One of the more notable differences between Millennials and other generations are their equivocal feelings about work. While they (and their parents) are anxious to get a good job and begin establishing their adult lives as functioning members of the modern economy, they are also vaguely uneasy about the place of work in their lives. They expect they will need to make serious compromises to land and keep a job.
We identified some of these anxieties in focus groups last spring among young professionals at major companies. Last week, Ad Age featured our findings in an article, “The Inside Scoop on What Spurs Millennial Hires” (9.22.08) Nealy everyone we talked with was concerned with two issues: ‘work-life balance’ and ‘making a difference’. These two concerns were sometimes related, particularly if their job was not seen as offering much opportunity to ‘give back’.
No doubt the recent financial shocks are causing Millennials to give even greater thought – and worry – to what the work world will mean for their lives. Shrinking job markets make for fewer chances to ask for concessions on vacation time, education perks, and other incentives dear to the hearts of Millennials. This week, in her GenNext blog, Sarah Ewing frankly discusses the tradeoffs she considered in taking a more ‘strategic’ job with fewer perks. Alex Kniess’s posting is titled, “Your Career Should Be Part of Your Life (Not the Other Way Around)”. And in his GenNext blog entry this week, Michael Girts, a new AAE at Leo Burnett in Chicago, posted a wonderful video, “”Music and Life” that neatly encapsulates Gen Y’s fears about the potential lack of fulfillment they face by continuing to chase workplace succcess. The 1-minute video (you’ll be glad you watched it) pairs an Alan Watts voiceover with adorable animation to capture the angst many young workers feel about the school – career — success trajectory. “Then when you wake up one day when you are about 40 years old and you say ‘My God! I’m here, I’ve arrived. I’m there’. But you don’t feel any different than you’ve always felt… you’ve missed the point.” Are you sensing a theme here?
In our research, this translated into a desire to tell their bosses, “This job is not my life” or ““This job is not my life!” Or as another put it, “My job isn’t life or death – I’m not saving lives, I work in marketing – sometimes people forget that.”
I’m not exactly sure how this insight to the psyche of Millennials relates to marketing, but I think it’s important; they are unsure whether to be motivated by the same incentives as the rest of us — or at least up until this latest economic crisis.
Smoothies may be the quintessential Millennial category — and Jamba Juice may be the quintessential Millennial brand. Forty percent of all 18-24 year olds, had a smoothie made fresh for them in the past month (Mintel, March 2008). That figure is more than 2X total adults (18%), and rivals past month penetration of Starbucks (44%, Mintel, April 2008). Mention Jamba Juice in one of my Notre Dame marketing classes and you get immediate smiles and conversation. Jamba Juice is a brand that is loved, not just respected.
Little wonder then made to order smoothies are big business — $591 million in 2007. The average smoothie price is over $5.00. Jamba Juice is far and away the leader with a whopping 56% share, despite its generally higher price (a strong indicator of brand strength by any measure). In September, Jamba Juice was included in Inc. magazine’s list of the 500 fastest growing companies.
How did Jamba Juice become an iconic youth brand?
1. Authenticity: I met with a rep from Jamba Juice last spring. She told me JJ is uncompromising in its use of fresh fruit and quality ingredients, despite cost and competitive pressures.
2. Effective use of PR: Until recently, Jamba Juice had never made a TV commercial. Instead, it relies on great placement on shows like Dave Letterman. Click here to see his effort to see how many Spiderman can fit into a Jamba Juice store.
3. Innovative menu items: The addition of breakfast items gives customers another reason to visit.
4. Consistently fun personality: Whether you encounter JJ on the web, on YouTube, or in the store, the attitude is fun and a little quirky. I especially like the ‘chalk’ feature on JJ’s web site. Purpose? Who cares?!
5. Simplicity: Jamba Juice isn’t trying to be all things to all people. Research on top brands among trendsetting youth by Outlaw Consulting emphasizes simplicity of design and execution as a trademark of an iconic trendsetter brand.
