Millennials are famous for ignoring advertising, so it is no small matter to find data on what moves them to action. BIGresearch (July 2008) data show 18-24 year olds self-report that magazines and TV are effective in getting them to initiate an online search (see chart). 60% say this is true of magazines and 55% say TV can stimulate them to search online, the highest figures for any medium including online. We noted in a past post that Millennials index high for the original ‘mobile media’ (magazines and radio) and certain TV channels (MTV, Adult Swim) (see 9/9 post). Likewise, we reported that they rely on TV for election news (see 9/22 post).
All of this data suggests it would be unwise to overlook traditional media when attempting to reach Millennials and drive them to act. But before we get carried away –or you suspect that I am actually working for the Magazine Publishers of America — it should also be noted that the same pattern holds for most other age cohorts. The biggest takeaway is the old notion that it’s all about the mix — put your GRP’s in multiple media baskets.
Media research has consistently shown that multiple platform advertising not only increases reach, it also improves the likelihood that a target will act on the message. Last summer, Integrated Media Measurement (IMMI) reported a study of 3000 panel members who recorded all ads (TV, radio, in-cinema, Internet, TIVO Showcase) they had seen for new Fall TV shows, then tracked what shows they actually watched (conversion). The study confirmed the more different ways a target encounters the message, the more likely they are to act. Of the six shows that ran significant TV and radio campaigns prior to the season premiere, a siginfcantly higher number of panelists who saw ads in multiple media watched the promoted show than those who only were only exposed to one media type.
In each case studied, the data showed that exposure on television-only drives less of the target behavior than exposure on another platform in addition to television. Because the result is consistent across the board, the report concludes that there is value in constructing multiple platform campaigns that goes beyond simply maximizing reach.
While this research was not Millennial focused, I have no doubt it holds true for Millennials, who are media savvy and heavy media consumers. Bottom line? Diversification works!
Last November, CBS aired an unflattering Millennial portrait with its “The Millennials Are Coming” report. The generation was criticized for its coddled upbringing, lazy work habits, and unrealistic expectations. Here’s a sample:
“It’s a perfect storm we have created to put these people in a position where they suddenly have to perform as professionals and haven’t been trained,” Mary Crane [former White House chef who trains Millennials] says. Basic training, like how to eat with a knife and fork, or indeed how to work. Today, fewer and fewer middle class kids hold summer jobs because mowing lawns does not get you into Harvard. They have climbed Mount Everest. They’ve been down to Machu Picchu to help excavate it. But they’ve never punched a time clock. They have no idea what it’s like to actually be in an office at nine o’clock, with people handing them work. You now have a generation coming into the workplace that has grown up with the expectation that they will automatically win, and they’ll always be rewarded, even for just showing up.”
Ouch. Little wonder Millennials were offended. However, the picture doesn’t have to be this negative for them to take offense. When I first published an article in Ad Age last November about what my students DON’T know about Marketing, I was surprised how offended they were. Here’s a sample of the response:
“I pity all the people (including the author of this article) who so severely underestimate us. I think those who assume we will curl up in a ball crying every time we don’t get handed a cookie for good behavior are in for a big surprise in the years to come.” -New York, NY
This 3 minute spoof of the 60 Minutes piece on YouTube provides a mocking view of what older generations think of Millennials. The piece includes a hilarious interviews with a Millennial in his native habitat, ‘his parent’s basement’ who has no idea what the earnest interviewer is talking about. It also features an interview with Millennial expert, Dr. Alan So, author of “Generation Why Not Call Them Millennials?”. Dr. So patiently explains that Millennials are not equipped to communicate in person because with all their technology ‘they’ve never had to’.
This generation is well aware of their flaws. A recent survey (see earlier post, How Gen Y Sees Itself) revealed that Millennials are just as critical of themselves as anything their elders say about them. However, they understandably don’t want those flaws pointed out. Who can blame them?
