That’s how ordinary brands deal with extraordinary issues - in average ways producing very average results.

However, I’d like to focus on how great youth brands are breaking the mold and doing something out of the ordinary.

Youth marketing is always redefining the parameters of what is acceptable. Bright individuals will always push the envelope however there will always be a marcomms department to keep them in check. That was one of the themes of my recent presentation to Vodafone on Youth, Loyalty and Trust and follows on from the Great Youth Brands Series on MobileYouth featuring Red Bull, Jones Soda and Toyota Scion.

Perhaps the best example of Uncommon Sense to date is how EA dealt with the apparent glitch in the latest release of Tiger Woods 08 that including the “Jesus Shot” - where Tiger could walk on water. Obvious mistake. Not just an obvious mistake, but a well known one - one youtube pundit (Levinator 25) made it public amassing over 600,000 views.

Embarrassment for EA? Yes, if it was handled using Common Sense.

However, check this out for sheer marketing brilliance

Tiger Woods 09 - Walk on Water

This is the result of individuals within an organization taking risky decisions to produce extaordinary results that substantially impact the brand in a positive way - that’s what I call Uncommon Sense. That’s the result of bypassing marcomms and challenging the notion of “that’s how it’s always been done”.

Ask yourself, would youth react positively or negatively to this communication from EA then compare to what an average brand would do - ie a cover-up.

by Graham Brown

Technorati Tags: mobile youth report, youth research, youth social media, social media, mobile social media

Youth Marketing is all about something you do with not to youth.” Graham Brown (mobileYouth 2008 Report)

Following my earlier riff about trends in the marketing of Great Youth Brands (last time was Red Bull), I’d like to talk about one of my favourites.

This is the key question - how does a mass market “everything to everybody” brand build relevance with a specific segment - such as Youth?

Consider this challenge facing the largest and most profitable automotive manufacturer in the world - Toyota.

Toyota cannot roll out customized fat pipe blinged rims low riding coupes for the mass market because their core value of reliability is also one of a generic appeal - they will alienate your grandmother and the school teacher.

So this is how Toyota does it - meet Scion - the Toyota sub-brand that no one knows is actually Toyota (unless you study the marque a little harder).

Check the video - this is real ownership and consumer generated content in action, this is consumer ownership of the brand - creating rather than sponsoring events, local Scikotics, magazines etc.

Vodafone, like most mobile operators, faces the ongoing challenge of being relevant to the next generation of its customers (youth) while at the same time not losing its broad appeal. It couldn’t re-invent itself as another Blyk or Boost Mobile (nor would it want to) but at the same time, as with the current problem facing the BBC and the recorded music industry the beginnings of a disconnect with young consumers may not be felt today but represents the manifestation of a long term and, importantly, irreversible disease.

Some of the points I discussed in my presentation to Vodafone about the MobileYouth Report include:

* How to build trust through relevance by drawing down on the insight from how brands such as Toyota (through Scion) have already achieved this. Also how brands can use simple metrics such as net promoter score and customer lifetime value to measure progress.
* How to be a remarkable youth brand (see Jones Soda)
* How to communicate directly with youth through their own channels (eg using Youtube rather than mass media and press releases (in this example we look at EA and the recent Tiger Woods “Jesus Shot” fiasco - which is also very funny)

“How Youth Culture Is Reinventing Capitalism”

Published by

Original source : http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Threebillion/~3/427…

View the video on Blinx/BBC website

Technorati Tags: mobile life report, youth handwriting, youth writing, josh dhaliwal, bbc

• Want to find out more in our global Youth Trends Report?
• Need powerpoint presentations on Youth Marketing and Mobile Trends?

The fitness landscape that determines success in marketing to young consumers
is changing. 10 years ago, the TV provided the de facto advertising
channel to win the hearts and minds of this often difficult to reach
demographic. Since 2007 alone, the rise of social networking, flat rate
data plans both on mobile and internet as well as a widespread growth
in niche media content means that marketers are now increasingly
challenged when it comes to both communicating with and understanding
youth.

Technorati Tags: mobile youth, mobileyouth, youth marketing, youth trends, marketing trends, youth mobile, graham brown, luke mitchell, reach students, student marketing, brands, youth brands

But fear not, because we bring you insight from two of the youth
marketing industry’s key commentators to shed some light on what’s hot
in 2008 when it comes to trends in youth marketing.

Graham Brown author of mobileYouth and Luke Mitchell from Reach Students bring you the 7 key youth marketing trends to look out for in 2008.