Are Millennials engaged in this election? Opinions are divided (see earlier blogpost and comments). But whether they care or not, getting out the vote is a marketing issue — and a marketing opportunity for those interested in reaching Millennials.
First there was Rock the Vote; now there is Shop the Vote. Shop the Vote is a partnership between the filmmaker who brought us “18 in ’08“, a documentary that provides a picture of this year’s 18-year olds and why they should care about this election. I haven’t seen the film, but would like to. A 6-minute CNN video (accessible from the home page, with film creator, David Burstein, yielded a great quote representing the message of the file: “I understand your cynicism.” 18 in ’08′s web site is worth visiting. It describes its missions as a “peer to peer youth voter engagement and mobilization organizationsing the film as a voter registration vehicle.” The site is comprehensive and engaging, a great example of Millennials talking to Millennials.
The other partner in Shop the Vote is Access 360 Media, which describes itself as “a premier multi-platform media network that connects to more than 173MM young adult (P12-34) consumers each month in the places and through the communication channels that matter most to them: In-store, Online and Mobile.” In-store partners include Journey and FYE.
A visit to Shopthevote.org provides many opportunities to get involved in the election:
Links to Obama and McCain campaign web sites
Download mobile media wallpaper and signups for election news delivered to your cell phone
Register to vote
Participate in a poll
Upload videos
The main purpose of the site, no doubt, is capturing email and mobile numbers in exchange for debate alerts and other relevant content — and presumably ad messages. It’s not clear how successful this effort has been, or will be. But as a creative approach to engaging Millennials in the election — and exploiting a marketing opportunity at the same time — I admit it is impressive.
Of all the scary financial news in the past few weeks, the scariest for marketers are the dire 4th quarter retail sales predictions. Yesterday the WSJ ran an article, “Neiman Marcus Sees Bleak Holiday: Luxury-goods Retailer Reports a Doubling of Its Quarterly Loss and Warns the Wealthy Are Cutting Back“. If that’s not scary, I don’t know what is, especially since, until recently, luxury goods were retailing’s bright spot. Only last week (9.15.08) the WSJ had a story titled “Fashion in a Faltering Economy“. Here’s an excerpt I found especially amusing:
Neiman Marcus fashion director Ken Downing praised the edgy “’80s moment” he saw on several runways, a trend long absent from stores and one he felt would look fresh to shoppers. At Bloomingdale’s, fashion director Stephanie Solomon expected “rich hippie” looks to appeal in spring.
Excuse, me? I don’t recall the 80′s ever having an “edgy moment”; “rich hippie” sounds like an oxymoron if there ever was one; but I digress.
With all the doom and gloom, it may be interesting to see what is known about Millennial’s fashion shopping habits. First of all, they don’t shop in department stores, for a score of reasons, among the most prominent being that is where their moms shop. Millennials much prefer smaller, more boutique like shopping venues, even if they happen to be chains that act like boutiques such as Abercrombie, American Eagle, or Limited. The photo above shows my friend, Melissa and one of her friends having a birthday shopping spree on Melrose, far from Nordstroms, Macy’s and JC Penney. According to BIGresearch, Melissa is pretty typical: 31% of 18-24 year olds say they shop most often for clothing at a specialty retailer, compared to just 16% of those 25 and older. This month, Fortune picked 3 specialty apparel retailers as their ‘five retail winners’:
American Apparel: The Los Angeles based apparel chain sells basics with a twist: Its advertisements tout both the company’s high quality, hipster-friendly tees and its fair-wage policies. Such meticulous branding has not only distinguished the retailer from Wal-Mart, but has also enabled American Apparel to boost profits 42% this quarter to $6.8 million and same-store sales by 23%.
American Outfitters: Urban Outfitters, which also owns clothing retailers Anthropologie and Free People, increased revenues by 30% this quarter to $454 million and boosted same-store sales by 13%.
Aeropostale: Aéropostale reported a 43% increase in profits in 2Q, and an overall sales increase of 21%, to $377.1 million. Even more shockingly, the New York based chain saw same-store sale growth of 13% this July, compared with a decrease of 12% in July of last year.