To see or not to see Hamlet 2? If you are interested in Millennials, the answer is definitely ‘see’. The humor and pacing are wildly uneven, the outcome is telegraphed from the outset and the vulgar language is not at all what you would find in Disney’s High School Musical. But the insight about what will appeal to Millennials was on target from beginning to end, proving the real Hamlet correct in saying, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
While the story appears to be about a failed actor, failed high school drama teacher and failed husband, the real story, as Millennials will no doubt discern immediately, is about the students. The movie first presents this hapless bunch as disrespectful, illiterate, racially and class-divided, drug using, losers. But this is just a cover. They choose to present themselves this way, of course. In fact, they have amazing talents — for singing, stage production, choreography, musical composition, technology, organization, persuasion, and more — which only needed to be given a chance and an inspiration to thrive. They don’t need good material, a competent teacher or even much knowledge of the real Hamlet. With the students’ help, the truly hapless teacher’s laughably uninspired and ridiculous script is transformed and transplanted to yes, Broadway. (Sorry to give it away for those of you who have not seen the movie, but you would have guessed anyway).
Steve Coogan, as the Boomer drama ‘teacher’, is pitied and loved, but not respected. He is harmless, but ineffective. He doesn’t even wear underwear. He succeeds because of the students, despite his lack of talent and self-destructive qualities.
It is also significant to note that none of the young wunderkinds stands out as the ‘star’. They work, and succeed, as a team. Everyone is included — including the nerdy, sexually confused teacher’s pet and the bad girl ‘wanna-be’. It is the students’ pooled gifts, and ability to pull together, that make them successful, a true Millennial value.
I have written before of Millennial personas, archetypes and ‘secretly gifted’ fantasies. Hamlet 2 wraps them all into one package.
On the occasion of my 50th post about Millennials (wow, can hardly believe it myself), I did some digging on the social media phenomenon. While many believe it is values that define Millennials. Millennials themselves believe it is their use of the Internet, nothing defines Millennials on the Internet more than their use of social media. In March 08, McCann released Wave 3 of its Social Media Tracking Report based on a survey of 17,000 Internet users in 29 countries. Here are a few findings worth noting:
1. Social media is much broader than social networking. McCann defines social media as “Online applications, platforms and media which aim to facilitate interaction, collaboration and the sharing of content”. That includes blogs, photo and video sharing, podcasts, microblogs (Twitter), widgets, chat rooms and message boards, and more.
2. Social media’s reach is surprisingly high.. 83% of active Internet users watch videos, 73% read blogs. 39% have started their own blog (I am sure the number is even higher for Millennials, especially young women who are more into blogging than similarly aged guys, who favor gaming. In fact, McCann believes blogging rivals traditional media with a 70% weekly reach. 33% have a favorite blog they read regularly. “As a collective, the blogosphere rivals any mass media in
terms of reach, time spent and wider cultural, social and political impact.”
3. Social Networks have evolved into platforms to organise users’ internet experience. 74% use them to message friends. Social networks are becoming a ‘one stop shop’ for all internet needs: messaging friends, posting photos and videos, and unique applications. Consequently, they are becoming one of the most powerful ways to disseminate information.
The blurring of media and creators is nearly complete, as the popularity of Engadget with trendsetting Millennials makes clear. The ‘citizen’ journalist has become a reality and bloggers are becoming mainstream personalities. Need evidence? The NYT and Entertainment Weekly had this to say about www.pinkisthenewblog.com/home/:
“Pink is the new Blog: Must Star Hazer — Why This: Trent Vanegas may run the uproarious gossip roundup from his home outside Detroit, but he doesn’t need proximity to make riotous observations about celebs — often typed directly onto scary paparazzi photos.” — Entertainment Weekly
“Anyone looking for a case study in the convergence of homespun blog culture and market-driven mainstream media need look no further than pinkisthenewblog.com and its creator, Trent Vanegas … It’s Not Just a Blog, It’s a Brand”. — The New York Times
Finally, we have prospect of ‘Facebook: The Movie’. The New York Times reports today that West Wing creator, Aaron Sorkin, and Columbia Pictures producer Scott Rudin, are collaborating on a film about the creation of Facebook. They have set up a place on Facebook to participate. (Talk about media coming ‘full circle’!) Where did I read about it first? A blog of course!
