Edited by Elv
Setting Up An Enterprise
Just two days after the Lantern Festival, the PenPoint app underwent a round of updates, unlocking the shopping mall section.
After half a year of discussions within Zhou Kao’s company about PenPoint’s transformation, they finally reached a unanimous conclusion.
PenPoint’s ambitions were clearly substantial. They didn’t limit their market solely to women but instead expanded to attract various types of users based on this foundation.
Such a transformation, if not handled properly, would not only fail to retain existing users but also risk losing the original fan base. However, on the other hand, this transformation brought about a more diversified user base and expanded PenPoint’s market.
After the mall was launched, PenPoint, in collaboration with merchants, vigorously conducted several major promotional activities to stabilise its user base and market.
After school started, Wen Le often heard discussions about the PenPoint mall around her. Most people were initially attracted by the discounted prices offered by PenPoint’s collaborative merchants, but after their first purchase, they were drawn to PenPoint’s sharing model.
Shopping in PenPoint’s mall was equivalent to publishing insightful notes. Not only could users shop, but they could also attract followers while sharing their experiences, which was truly eye-opening.
This innovative model attracted a large number of users to PenPoint. Coupled with PenPoint’s team sparing no effort and investing a large amount of money in promotion, PenPoint’s transformation was on track in less than half a year.
All the data from PenPoint indicated a highly successful transformation.
During the six months since the launch of the PenPoint mall, Zhou Kao was extremely busy, which naturally reduced the time he spent with Wen Le.
However, the main reason for the decreasing time they spent together was not Zhou Kao’s fault. On the contrary, Wen Le seemed even busier than Zhou Kao. Whenever Wen Le called Zhou Kao, he could always pick up, but when Zhou Kao called Wen Le, he could only get through about two out of five times, no matter what time it was.
Zhou Kao didn’t know what Wen Le was so busy with. He had asked her, but Wen Le only said, “You’ll know soon enough. I’ll give you a surprise when the time comes.”
Since Wen Le refused to say more, Zhou Kao stopped asking.
But Zhou Kao never expected that Wen Le would be busy for even longer than he thought.
Half a year later, the PenPoint mall had entered the right track. Zhou Kao finally had some free time and planned to invite his girlfriend out for dinner.
But when he called, Zhou Kao found out that Wen Le had taken a week off and gone out of town.
Zhou Kao made a video call, which surprisingly got through this time. He saw Wen Le wearing a straw hat, a white T-shirt, and black pants, holding a bunch of grapes, standing in a lush orchard, and smiling brightly. “Zhou Kao.”
Zhou Kao raised an eyebrow, puzzled. “Wen Le, what are you up to?”
Wen Le laughed. “Building my career.”
Zhou Kao carefully examined Wen Le in the video, hesitating before asking, “Are you… tanned?”
Wen Le subconsciously touched her face. “Really?”
Zhou Kao thought Wen Le, who cared so much about her appearance, would be very concerned, but he didn’t expect Wen Le to just casually touch her face and say, “Well, it’s normal.”
Wen Le’s reaction made Zhou Kao even more curious about what she was up to.
Zhou Kao asked, “When are you coming back?”
Wen Le smiled and teased, “Missing me?”
Zhou Kao really had no energy left for banter. He sighed, surrendering, “Yes, I miss you.”
Wen Le said, “I’ll be back soon, but would the situation be I’ll have time then, but you won’t?”
Zhou Kao replied, “The company is on track now, so I’ll have plenty of time to spend with you. But you still have to give me that chance.”
Wen Le softened a bit. “How about we go on a date when I get back?”
Zhou Kao murmured, his voice low, “Okay, I’ll wait for you.”
Wen Le’s ears tingled, and her heart trembled along with them. She couldn’t wait to fly back immediately and see how he was waiting for her.
He would probably be wearing a white T-shirt and black pants, standing tall under the blooming cherry blossom tree outside the girls’ dormitory. He might be quietly contemplating thoughts unknown to others, with his profound and handsome features and his cold demeanor.
And she would push open the door of the girls’ dormitory, calling his name with a smile. He would turn to look at her, and his eyes only focused on her…
Wen Le covered her slightly blushing face, shook her head to stop herself from daydreaming further, and sighed. It had probably been too long since they had seen each other; even the sound of his voice made her lose control.
Unbeknownst to both of them, that evening, an article went viral on Weibo. Along with it, the term #PenPoint also started trending.
At that moment, Zhou Kao was studying in the library. When he received a notification about the trending topic #PenPoint on Weibo, he thought the company had paid for another promotion and didn’t bother to click on it.
He felt somewhat puzzled because vice-president Lu had told him that the promotional work by the marketing team was basically completed, and there was no need to increase promotional expenses in the short term.
However, Zhou Kao didn’t know that even vice-president Lu, who had just received the news the next day, was also puzzled.