Not all specialty retailers are doing as well as these three; Abercrombie & Fitch and Urban Outfitters have both suffered small losses, which Fortune speculates as having to do with higher prices/lower value.
When Millennials do venture into the world of mass merchandising, Target is far and away their favorite. We have discussed the reasons for Target’s status as Millennial darling in previous blog posts, so won’t rehash here, other than to point out that BIGresearch data provides confirmation: twice as many 18-24 year olds say they shop Target most often for clothes than those 25 or older.
Macy’s is thinking of revamping its famous Cellar of housewares in its flagship Manhattan store to appeal to younger shoppers: “By giving teens a separate entrance and their own place to hang out – similar to creating a rec room in the basement – Macy’s is hoping kids will feel less self conscious about shopping where their parents shop.” (Fortune, 9.24.08, “Macy’s searches for the fountain of youth“). This might work, if like Target, American Apparel and Urban Outfitters, they emphasize value as well as ambiance. Millennials have money but they don’t think of themselves as affluent. Sniffing out the bargains AND the fashion is more than half the fun.
There’s universal agreement that the youth vote is critical to the outcome of the 2008 election, but how engaged are Millennials? Engagement is a tricky thing to measure, but just released data (9.23.08) from Pew Research sheds some light. First, the table shows a strong trend among 18-24 year olds for going ‘newsless’; 34% say they watch no news on a daily basis, up from 25% in 1998. (Presumably news on the Comedy Channel doesn’t count as ‘news’, although I’m not sure.) While over 9 out of 10 18-29 year olds say they intend to vote, only 7 out of 10 say they ‘definitely plan to vote’ and less than two thirds say they voted in their precinct last time they had a chance, and only 4 out of 10 say they ‘always’ vote. These figures are even lower for ‘cell phone only’ respondents.
Given these figures, it’s clear why the candidates are focusing on social media to engage young voters. Obama is doing far better than McCain, but the gap is closing. According to Hitwise, Obama gets about 56% of the total candidate web site traffic. As of Sept. 9, Obama boasted 510,799 MySpace friends, compared with McCain’s 87,652 friends, a more than 5-to-1 lead in number of friends, but down from a 7-to-1 advantage in August according to Live Research. Obama also has a sizeable leads on Facebook with 1,726,453 supporters to McCain’s 309,591. Obama’s Web site has twice as many videos posted to his official YouTube channel and far more YouTube channel subscribers, by an 11-to-1 margin. But what is surprising to me, is that these figures aren’t higher, given the penetration of these media among young people.
The Stanford Daily, in an article yesterday titled “Just How Political Is This Place?”, quotes Evan Purcell ’09 as saying “it’s diffcult to stay informed; politics isn’t a big social presence here.” My daughter at Notre Dame reported the same lack of interest when I asked how students were responding to the Palin pick. “Mom, we’re in a bubble.” While I am sure some campuses, like George Washington University in DC, are more passionate about politics, neither candidate should overestimate the ‘engagement’ of today’s young voters in the election — at least for now.
What media do Millennials rely on for election news? Political marketers addressing the youth vote would be wise to avoid overreliance on Internet media. Among the 88% of Millennials who are actively seeking or at least paying attention to the 2008 election, there is as much reliance on old fashioned TV news as on flashy Internet web sites. According to a May 2008 study by Crawford, Johnson, Northcott, a respected audience research firm, “Even with all of the media options available to Americans, television still rules – at least as a source for presidential election information.” CJN’s research shows National, Local and Cable TV News are the three most relied upon media sources for election news across every age group — including 18-29 year olds. 
What about Internet media, surely young people are more likely to turn to the web for news than their parents or Gen X’ers? Reliance on Internet media for election news across all four age groups polled reveals a surprisingly complex dynamic. It’s not as simple as ‘young = Internet, old = TV’.
• Across all four age groups, news organization web sites are the most heavily relied upon.
