How Design Thinking Drove a Successful Chinese New Year Campaign for 58 Used Cars

Preface

Designers are familiar with using design thinking in daily work, but how can operation designers apply the same methodology to a large Spring Festival campaign? This article reflects on the 58 used‑car business line’s Chinese New Year operation, summarizing the methods and outcomes.

Applying Design Thinking in Operation Design

Design thinking is a human‑centered approach to solving complex problems. By integrating it into the workflow, designers can align business, product, and design goals, respond faster to similar requests, and produce higher‑quality outputs.

Understanding Requirements to Avoid Design Errors

Before starting, the team clarified the project background: product noticed a conversion‑rate peak in the half‑month after New Year and planned a boost activity. A brainstorming session with product, design, and tech defined the direction, using case studies (festival stories, game themes, sharing‑viral concepts) for inspiration.

The final concept packaged car listings as a ranking board to let users quickly see options, balancing visual appeal with resource constraints.

Solid Foundations Ensure Reliable Design

Visual communication relies on four basic elements: typography, graphics, color, and form. Mastering these basics sharpens the team’s sense of visual atmosphere and guarantees design quality.

Keyword Extraction: The campaign used big‑data‑driven recommendations to present premium used cars in a ranking format, aiming to help users find their ideal car in the Year of the Ox.

Visual Mood Board

After confirming keywords and design rules, the team collected reference images to shape the visual style.

Main Visual Design

The final visual combined C4D 3D style, 58’s custom “smile” typography, and Chinese‑style elements. Consistency across business lines was maintained while allowing each line’s unique identity.

Head Image and Font

The head image centers a character against a traditional Chinese‑style architectural background, using warm colors and festive accents. The headline font builds on 58’s proprietary “smile” typeface, enhanced with 3D rendering.

Interface Design

Chinese pattern motifs and a “cow” mascot were applied to UI elements. The brand’s blue was paired with traditional red, and both colors were desaturated to harmonize with gold, creating an elegant festive palette.

Skinning of Category and Detail Pages

Both the category page and detail page received a Chinese‑style skin, featuring 24 icons that blend Spring Festival elements with car‑business attributes, using warm red as the primary hue and blue as accent.

Project Retrospective

The campaign launched successfully. Key takeaways include:

Plan early and sync proposals: Involve product and tech early to evaluate feasibility of creative ideas.

Master design tools: Operation designers must be proficient with visual techniques (e.g., C4D) to deliver high‑impact results.

Communicate frequently: Regular feedback and broader perspectives prevent tunnel vision and improve outcomes.

Conclusion

The team invites users to experience the new features, hopes everyone finds a good car in the Year of the Ox, and thanks all product, tech, and testing colleagues for their support.