white2tea’s YES Nefi and Gawain & Aggressive Trigger Word Marketing

Haven’t you noticed a lot of YES showing up on white2tea’s social media???

Well, of course the answer is Yes!... hahahah…

I know, it’s all a part and parcel of Paul’s Taylor Swift style, shock everyone with positivity after a few years of sassy and nasty, positive energy all Unicorns and rainbows marketing direction.  I also understand that “Yes” is one of the most powerful marketing trigger words but I really wanted to look into how powerful the technique of continually barraging ones followers with this subliminal message can really be on the consumer.  What I found was actually quite shocking….

It turns out that the word “Yes” is one of the strongest marketing trigger words.  It’s also interesting, exactly how trigger words actually work.  They actually bypass our logical brains and speak right to our emotional brains urging us to act on a purchase.   They actually tell a customer exactly what to do next or describe something in a way that encourages the customer to buy it.  That’s so cool!

It’s interesting that Paul of white2tea has chosen to go with a hand written “Yes” on all of his Nefi’s this year (pictured above).  It’s actually brilliant because when people are photographing a puerh cake for review naturally they take a pic of the nefi as a way for others to authenticate a cake from a fake.  So basically, everyone who does this is continually transmitting the subliminal message of” buy this cake”.  The fact it’s a hand written “Yes” apparently makes it more emotionally salient because it personalizes the message in the same way using the trigger words like “You” or “U” does.  Double powerful!

On social media Paul has been flashing a gaiwan that has a bunch of “Yes” written on it.  He first comment that it was a special commission for himself only, very personal, rare, and very expensive.  Then more and more people began commenting that they want one… of course they do… it has one of the most powerful trigger words written on it… Even I started to want one…

Finally, under pressure from continuous requests, he tells everyone that he is going to commission some more… but only a limited amount… and he has already warned us all that it is going to be pretty expensive…. It’s basically from his personal collection.  These eager buyers are probably going to post their gaiwans steeping white2tea products on social media, sealing the deal (after taking photos of their Yes neifi, of course)  Oh, boy… I feel kind of silly for wanting one of these…

I also, quite accidentally, discovered something super interesting about the way Paul names his premium, highest priced puerh.  You know the ones we’ve shelled out hundreds of dollars for?  He always uses a trigger word in the title (with the only exception being Unicorn).… brilliant! 

Lucky Puppy – Of course everyone want so be special, to be chosen, to be lucky, right?  The title Puppy just wouldn’t cut it.

Is A Gift- That’s right, everyone wants a gift, it will make you feel special… I know I feel special... however, this trigger word is not as powerful as others below…

The Box & The Treachery of Storytelling – Apparently the most powerful of all trigger words is the word “The”.  It gives someone the impression of being better than others, or better than comparable products, … this is the one, the one and only… Box and Treachery of Storytelling just don’t seem powerful enough for a paying hundreds of dollars, I guess..

Fuck What U Heard- The word “You” is also arguably the most powerful trigger word (or is it The?)… in this case an extra emphasis is placed on the word because it is written “U” which makes the eyes while tracking focus on it more…. The word “you” or “U” gives the message a personalized touch…

Last Thoughts- the trigger word “Last” is also very powerful it plays on the fear of missing out.

This post just looks at the names of these cakes.  If you look at the actual webpage descriptions of the cakes or even the text on the wrappers you are bound to find many many more trigger words.  Of course, you want strong messaging in your products…

This year Paul has gone in a weird direction with the wrappers and even with a small selection of some cake names. I think he has done this partly as a response to the criticisms that he uses the wrapper and cake names as a marketing shtick and partly to address the criticism of his use of blurry messaging.  However, he has replaced one powerful marketing technique with an even more powerful technique- the use of continuous exposure to marketing trigger words.  Its as if he is saying look my wrappers are blurred and names are random so there is no aggressive marketing here, only to drop one of the most powerful trigger words, literally, into each and every cake pressed by white2tea this year.  It makes the gesture a bit shallow, albeit brilliant.

I also wonder this, if the consumer is given less actual information about the product, are they more susceptible to the use of trigger words?  Given the fact that white2tea gives us very little actual information about the tea itself, I wonder if the effects of trigger word marketing is all the more powerful?

I am hopeful and optimistic that Paul will one day reach, what I believe is his end goal of releasing a full season of whiteout cake wrappers with randomly generated names  …He has blurred some of them and even randomly generated some names, so he is part way there.  I think its a bit of a test to see if he can take it to the next step... I think he can do it sooner than later…. Yes he can… because in the end everyone knows that its the tea that counts... or to put it more positively, its what's inside that counts.

Peace