• Those under 45 are more likely to rely on ISP news pages than those 45 and older.
• There is no age difference in likelihood of relying on candidate email, political web sites and local TV web sites.
• The largest age differences are in reliance on YouTube and social networking sites, which skew strongly young, but have fairly low penetration even among 18-29 year olds (less than 1 in 5).
As a parent who spent way too many hours last year with the Princeton Review of Colleges Guidebook, the idea behind Unigo.com is compelling. Why rely on statistics, the college web site, a campus tour and a few anecdotes, when you can hear everything direct from the students themselves? That’s the idea behind Unigo.com which launches this month just in time to help the class of 2013 pick a college. The idea combines many concepts familiar and dear to Millennial’s 1) No one is as smart as all of us 2) All the information, all the time 3) unfiltered and unedited 4) free. What’s not to like?
Here’s how the New York Times (9.19.08) describes Unigo’s utility to a prospective student:
“Every student who joins Unigo has a user profile, and while that profile might not feature his or her real name, the idea is that by garnering a few pieces of personal information — your major, your hometown, your race, sex and political leanings — a database is created that makes it possible for newcomers to search the site by all kinds of hyperspecific criteria. You can see how many other people from your own high school are looking at a particular college. You can contact the author of a review with follow-up questions. “You can say, ‘I only want to see reviews of Harvard by African-American students,’ and have a choice of 20,” Goldman projected, “or by English majors, and have a choice of 50. So you can not only see a more comprehensive version of the school than you can anywhere else, but you can also see the school through the eyes of someone who’s just like you.”
The Beta site is still a little dysfunctional, but the promise, is enormous. The idea of video testimonials is compelling, you can hear the ‘virtual’ tour on an official web site, then hear the unofficial tour on Unigo. With my ties to Notre Dame, I will be especially interested in seeing this video described in the NYT article: “Two girls at Notre Dame, one an official campus tour guide, visit several spots around campus: at each one, the tour guide gives you the approved spiel, and then her friend tells you what the spiel leaves out.”
This week, Ad Age launched a new blogging feature called “GenNext“. I am thrilled to report that two of my favorite former Notre Dame MBA students (now grads) are featured bloggers. Sarah Ewing and Michael Girts were both standout students, and are now about to be stars in the blogosphere. Since I nominated them for this gig, I am confident you will find their musings of interest. Here are some excerpts from each of their initial blog entries. I’ve included links to their Ad Age bios as well. BTW, Both Sarah and Mike are currently in the hunt for marketing jobs.
Sarah Ewing Ad Age Blogger Bio
Top talent seeks a long-term relationship and will partner with companies whose manners reflect a soulmate, like online retailer Zappos.com. In my interview experience with them, the only prices discussed were potential media buys. Our date included an all-expenses paid trip to Vegas, a trip to the “Soul Doctor” (Zappos’ personal onsite psychologist and career therapist) and a Polaroid for my personal scrapbook. In the end, I didn’t get the job because they were looking for someone with more experience, but had things worked out, I could easily see myself growing old(er) with them (as can other swooning potential employees).
To attract top talent, I recommend these behaviors: 1. Don’t make me go Dutch. Please pay for interview travel. It indicates financial stability and employee value. 2. Don’t speed date. This is a courtship. Get to know me beyond a rote questionnaire. 3. Break up via phone, not silence. Quickly tell me that we are through rather than dragging it out in ambiguity. 4. Value me for me. As an MBA, I know what I’m worth. Although advertising agencies are notorious for paying under industry average, please do not immediately lowball my desired salary. Treat me like a potential partner. Partners require negotiation.
Remember: Any company can find employees. But a charming company who uses these manners will almost always get the most striking partners in the employment pool—and keep them, too. Which do you want to be?
