Posts filed under ‘Marketing’
Tweens = $43 Billion in Spending Power
This tidbit stuck out to me from The Washington Times article, “Retailers lure parents of powerful tweens:”
“Tweens wield $43 billion in spending power annually and influence the spending of billions more on everything from cell phones to vacations to automobiles,” New York consumer behavior and marketing firm EPM Communications Inc. said in a 2008 report.”
That’s a-whole-lot-of money, and the figure doesn’t even include teen spending power. As we seek out responsible advertisers and sponsors for PlumbBrain, this study is a great reminder of the missed opportunity for retailers who do not to engage the tween market.
(Image found here)
Building a Tribe of True Believers
Found via Ypulse, Dan Pankraz’s thoughts on tribal marketing for youth audiences spoke directly to what OneSeventeen Media knows motivates kids to engage. These principles will be put into application in PlumbBrain’s launch. To summarize at a high level, Pankraz calls on brands to understand the value of:
- Agitating and disrupting the status quo
- Connected collective
- Power people
- True believers
- Lead them
- Create culture
- Tribal identification
- Constant content creation and ongoing storytelling platform
Be sure to read the full post to understand the power of Pankraz’s strategy.
(Image found here)
Making the Most of Ypulse Mashup 2009
By Amy Looper, OneSeventeen Media Co-Founder
This year’s 2009 Ypulse Youth Marketing Mashup conference was another winner and maybe even the strongest lineup yet. It was good to catch up with old friends and to make new ones. For those of you who may be new to OneSeventeen Media, this is one of our very favorite conferences because Anastsia Goodstein, Ypulse Founder, does such a fantastic job bringing in top brand, corporate and social marketers, media professionals, non-profits and educators together to share the latest best practices, research and the strategies on marketing to youth with technology.
For OneSeventeen Media’s focus, the following were particularly relevant highlights:
- Social networks continue to be an important place for youth to accomplish social good and engage around current events. Interestingly enough, C&R research presented that environmental issues were no longer the number one issue among youth, their research shows it was youth oriented issues like education and child poverty as number one, cancer was number two, then followed the environment in the number 3 slot.
- I think the big shocker was learning from Bill Carter’s presentation on Fuse Marketing’s latest research, that teens still read magazines! In fact, it was the second most effective rated medium to reach teens, and TV isn’t off their radar either! Several girls on the youth panels mentioned they like to read Seventeen Magazine, and they do pay attention to ads. However, when they see an ad of interest they will go to the web to do research and then make any purchases from there. 75% of teens believe it’s appropriate for brands to reach them via TV ads. The bottom line? It’s imperative to have go-to-market strategies that fully integrate all available platforms youth utilize. The underlying theme here was to have an authentic, value-providing story that your youth market can relate to.
- Facebook’s faceoff with Twitter continues. While it’s been widely reported that youth have been slow to adopt Twitter, the youth panelist were somewhat divided on which was a better marketing tool. Of note, none of them mentioned MySpace. Facebook fans liked the ability to create a community around your brand ie: through a fan page and or group, while the other panelist opted for Twitter because it was the best way to monitor your brand as well as insert yourself into a relevant conversation with others about your brand. It’s important to remember these young panelists are still a bit older than our market, but trends with the older youth trickle down to younger kids over time — something for us to watch for.
- Last, but definitely not least, Don Tapscott’s keynote presentation was brilliant, and Guy Kawasaki’s masterful moderation of the Youth Entrepreneurs panel was fantastic! These young entrepreneurs are fearless and had many valuable insights to share. You can read more about what others are saying about their conference experiences on the Ypulse site.
Job well done Anastasia and team!
(Pictured above: Guy Kawasaki and the Youth Entrepreneurs panel in action)
$1Billion Annual Spending on Virtual Currencies
“Castronova says people transfer at least $1 billion into the virtual currencies each year, with most of that money going into online games. The actual amount could be much higher, he said, but the market is hard to quantify.” — John D. Sutter, CNN
Virtual currencies are a popular feature of many online gaming and networking sites, but even I was surprised at the amount of annual spending devoted to virtual currencies as disclosed by CNN. If you’re new to the social media space, the article also provides a strong overview on the traditional features of virtual currencies on many sites. Virtual currency utilization is not a primary revenue means for most sites, however the $1Billion+ in annual spending validates that youth and adults are willing to spend their real-life-dollars for virtual products and services.
(Image found here)
50% of Ad Spending Going Online, Higher For Kids?
“[T]he [advertising] industry is heading into a “50-50 world” in which half of revenues go to digital and interactive campaigns.”
– Laura Desmond, Starcom MediaVest (BusinessInsider.com)
I would venture to guess that an even higher percentage of youth-targeted advertising will be spent online, since more young people have greater online density than other age demographics. Companies that know how to engage youth with brands in respectful, responsible, audience-useful ways <read OneSeventeen Media>, have a tremendous revenue opportunity in the shift to increased online spending.
60% of Companies Behind Digital Marketing Curve
“A new survey of chief marketing officers (CMOs) conducted by Heidrick & Struggles and Digital Scientists reveals that CMOs across nearly all sectors believe their companies are under-delivering in the area of digital marketing.” (As reported by cnet)
With social media as the latest tool in the box, marketing executive are not always sure how to successfully navigate these spaces where they are not native participants — particularly when it comes to reaching youth audiences. OneSeventeen Media’s Adaptive Creative Ad Network has been developed to address this specific problem. By empowering kids with control over the brands they interact with, we’re changing the face of advertising.
“OneSeventeen Media has developed a social advertising model characterized by intelligent selection of advertising messages that will deliver measurable results to advertisers; individualized guidelines for advertisers who wish to market safely to tweens and teens; intellectual property that can be leveraged outside of OneSeventeen Media properties; creation of ad catalogs for advertisers that are safe for tweens and teens; and a recognized rating system where kids give their own seal of approval.” (www.oneseventeenmedia.com)
