Posts Tagged ‘trends’

From the mouths of babes (well, 15 year old teens)

{ July 16, 2009 @ 9:25 am } · { Youth Marketing }
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// Found a fabulous article by Ben Patterson about the 15 year old Marketer causing waves in the US. Just goes to show – again – that you need to listen to the audience – thank goodness for Trax!

//

Teens don’t use Twitter, nor do they read newspapers. They also hate advertisements, and they’re really, really into free music.

Nope, those aren’t the results of some bone-headed new survey; instead, they come straight from the keyboard of one Matthew Robson, a 15-year-old Morgan Stanley intern whose candid report on his friends’ TV, music, and online habits set the media world on fire this week.

According to The Guardian, Robson’s bosses at Morgan Stanley’s European Media group were so impressed with the teen’s report—”one of the clearest and most thought-provoking insights we have seen,” one Morgan Stanley exec said—that they promptly sent it out to their C-level clients.

The response, apparently, was immediate, with “dozens and dozens” of high-level clients “e-mailing and calling all day,” the Guardian reports.

As for Robson’s report, well … the kid didn’t mince words. “Teenagers do not use Twitter” (as quoted by the Guardian). Why? Because updating Twitter on your phone counts as a text message, and teens would rather use their texts to ping friends than update a Twitter profile “that no one is viewing,” Robson writes.

He goes on, dissing newspapers because teens “cannot be bothered” to read physical pages when they can get the condensed version online or on the tube. As for banner ads on the Web? “Extremely annoying and pointless,” Robson observes (according to the Guardian). By the same token, Robson says teenagers are “very reluctant” to pony up for tunes, preferring to stream or share them for free.

Of course, Robson is only speaking for himself (and his friends, I’m assuming). Still, I think it’s great that he took his assignment at Morgan Stanley seriously, writing a direct, honest report that (apparently) hit media bigwigs in the solar plexus.

Rationed Indulgence – marketing to youth in hard times

{ July 12, 2009 @ 8:34 pm } · { Youth Research, Youth Strategy }
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We’ve seen how fluctuating inflation and credit regulation has left consumers cash strapped. The global recession is spurring consumers to revaluate their standard of living, whether it is cutting back on spending, trading down or choosing quality over quantity. Given that consumers are still dependent on feeding their materialistic nature, it’s important for brands to offer them a taste of the good life at ‘cost’ or premium value.

As care-givers, parents often feel the brunt of over spending kids as noted by one of the mothers involved in the Brat®Trax (7-15 year olds) study when asked about perceptions of materialism: “They (the child) even compare cell phones, they ask you: When are you going to change your cell phone? What will people say with this phone?”

With one foot in the recession, parents will have to adopt a rationed approach for their kids, going forward – providing rationed indulgence in order to survive the looming effects of the recession yet still maintaining some modicum of contentness.

If you’re a parent you’ll know the excessive demands kids can make! Youth Dynamix have highlighted the ascendance of a new trend from its Brat®Trax study – DemandAge – where nagging had evolved from pestering into demanding.

The youth research further shows how the youth have only recently started saving as opposed to their past financial habits revolving around living for the ‘now’ (spending quickly to receive instant gratification). Saving for the youth (16-24 years) has increased from 50% in 2006 to 70% in the Youth®Trax 2008/9 study – the condition of the economy is understood by this group. For the 7-15 year olds however, saving is still negligible with only around a third saving anything significant. Although this may forecast a bleak relationship for financial institutions with the youth, it also offers them an opportunity to educate them on the fruits of short and long term saving.

The Global Teen & South Africa

{ July 7, 2009 @ 10:52 am } · { Youth Research }
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In a country where the youth make up more than half of the total population, and with increasing amounts of spend and influence, marketers need ongoing access to the most up-to-date, statistically robust and largest youth research studies in the country: the Youth Dynamix Trax® research studies (both BratTrax® exploring 7-15 year olds and YouthTrax® exploring 16-24 year-olds). ). These studies have been successfully conducted by Youth Dynamix over the past 10 years, providing trended information, across a comprehensive range of topics including Technology & Telecommunications; Media, Advertising and Competitions, Fashion & Music; Attitudes, Lifestyle and General Trends; Financial & Shopping Behaviour and others.

Ultimately, the studies provide a holistic understanding of the lifestyles, behaviour, attitudes and mindsets of the youth, with the insights informing the development of long-term, sustainable and youth-relevant brand and marketing strategies.

To add to the ongoing Trax® offering, in 2008, Youth Dynamix’s YouthTrax® 2008/9 research study partnered with TRU USA in their Global Teen Study which included teens (12-19 year-olds) from 16 countries worldwide, representing 5 continents. The TRU Global Teen Insights Program is the most in-depth look ever at global teen that includes a variety of topics ranging from attitudes and values to lifestyles and trends, as well as consumer behaviours which contains brands, media, telecommunications and technology and much more. The similarities between the two studies, provided a perfect fit, and an ongoing affiliation, as well as comparable results, allowing us to be able to see where and how the teens in South Africa measure up to their global counterparts.

The countries in the Global Teen Study were categorised into “developed” and “emerging” countries according to the FTSE categories, and South Africa fits into the emerging category, along with Brazil, China and India. The results of the study demonstrated many commonalities in teens worldwide, with some differences identified between developed and emerging market teens which were largely governed by disparities in personal spending capacity.

As a rule, South African youth sit fairly comfortably in the emerging market teen profile, although in certain respects our youth think and behave more like developed market teens. For example, the cellphone penetration in South African teens, in terms of having their own cellphone, stacks up handily at 86% with teens in Germany (86%) and Greece (87%), and even slightly ahead of teens in the UK (85%), Spain (84%) and the US (83%).

Taste in brands is another area where true globalisation of teens has been seen: South African teens list Coke, Nike, Billabong, Levi’s and Adidas as their top five brands (irrespective of category); in selecting Coke as a top brand, they are joined by teens in Brazil, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, India, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Nike is a top brand amongst teens in Brazil, China, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Other areas illustrating the phenomenon of the Global Teen are their common leisure time activities, interest in sports, and favourite movie/TV stars.

On the other hand, developed and emerging teens show distinct differences in terms of personal spending capacity, interaction with media (in particular Internet, and favourite types of websites, as well as their attitudes towards various societal, politicial and environmental issues. For example, video and photo sharing websites are much more popular among developed teens than emerging. In this regard, South African teens are much more akin to their emerging market counterparts.

These insights are but a few of those to have emerged from the two studies and the partnership between them. For more information on where South African teens are, and where they stand in relation to their global counterparts contact Quentin Weldon at Youth Dynamix on tel (011) 806 8068 or email quentin.weldon @ youthdynamix.co.za.