Michael Girts Ad Age Blogger Bio
As I write this, I’m 12 weeks into the 10-week internship [with Leo Burnett]. In other words, they’ve asked me to stick around. I’m thrilled about it. I’ve worked hard all summer long. I like the people I’m working with, and I’m interested in the work I’m doing. Early in my internship, I asked my supervisor if I could take a shot at writing a case study for an upcoming new business pitch. Rather than wait for someone to teach me the best way to write a case, I asked if I could try it myself and schedule time with her the next day to review and improve the case–or scrap it if need be.
Well, I did it well enough that we used the case, and she asked me to write another. And another. And another and eventually, I was the go-to-guy for new case studies. I was meeting one of the business-development team’s real needs. And before the internship was over, I had put myself in a position where it was much easier to keep me on, rather than find some new way to replace me.
The interns that are still around are the same interns that seemed happiest all summer long. For all the talk about the perks and the freebies, it seems that what people really want out of their internship is real responsibility and legitimate work experience. Those people who sought the opportunity for real work–and subsequently seized that opportunity–are the ones who enjoyed their internships the most. They’re also the ones who are still here.
We are all familiar with the 24/7 lifestyle of Millennials, where the social conversation shifts seamlessly from an offline party to an online post-party discussion complete with photos. Why stop for sleep while the party plays on? But what about their kids? I spotted this poster on the New Haven train line in New York yesterday. My immediate reaction was ‘Why on earth would anyone need a 24 hour preschool channel?’ Then Bingo! Millennial Moms. “Sprout”, as the channel has been named, brings together several recent blog themes. Put a baby boomlet among Millennials together with a 24/7 lifestyle and seeing Elmo (or Barney) at an hour of the day makes perfect sense.
A little investigation reveals Sprout is a collaboration between Comcast and PBS. In addition to the cable channel, there is also Video on Demand and Sproutletsgrow.com (not .org). Here’s what PBS had to say in its 2005 joint press release with Comcast:
Diana Kerekes, the acting GM for PBS KIDS Sprout said, “Building on the remarkable success of our video-on-demand (VOD) service, we’re very excited to be launching our digital cable channel and website today — making Sprout truly a multi-platform destination for preschoolers and their caregivers.”
The need for 24/7 access to preschool programming is, in my opinion, an outgrowth of the 24/7 Millennial lifestyle. As Gen Y grows up, they will expect the same opportunities for their kids as they now take for granted.
And all week long your River City
Youth’ll be frittern’ away,
I say your young men’ll be frittern’!
Frittern away their noontime, suppertime, choretime too!
– Professor Harold Hill, aka, The Music Man
Substitute “Twittern’” for “frittern’” and you’ll see “either you’re closing your eyes to a situation you do now wish to acknowledge or you are not aware” of the impact of the 24/7 media world Millennials inhabit. Ever wonder why Millennials always seem so tired? It’s because they are nocturnal, surrounded by what the New York Times last week described as ‘ambient social awareness’(“Brave New World of Social Intimacy” 9.5.08). Facebook, MySpace, YouTube are ways to extend the social conversation beyond the hours when most face-to-face social conversations take place. The party continues — online.
I admit I have dabbled in this world. I have strangers following me on Twitter and I am following strangers. I use LinkedIn and Facebook. But I feel like a stranger in a strange land; it is not my natural habitat and I see them as time stealers, not productivity enhancers. That is one of the main differences between my generation and Millennials. Millennials, and those who share the digital mindset, find the blurring of online and offline realities completely natural–and productive.
Marketers are starting to catch on. Last week, I noted several hefty articles on ways to leverage Twitter as a business building tool. My favorite is by Steve Mulder, (“Five Marketing Tips for Attacking Twitter“, Mediapost, 9.1.08). He explains why this is important:
Numbers are hard to come by, but TechCrunch reports that Twitter has more than 1 million users (200,000 of which are active every week), and about 3 million messages are posted every day. These are still relatively small numbers, but the activity comes from an early-adopter segment that can be hard to reach using traditional marketing channels.
Mulder points out that brands that use Twitter as a way to extend a brand’s personality have an edge over those who are just pushing information. He points to Zappos as a good example.
Will I ever get it? I am not sure. But I plan to try. Now it’s time to get some sleep!