Enter “Millennials” in the YouTube search window and you will get an hour’s worth of entertainment. (That is both a promise and a warning). Millennials are speaking out about their generation in their own special medium: video. I especially like the way this one captures both the spirit and the facts of Millennials in just 1:30 seconds.
Enjoy!
As the class of 2012 winds down its college search and arrives on college campuses later this month, it’s time to take a closer look at how Millennials make this, their first significant life choice. At Brand Amplitude, we have been especially involved with incoming freshman. Hanover College is a client. I teach at University of Notre Dame. Most significantly, I lived every step of the process with my 17-year old daughter this past 18 months (that’s her in the photo with a friend at one of our dozens of campus visits). College admissions professionals have been pondering how Millennials think about college for several years and much as been written about the differences relative to previous generations. As the largest generation since the Boomers, their sheer size has made getting into college more competitive. The number of high school graduates peaked in 2008 and won’t reach this same level again for a decade. As one of the most closely parented and best chauffeured generations, they are uniquely qualified with after school activities, awards, and impressive SAT/ACT scores (yes, math scores are improving). Consequently, the process starts earlier (as early as sophomore year) and requires more diligence, and applications, than ever before.
Our work suggests that the main difference is that Millennials love and demand choices, but have a hard time narrowing them down. Making a choice, means giving up the alternative, something they seem particularly loathe to do. While most will tell you that their decision process was driven by financial considerations, College Board statistics show the actual cost of attending college, adjusted for ‘tuition discounting’ (also known as financial aid), is flat or declining. Less than 10% say financing college is a ‘real concern’ (down 100% from a decade ago) and 39% say it is no concern at all.
So what is the real driver? A quick look at how many students remain close to home suggests that location is key. With the exceptions of Alaska and many New England states, most 2007 graduates stayed within their home state. In Michigan, Indiana, and Kentucky, less than 15% of 2007 graduates attended school out of state.
Academic reputation is consistently the attribute that college students say is their main choice criteria, but with so many excellent schools to choose from, the difficulty of comparing schools, and the ‘undecided major’ status of most incoming freshmen, this finding must be taken with a large grain of salt. So what is actually driving decisions? Ask an admissions officer this question, as I have at George Washington University, Notre Dame, Hanover College and Purdue North Central, and it is remarkable how often you will get a knowing smile. The true answer is that the minds of Millennials are a mystery — many times even to the students themselves. Seemingly random elements such as the tour guide’s attitude, the weather the day of a campus visit or a call from a faculty member can make the difference.
Millennial indecision makes life especially difficult for college marketers, who spend millions a year on glossy view books, web sites and college fairs. Our advice to colleges is that with differentiating based on academics so difficult, 1) details matter more than you think 2) parents are especially influential (although students will tell you otherwise) and 3) third party endorsements are key. On this last point, we found that students are likely to dismiss the avalanche of school generated propaganda in favor of peer information. At the same time, Facebook has made it easy to find ‘friends’ at other schools, so you no longer have to wait until Christmas break to hear how they are doing. Sites such as Rate my Professor and StudentReviews.com make it easy to get the “real” scoop on what other students think of their school, good and bad.
(For a hilarious send up of school literature, check out this fake commercial for Quendalyn College.)
So how do Millennials decide? In the end, it often comes down to immediate questions of where they think they will ‘fit in’ and have an enjoyable experience. Schools that extend themselves and show that they really want the student, as opposed to just ‘admit’ them are likely to have the edge. For this collaborative generation, the need to ‘belong’ trumps most other considerations.
