Advertise To A Millennial Part 2

Hide The Ads

From my first post we learned that the millennial generation is not watching your expensive commercials. So how must advertisers work around this? Well us millennials are still watching the content, we just happen to be skipping the commercials. This is why I suggest the use of branded content. When branded content is used correctly, the product or service becomes the star of the show.

What do Nicki Minaj, Robin Thicke, and Miley Cyrus all have in common? (Besides being incredibly annoying). They each have a music video that features the Beats Pill. The Beats Pill is a portable speaker that has been appearing in pretty much every music video. Although the speaker itself has been taking heat for its technological flaws, the placement of the product into music videos is genius. It hits the target market of the young music lovers who are clearly watching music videos on a phone, tablet, or computer.

Invite Your Brand To The Party

Our generation enjoys free will; we do not wish to have your advertisements pushed in our face. We don’t want you wasting our time. We want the option to approach your brand when we want. We enjoy when your brand has a booth at an event we are attending. Whether it’s a baseball game, street fair, or music festival. We enjoy walking up to your booth. Make your booth memorable! Supply us with samples, deals, promotional freebies, and information about your company with a smile. This can be an especially vital technique for up and coming brands, because this will allow your brand to interact face-to-face with potential customers.

How Do You Build Trust With Us?

Millennials are thought to not research a product or service before committing to purchase, however research has proven that this is not true. So the question is how does a company gain the trust of a millennial. Millennials want to be shown that the company isn’t a money hungry giant. That they aren’t just trying to sell their product or service, that they are actually making a change in the world.

Millennials trust their friends and family over anyone else, and because they have grown up in such a technologically rich world they are open to sharing information online. This is why everything your company posts should be creative, relevant, and share-worthy!

Millennials are also more open to seeing other people’s experience with the product or service, rather than merely seeing an advertisement. A great example of this would be Canon’s “Bring It” campaign. This campaign encouraged photographers to take pictures using their Canon Cameras and submit the content to then be posted on the Canon website. This showed potential customers the amazing things you can do with a Canon Camera. Campaigns such as these allow the consumers to create the advertising for your company!

Why Do We Like The Brands We Like?

I interviewed ten people ages 21-25, asking what drives you to like a brand. The main responses were the price, quality, and humor. Humor? Yes that’s right millennials enjoy companies that have a humorous side. A company that excels at this is Jack in The Box. Jack in The Box has a humorous brand personality from their commercials and radio spots, to how they interact on social media.

Now, I’m not saying that all companies will succeed with a humorous brand personality. Higher end companies such as Louis Vuitton would deteriorate the quality of their image by doing so. However it’s not like us millennials can afford luxury brands like that. We are having a hard enough time paying off our student loans and attempting to move out of Mom’s house. Companies like Dos Equis, Charmin, and Old Spice all have successful humorous brand personalities.

Marketing to millennials is all about brand image. Whether it’s making your company the star of the show, increasing the funny factor, or meeting face to face with potential customers. Make sure that your brand is one that millennials would be proud to associate with.