“Yeah, it wasn’t sponsored by the company. I checked it out. It seems that it was originally discussed on Zhihu*, where it gained a lot of attention. Later, it was reposted on Weibo and got even more traction from users. And I don’t know if vice-president Lu has checked your Moments**, but my Moments have been flooded with this article for the past few days.”
*Zhihu is China’s version of a Quora-type question-and-answer site and news aggregator.
**Moments is a sharing page on China’s message app, WeChat, where people can share their pictures, statuses, etc. with their friends who they add as contacts.
Listening to the report from his employee over the phone, vice-president Lu raised his eyebrows in surprise and asked, “Is it that remarkable?”
The employee’s voice sounded somewhat amazed, “Vice-president Lu, you probably haven’t read this article yet, have you? You should take a look; it’s really impressive. Even the reviews on Zhihu are highly positive.”
Vice-president Lu picked up his phone and checked Weibo.
It was a repost by a major influencer.
Wen Bo: Unbelievable. I thought this was a piece of prose by some great writer, but damn, it turned out to be a recommendation by a product-promoting blogger. [Shocked.jpg]
– This is the most unique product-promoting blogger I’ve ever seen online. While others promote products through live streams or short videos, this one is amazing, using articles and literary prowess.
– The writing is delicate and highly aesthetic, wielding emotions as a weapon, evoking memories through imagery. Every word is like a gem, piercing straight into the heart. Just one word: incredible.
– I don’t care, I’ve been convinced. I’m buying it.
– Are all bloggers like this nowadays? With your level, why bother being a product promoter when you could be an author?
– I read on Zhihu that this article was definitely written by a big shot. The quality is very high, although we can’t pinpoint exactly what makes it good, but professionals say it’s excellent.
…
This blogger from PenPoint had gone viral, leading PenPoint to trend on social media.
There had been discussions online about why this blogger became so popular.
Some said it was a coincidence; he happened to choose something deeply touching and engaged in a nostalgic battle, tapping into consumers’ memories.
Others said it was the author’s sincere and delicate descriptions that touched people’s hearts.
Some said the author found something that people genuinely wanted.
And others just loved his emotional storytelling and writing style.
There had also been comments online about his writing, praising its delicacy, creativity, soulfulness, skillfulness, and depth. Some speculated behind this account was a writer over forty with some fame.
In short, this blogger had become popular, breaking new ground in the world of product promotion with a stunning piece of writing that touched people’s hearts and showed the unlimited potential of product-promoting bloggers.
After dominating social media and sparking discussions on Zhihu and trending topics, PenPoint had attracted a new wave of followers after six months, with some even downloading the PenPoint app just to follow this blogger.
For PenPoint, this was an unexpected joy.
When Lu Bohan called Zhou Kao about this matter, it was already half a month later, and Zhou Kao had only a rough idea about it.
Lu Bohan said over the phone with a hint of pride, “It’s like divine intervention for us. PenPoint has been quite lucky. This author is amazing; I even want to recruit him to our company for planning. With just one person, he’s driving a huge increase in platform orders, surpassing the sales volume of previous campaigns with affiliated merchants. The tea recommended by this blogger sold out in just two days. From the time the author published this article until now, which is less than half a month, Shanzhe Tea has already made a name for itself. I reckon they won’t worry about sales volume in the future.”
“Afterward, we also found out that the products promoted by this blogger were surplus agricultural products from impoverished areas with low incomes. The article that made her famous was written for free, with a more charitable purpose. It reminded us that we can also start from this aspect…”
After hanging up the phone, Zhou Kao was still curious, so he took out his phone and checked the article on PenPoint. This was a new user, with less than six months of registration, but now already had 100,000 followers.
After clicking on that note, Zhou Kao glanced at the article. This piece of promotional writing that made him famous was actually promoting a type of tea from the southwestern region of China.
After all, it was a promotional piece, not very long, about a thousand words or so, almost completed in one go. The writing was fresh and delicate, with natural emotional expression, adept at creating atmosphere, blending emotion with scenery, and especially skilled at tapping into the most delicate and tender parts of the human heart.
After reading the article, Zhou Kao felt moved, and he couldn’t help but want to try the tea mentioned by the author, to see if it was really as wonderful as described.
The fact that it became popular wasn’t without reason; its absolute strength and sincere emotion led to extremely high praise for Zhihu. With such sincere and graceful writing, who wouldn’t be touched? Behind these words, there was probably a delicate heart burning with sincerity, making people curious about the author of this article.
Zhou Kao looked at the author’s mere 100,000 followers and couldn’t help but feel a bit regretful. With such talent, she should be an excellent writer; it was too much of a waste for her to be just a blogger.
But perhaps she was already a well-known writer herself, or maybe she, like Wen Le’s grandfather, secluded herself in the mountains for the sake of her writing, and thus encountered such good tea. Surely, this author had a soft and delicate heart, seeing the local farmers struggling to sell their tea leaves, and thus picked up her pen to write such moving words.
Yet Zhou Kao couldn’t shake the feeling of familiarity with the writing…