In an earlier posting, I noted French Millennials are forgoing wine, Mon Dieu! Now Nielsen is reporting U.S. Millennials are forgoing beer in favor of wine. Shocking but true, beer drinking among 21-30 year olds dropped 12 percentage points in the last 10 years. For comparison, over thirty’s beer consumption dropped just 6 percentage points. According to Nielsen, most of the ‘slack’ is being picked up, you guessed it, wine! (Before we get too carried away with this insight, Nielsen also points out that beer still accounts for 83% of Gen Y alcoholic beverage purchases.) Research by Gallup and another study by the industry group, Wine Market Council, confirm the trend. The Boston Globe speculates that “Millennials have the potential to become the next generation to embrace wine in numbers not seen since the baby boomers.”
What does this trend tell us about the tastes of U.S. Millennials? A lot, according to qualitative research by Liz Thach, Sonoma State University. First the research revealed that only 18% of Millennial wine drinkers see wine as “hip or cool”. Most in fact think it is too ‘elite’ to be hip or cool and wish that marketers would portray wine drinking as more ‘fun’. Instead, the Millennials who drink wine regularly drink it because they like the taste and think it goes well with food. Furthermore, (big hint here), half said that they were introduced to wine through a family member. This suggests Millennials tastes are influenced by their Boomer parents. The Boston Globe put it this way:
Thach’s (focus group) respondents seemed to have sophisticated culinary interests. She says they watch cooking and decorating shows, throw dinner parties, and eat interesting, diverse foods. ”They like wine with food,” she says. ”This is where I see a trend happening in this country, which also happened in Australia several years ago — what they call the cafe society. We are starting to be more interested in the good things in life: good wine, good food, friends, taking time out to relax and enjoy things. This is actually one of the values we identified of this generation…The generation who grew up with free-range chickens, organic vegetables, and working moms who stopped for take-out on the way home were exposed to all kinds of food from an early age. Add to that the array of imported foods and beverages available to them — this demographic moves from Swiss chocolates to Hershey’s bars with ease — and you have one possible explanation as to why the diversity of flavors in wine are appealing to this group.
This insight confirms my earlier assertion that Millennials, with their above average earnings and sophisticated tastes, are an untapped market for what many consider ‘luxury’ goods. You just can’t call them luxuries.
If you are casting around (as I have been) for alternatives to Andy Sachs, Hannah Montana, and Harry Potter to epitomize the Millennial Persona, look no further. Joshua Glenn of the Boston Globe provides a comprehensive list of candidates by birth year from 1984-1993.
His fresh takes on the subject include the observation that many of the icons of Gen M are actually throw backs to the fifties – think Nancy Drew, Lion Witch and the Wardrobe, High School Musical (a less edgy Grease). He also wonders at the sheer number of Millennial actresses called upon to play the role of ‘princess’:
I’m thinking of Lindsay Lohan (“Lifesize,” in which a princess doll comes to life), Kiera Knightley (“Princess of Thieves,” “King Arthur,” plus every other role), Mandy Moore (supporting role in “The Princess Diaries”), Hilary Duff (“A Cinderella Story,” plus she’s sort of a princess in “Material Girls” and “The Lizzie McGuire Movie”), Amanda Bynes (“What A Girl Wants,” also sort of a princess), Scarlett Johansson (“The Other Boleyn Girl”), and Michelle Trachtenberg (“Ice Princess”). Plus India Oxenberg on the reality show “I Married a Princess.
Glenn points out that many of the most successful TV shows aimed at young girls suggest princess-dom without the crown: Nickelodeon’s “iCarly” is about a schoolgirl with a globally popular website, “Hannah Montana,” Miley Cyrus plays an average kid by day who’s a rock ‘n’ roll superstar by night.
Are Millennials as insipid as these fictional princesses and fifties personas suggest? Until real life achiever Millennials emerge, we may have to live with these fictional personas.
