Internet Marketing and Millennials

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What's the catch with the so-called Millennials or the so-called Generation Y? Well, this may come as a huge surprise, but we have a very surprising answer. We aren't quite sure whether or not this generation born between 1980 and 2000 is going to save the world, but these cyber boys and girls impressive buying power. This is more than enough for any industry or company to pay close attention to what's going to with these youngsters, who just can't wait to spend their money. This also includes the Internet marketing machinery.

Here's a handful of useful tips how Internet marketing can successfully communicate with the Millennials:

#1 Millennials move in the mobile ways

More than 90% of Millennials use or own a smartphone. Therefore, if you want to speak their language, you have no other choice than to go mobile full-scale. This means that a successful Internet marketing strategy has to make sure that all material you plan to present is mobile-friendly. In addition, you need to hit the right apps and be present on all social media, which are extremely popular on smartphones.

#2 Tell me an interesting story
Selling a good story behind a product or service for Millennials has a completely new meaning. They don't have the patience to go through the traditional marketing process. Instead, they want to hear and learn something new and interesting. If you can get their attention, then the sky is the only limit. Yet, don't think it's going to be easy.

#3 Target the social groups and communities
The funny thing about the Millennials is that they can stop talking about individualism and the importance of personal choices. Yet, the Millennials feel comfortable when they function within a group or community, which lives and grows online. So, you need to target the specific social group or community with your Internet marketing campaign.

#4 Sharing v Subscribing v Owning
The Millennials are definitely not too enthusiastic about the traditional owning concept. They prefer to "borrow" on a regular basis, or in other words, they're perfect subscribers. Therefore, if your Internet marketing team can come up with a subscription model, which can keep them motivated all the time, you can also forget about one-time-buy and a traditional buy-to-own model.

#5 Play their game
At the first glance, Millennials may seem spoiled, too demanding, impatient, disinterested and even naïve. However, this first wrong impression can cost you a lot. If you don't play their game, rest assured that someone else will. We're talking about your competitors. Therefore, your Internet marketing strategy shouldn't allow itself a luxury of underestimating the Millennials. In return, they can be surprisingly grateful and loyal, if you can press the right buttons, of course.

So, what's the moral of our story about Millennials? Well, if the customer is always right, then Millennials will be always right for the next couple of years or decades. Or, you can start preparing the Internet marketing strategy for the next Generation Z.
#internet #marketing #millennials
  • Profile picture of the author discrat
    Originally Posted by dansilvestre View Post

    #2 Tell me an interesting story
    Selling a good story behind a product or service for Millennials has a completely new meaning. They don’t have the patience to go through the traditional marketing process. Instead, they want to hear and learn something new and interesting. If you can get their attention, then the sky is the only limit. Yet, don’t think it’s going to be easy.

    .
    Yep, Storytelling is always something that will keep people engaged. And it has through the history of man.

    In every facet too.
    At Church the other day my wife made the remark how our Pastor does not tell enough modern day stories to keep our attention.

    Good storytelling just resonates with people !!
    Learn that skill and you will be miles ahead of others in this Industry


    - Robert Andrew
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  • Profile picture of the author ForumGuru
    Banned
    Originally Posted by dansilvestre View Post

    #4 Sharing v Subscribing v Owning
    The Millennials are definitely not too enthusiastic about the traditional owning concept. They prefer to PIRATE on a regular basis, or in other words, they’re NOT perfect subscribers.
    Fixed that for you...

    A great many Millennials are prolific image pirates...I think that may have been what you were trying to say. Not many Millennials use subscription models in my areas of expertise...since a great many of them copy and paste whatever image they see with a blatant disregard for copyrights, releases, and image ownership. Bandwidth theft too you may ask? Why certainly....

    After seeing many tens of thousands of instances of my images being pirated over the years....I'm convinced that very few millennials get the concept of ownership and copyrights....and most don't appear that willing to learn or comply anytime soon.

    Of course you can always find a few good apples in a giant bag of rotten ones.

    Cheers

    -don
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  • Profile picture of the author kilgore
    I find that generalizing about entire generations sloppy, lazy, and ultimately unhelpful. Consider this statement from Pew Research about millenials in the United States (emphasis mine):

    "Millennials, whom we define as those ages 18-34 in 2015, now number 75.4 million, surpassing the 74.9 million Baby Boomers (ages 51-69)."
    (Source: Millennials overtake Baby Boomers as America's largest generation | Pew Research Center)

    First of all, most 18-year-olds are in very, very different life stages than 35-year-olds. They have different needs, wants and preferences; different relationships to technology.

    Second, they're very diverse -- which isn't surprising given that there are over 75 million of them in the US alone. Even if you take a subset of millennials, say millennials over 30, you'll find your 30-year-old single father rancher in Wyoming is probably nothing like your 30-year-old childless lesbian working for a hedge fund in New York City. Obviously I'm exaggerating and presenting caricatures, but if my examples seem cartoonish, how much more so is calling an entire group of 75 million people "spoiled, too demanding, impatient, disinterested and even naïve"? Of course some are all of these things, but many, many are none of these, too!

    None of this is to say that the advice here is necessarily bad. Mobile-first has been a best practice for several years. But it's not just millennials who are on smartphones -- according to Pew Research 72% of all Americans use smart phones (Source: Smartphone ownership rates skyrocket in many emerging economies | Pew Research Center). Similarly, stories have been effective marketing tools for years -- across generations. Think back to the snake-oil salesmen of the 19th century. What did they do? Tell stories. And so on...

    So rather than using pop-psychology heuristics about what your customers want or how they behave, study them, learn about them, ask them. Then, if it helps break them down into meaningful categories based on what's important to you as a business owner and actually important to them as customers. I'm 99.9% sure that "generation" won't be one of those categories.

    Sure, my way is a lot more challenging than saying, "This person was born in 1988, so he must be spoiled." But I guarantee you'll get a lot more out of it.
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  • Profile picture of the author dana67
    Millennials can be a great demographic to target. They are tech savvy. They know there are opportunities online.
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