Lowering the threshold for coupon usage can significantly boost sales at physical stores. Uniqlo believes that when a customer goes through great efforts to participate in a queue and finally obtains a coupon, they are likely to share this hard-earned coupon with all their friends (via copying, forwarding, or taking photos). In doing so, they gain gratitude, praise, and respect from their friends, which instills a sense of pride and accomplishment within them.
Additionally, during the second week, Uniqlo increased the chances of winning. Users reported that during the first week, it took an average of five attempts in line to win a coupon, but during the second week, almost every one or two attempts resulted in a win. The effect was immediate; participation in the game reached a new high during the second week, nearing one million participants. This lightweight social game even attracted hardcore players. One of Uniqlo's awards was for anyone who queued 500 times and submitted the first report to Uniqlo, earning them 20 pieces of Uniqlo clothing. Uniqlo calculated that queuing at a frequency of no less than five minutes between each turn would take about two days of non-stop queuing to reach 500 turns. Ultimately, one player queued for nearly three days and won the grand prize. Their photo was posted on Uniqlo's Renren homepage photo section.
This was Uniqlo's most successful queue-based promotion. By the time the game ended on December 24th, a total of 1.33 million people had participated in the queue. Uniqlo's physical stores successfully met their sales targets, and during the event, Uniqlo's B2C website saw daily unique visitors exceeding 100,000, compared to just over 20,000 before the event. After the event, Renren automatically tagged over 100,000 users who participated in Uniqlo’s queue game as Uniqlo friends.
However, there were some minor regrets regarding this event. For instance, the servers were located in Japan, leading to slower response times, which could have otherwise seen participation in the queue game skyrocket to several million. Additionally, Uniqlo’s stores are concentrated in Beijing and Shanghai, while users participating came from across the country. Thus, such a good promotional effect was not fully utilized, resulting in some wasted resources.
Nevertheless, these are mere blemishes on the sun. Most importantly, through this activity, Uniqlo reinforced its fashionable brand image in the minds of young consumers, which is the marginal benefit of the queue-based promotion.
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