#1 “Free” is a viable business model

Given
the increasingly challenging task of reaching out to young consumers,
more brands consider the “free” route (eg ad supported or
cross-selling) as a viable alternative to paid downloads.

Recent
download data from NIN and Radiohead’s respective attempts at “pay what
you like” charging models demonstrates that allowing the consumer to
decide what value should be placed on the relationship and content can
be both profitable and a shrewd PR move.

But it’s not just
music artists trying to crack the “free” nut but delving deeper we find
well established brands from RyanAir to Google to Skype making money
out of young consumers by giving away goods and services others would
traditionally have paid for.

Blyk’s
attempt to crack the mobile industry nut claims that rather than bring
to the telecoms table yet another fledgling MVNO, the startup says the
operator’s position is a response to a market need - on the one hand
young consumers are keen to have subsidized phone bills and the other
we have a line of brands queueing up to build a dialogue with young
consumers.

Youth indifference may well prove to be a brand’s
most significant cost factor so offering a service for free with the
promise of cross-selling related services may well provide the first
tentative steps in addressing that challenge.

#2 Transparency

When
things go wrong, as they inevitably do, legal eagles compete with
internal marcomms departments to issue the highest volume of memos all
in the name of Brand IP and protecting corporate interest.

Some
of the more innovative brands, however, are going long on being
transparent about their values and mistakes when communicating with
youth. Household names such as Jet Blue, GAP, Starbucks are learning
the hard way that covering up no longer works and consumers, especially
the younger ones, warm to companies that admit their human fallacies.

Consumers
are tired of being both whitewashed and stonewalled. In an era when
youth expect access and brands are willing to provide it, the company
CEO that appears on YouTube confessing they’d “screwed up” may lose a
few investor friends, but wins the long term hearts and minds of the
consumer.

After all, he is like us - human. And people buy people, not brands.

#3 Facebook fatigue

It’s
now all about 30 somethings in the world of Facebook. Youth are already
exploring new avenues more relevant to their lifestyle - such as Bebo.
Do we yet have a student specific SNS?

MySpace’s partnership
with MTV to platform young musical talent from the social network is a
PR victory in the face of a Facebook population disillusioned with
their parents and corporates hijacking the party.

Back in the
80s, youth witnessed their parents squeezing into a pair of Levi’s
501s. No longer was the “original jean” cool because it failed to
evolve its consumer relevance in as much as SNS sites seek the latest
widget to keep themselves alive.

MySpace continues to thrive despite the naysayers, Facebook however is not the youth player it once was.

#4 The rise of the moderates

You
know that student activism is finally dead when even NUS suggests a
radical reform of its own organisation. It wants to move away from
discussing minority issues and global affairs, and instead reflect the
everyday interests of its members.

Individually, most students
have a moderate and parochial political outlook these days, more
concerned with the price of their Bacardi & Coke than any ethical
questions that may come served with it. But now this swell of moderate
opinion has become a determined movement.

Look out for a new generation of young leaders, keen to show the world how pragmatic they can be.

#5 “Inner circle” brands

Once
young consumers were thought to be naïve and persuadable. Then they
were savvy, fickle and cynical to brand messages. What followed was a
stalemate where wise brands and young consumers knew each others’ hands
and knew it would be foolish to pretend otherwise. Then things got
complex.

The
brands that are winning now have been allowed into a collective inner
circle, one where they carefully manage very sophisticated and very
considered relationships. Recent research by Opinionpanel discovered a
maximum of twenty brands that students were willing to be Facebook friends with. They included Sony, H&M, Apple and Innocent.

But
there is also space in the inner circle for maverick brands who don’t
give a damn for high-level marketing approaches. In convenience foods
this year, watch as sales of plain, honest and simple Pukka Pies rise,
while youth ‘try hards’ like Pot Noodle fall.

See how brands such as Scion and Red Bull are building relevance with youth in our Great Youth Brands series.

#6 It’s cool to be a suit

In the eyes of the young, businesspeople were once the least cool people in the world. Now it’s okay to want to be a suit.

Thanks
to Dragon’s Den, The Apprentice, a second wave of internet
entrepreneurs (spiritually led by youth icon Mark Zuckerberg), media
dramatisation of financial news and ever-increasing opportunities to
make money from your bedroom computer, business is somehow sexy.

Witness
the clamour of smart twenty-somethings trying to get in to London’s
must-see gig of last term. Not “Hot Chip” at the Electric Ballroom, but
investment bankers BNP Paribas at the LSE.

