right celebrity can help consumers accept them faster and better, reduce negative risks, and increase product sales. It is necessary to supervise the dissemination behavior of celebrities to ensure that their behavior is upright, ethical, and to avoid the image of celebrities not matching their long-term image, which may affect their reputation and reduce trust.

4.3. Improve conversion rate

Kukar -Kinney M and Close A G explored consumers' abandonment behavior towards online shopping carts and found that even if consumers do not purchase goods, they only add them to their shopping carts, which is a sense of satisfaction, a way to relieve stress, and entertainment for them. Therefore, they proposed that promotional quotes can be sent to consumers to stimulate their desire to purchase [13]. At the same time, Di Fatta et al. noticed that a major factor in improving purchase conversion rates is to focus on product quality and promotion methods, and these characteristics cannot be mixed with other content provided by online platforms [14]. Therefore, enterprises should analyze the purchase conversion rates of different platforms and consumer groups of different ages based on data validity, and discover users with high purchasing potential from them, and allocate more resources to them to improve the effective purchase rate. Enterprises should also pay close attention to user feedback and address their pain points in a targeted manner. After resolving these issues, they should promptly provide feedback on the results to users and consumers, demonstrating the company's execution ability and enhancing trust. At the same time, optimizing the product display page and simplifying the consumer purchasing process can enhance the user and consumer experience, reduce consumer purchasing resistance, and improve online purchase conversion rates.

5. Conclusion

This article takes three squirrels as an example to analyze the brand's online social media operation model as a full chain operation centered on consumers, which helps to form a digital model and interactive marketing approach through platforms. At the same time, it pointed out the problems that enterprises are facing in social media operations and proposed solutions. It can be concluded that in the era of new media, the most important thing in brand operation is to make customers the core and provide them with high-quality services and emotional value. Empower with data, accurately grasp customer needs, and innovate marketing strategies. Only when a deep emotional connection is established with customers can a company stand firm on this fiercely competitive e-commerce platform.