#7 Youth turn off the box

The
current generation of young consumers are perhaps the first that have
had real choice in their media consumption. TV, although remaining a
significant channel of influence in their lives, is increasingly being
squeezed out by other distractions. Facebook, MySpace, WII, homework,
after-scool activities, commuting and just good old “hanging out with
friends” compete with TV for youth attention.

And it’s not just
the decreasing time spent watching TV, it’s the quality of that time.
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 25% of high school students
were actively involved in another form of media (playstation, computer
etc) whilst “watching” TV. Add to that the increasing fragmentation of
media channels (MTV1, MTV2, MTVBase, MTVU etc) you find a situation
where advertisers can no longer identify clear front-runners for their
marketing spend.

About mobileYouth

(Graham
Brown) mobileYouth is a 7 year ongoing research project into how
technology such as mobile phones fits into the social universe of young
people. mobileYouth helps companies such as Vodafone and P&G
understand how to better develop and market youth products.
http://www.mobileYouth.org

About Reach Students

(Luke Mitchell) Reach Students is a digital marketing consultancy
focused on the intelligent youth audience. Recent clients include the
Cabinet Office, Cancer Research UK, Parcelforce Worldwide and the
University of Salford. It publishes case studies, resources and opinion
at http://www.reachstudents.co.uk and has been issuing its popular student marketing e-newsletter since 2002.

The following is an opinion piece edited by author Graham Brown

• Want to find out more in our global Youth Trends Report?
• Need powerpoint presentations on Youth Marketing and Mobile Trends?
  

The fitness landscape that determines success in marketing to young consumers is changing. 10 years ago, the TV provided the de facto advertising channel to win the hearts and minds of this often difficult to reach demographic. Since 2007 alone, the rise of social networking, flat rate data plans both on mobile and internet as well as a widespread growth in niche media content means that marketers are now increasingly challenged when it comes to both communicating with and understanding youth.

But fear not, because we bring you insight from two of the youth marketing industry’s key commentators to shed some light on what’s hot in 2008 when it comes to trends in youth marketing.

Graham Brown author of mobileYouth and Luke Mitchell from Reach Students bring you the 7 key youth marketing trends to look out for in 2008.

#1 “Free” is a viable business model

Given the increasingly challenging task of reaching out to young consumers, more brands consider the “free” route (eg ad supported or cross-selling) as a viable alternative to paid downloads.

Recent download data from NIN and Radiohead’s respective attempts at “pay what you like” charging models demonstrates that allowing the consumer to decide what value should be placed on the relationship and content can be both profitable and a shrewd PR move.

But it’s not just music artists trying to crack the “free” nut but delving deeper we find well established brands from RyanAir to Google to Skype making money out of young consumers by giving away goods and services others would traditionally have paid for.

Blyk’s attempt to crack the mobile industry nut claims that rather than bring to the telecoms table yet another fledgling MVNO, the startup says the operator’s position is a response to a market need - on the one hand young consumers are keen to have subsidized phone bills and the other we have a line of brands queueing up to build a dialogue with young consumers.

Youth indifference may well prove to be a brand’s most significant cost factor so offering a service for free with the promise of cross-selling related services may well provide the first tentative steps in addressing that challenge.

#2 Transparency

When things go wrong, as they inevitably do, legal eagles compete with internal marcomms departments to issue the highest volume of memos all in the name of Brand IP and protecting corporate interest.

Some of the more innovative brands, however, are going long on being transparent about their values and mistakes when communicating with youth. Household names such as Jet Blue, GAP, Starbucks are learning the hard way that covering up no longer works and consumers, especially the younger ones, warm to companies that admit their human fallacies.

Consumers are tired of being both whitewashed and stonewalled. In an era when youth expect access and brands are willing to provide it, the company CEO that appears on YouTube confessing they’d “screwed up” may lose a few investor friends, but wins the long term hearts and minds of the consumer.

After all, he is like us - human. And people buy people, not brands.

#3 Facebook fatigue

It’s now all about 30 somethings in the world of Facebook. Youth are already exploring new avenues more relevant to their lifestyle - such as Bebo. Do we yet have a student specific SNS?

MySpace’s partnership with MTV to platform young musical talent from the social network is a PR victory in the face of a Facebook population disillusioned with their parents and corporates hijacking the party.

Back in the 80s, youth witnessed their parents squeezing into a pair of Levi’s 501s. No longer was the “original jean” cool because it failed to evolve its consumer relevance in as much as SNS sites seek the latest widget to keep themselves alive.

MySpace continues to thrive despite the naysayers, Facebook however is not the youth player it once was.

#4 The rise of the moderates

You know that student activism is finally dead when even NUS suggests a radical reform of its own organisation. It wants to move away from discussing minority issues and global affairs, and instead reflect the everyday interests of its members.

Individually, most students have a moderate and parochial political outlook these days, more concerned with the price of their Bacardi & Coke than any ethical questions that may come served with it. But now this swell of moderate opinion has become a determined movement.

Look out for a new generation of young leaders, keen to show the world how pragmatic they can be.

#5 “Inner circle” brands

Once young consumers were thought to be naïve and persuadable. Then they were savvy, fickle and cynical to brand messages. What followed was a stalemate where wise brands and young consumers knew each others’ hands and knew it would be foolish to pretend otherwise. Then things got complex.

The brands that are winning now have been allowed into a collective inner circle, one where they carefully manage very sophisticated and very considered relationships. Recent research by Opinionpanel discovered a maximum of twenty brands that students were willing to be Facebook friends with. They included Sony, H&M, Apple and Innocent.

But there is also space in the inner circle for maverick brands who don’t give a damn for high-level marketing approaches. In convenience foods this year, watch as sales of plain, honest and simple Pukka Pies rise, while youth ‘try hards’ like Pot Noodle fall.

See how brands such as Scion and Red Bull are building relevance with youth in our Great Youth Brands series.

#6 It’s cool to be a suit

In the eyes of the young, businesspeople were once the least cool people in the world. Now it’s okay to want to be a suit.

Thanks to Dragon’s Den, The Apprentice, a second wave of internet entrepreneurs (spiritually led by youth icon Mark Zuckerberg), media dramatisation of financial news and ever-increasing opportunities to make money from your bedroom computer, business is somehow sexy.

Witness the clamour of smart twenty-somethings trying to get in to London’s must-see gig of last term. Not “Hot Chip” at the Electric Ballroom, but investment bankers BNP Paribas at the LSE.

#7 Youth turn off the box

The current generation of young consumers are perhaps the first that have had real choice in their media consumption. TV, although remaining a significant channel of influence in their lives, is increasingly being squeezed out by other distractions. Facebook, MySpace, WII, homework, after-scool activities, commuting and just good old “hanging out with friends” compete with TV for youth attention.

And it’s not just the decreasing time spent watching TV, it’s the quality of that time. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 25% of high school students were actively involved in another form of media (playstation, computer etc) whilst “watching” TV. Add to that the increasing fragmentation of media channels (MTV1, MTV2, MTVBase, MTVU etc) you find a situation where advertisers can no longer identify clear front-runners for their marketing spend.

About mobileYouth

(Graham Brown) mobileYouth is a 7 year ongoing research project into how technology such as mobile phones fits into the social universe of young people. mobileYouth helps companies such as Vodafone and P&G understand how to better develop and market youth products.
http://www.mobileYouth.org

About Reach Students

(Luke Mitchell) Reach Students is a digital marketing consultancy focused on the intelligent youth audience. Recent clients include the Cabinet Office, Cancer Research UK, Parcelforce Worldwide and the University of Salford. It publishes case studies, resources and opinion at http://www.reachstudents.co.uk and has been issuing its popular student marketing e-newsletter since 2002.

Technorati Tags: mobile yout, mobileyouth, youth marketing, youth trends, marketing trends, youth mobile, graham brown, luke mitchell, reach students, student marketing, brands, youth brands

* What do youth want from and think of their operators?
* Youth loyalty & churn (leading to Net Promoter Score)
* Trust Measurement as impact on Profitability
* Next Generation Brands (Red Bull, Jones Soda, EA, Scion etc)

Here’s the download for my (Graham Brown) presentation to Telenor Djuice in Oslo, October 2008 at the Djuice brand summit.

Technorati Tags: telenor, djuice, youth, mobileyouth, mobile youth, mobile youth report, youth marketing, youth research, net promoter score, churn, youth loyalty, crm, red bull, jones soda, EA, scion, graham brown

Presentation

Summary of my Understanding Mobile Youth Workshop @ The Prepaid Mobile Summit IIR 22-25 September 2008 in Prague.

Mobile Youth Workshop Q3 2008

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: mobile youth)

Note contains video not available on Powerpoint. MobileYouthNet to view on the street videos in full.

powerpoint, presentation, youth, marketing, download