While we at YMC most often focus on engaging with the high school to post-college set — those often called Generation Y — we’re always looking for insights about the generation behind them, the so-called Gen-Z-ers. According to demographers (and the legions of youth culture bloggers), Gen Z covers those born between roughly 1992 and 2010. If you want a (very brief) but insightful look into what this up-and-coming generation of consumers think about television, check out this video from Dave Knox at Hard Knox Life. In about 45 seconds it demonstrates that TV’s pop-culture reign may not be indefinite…
Those of you that don’t already subscribe are going to want to sprint to your nearest retailer of fine periodicals and purchase the latest copy of Event Marketer Magazine. In addition to its regular mix of cogent analysis, industry news and silky-smooth photography, there’s an outstanding profile of three of our Spring Break campaigns (which are rolling out as we speak).
That’s right, we’re kind of a big deal. The press can’t get enough of us.
The article, entitled “Playing It Safe,” highlights three of our largest Spring Break brands — MTV, Rockstar and Fuze — and notes that those brands see experiential marketing in tried-and-true Spring Break hotspots as the surest way to connect with Gen-Y. Especially when marketing budgets are lean. The moral of the story is simple: for youth-targeted brands, Spring Break is a nearly unmatched opportunity. Not only does it provide a chance to market to millions — literally millions — of college students, but those that travel to Spring Break destinations tend to be influencers on campus. You’re not just reaching college students — you’re reaching the college students that set the tone for youth culture in general.
To read the article in it’s entirety, either swing by your local newsstand, or go to Event Marketer Magazine online to get the details on our campaigns for Rockstar and Fuze. To whet your appetite, here’s an excerpt:
Branching out from its niche on the West Coast, ROCKSTAR now has college brand ambassadors in 75 schools nationwide. The ambassadors are actual students (keeping the peer-to-peer buzz authentic) that ROCKSTAR, via Youth Marketing Connection’s brand ambassador program, selects to spread the word about the brand on campus. ROCKSTAR brand ambassadors in key colleges and universities receive 20 cases of the product each month as well as premiums to distribute to fellow students at parties, study breaks and other campus activities.
Brand ambassadors post ROCKSTAR content and photos on a Facebook page to get the word out virally. When spring break comes around, ROCKSTAR makes sure its top performing brand ambassadors get the rock star treatment in time-tested locales like Cancun and Acapulco.
“You have to look at spring break as one aspect for a brand in terms of collegiate marketing,” says Frank Guernesey, vp-marketing at ROCKSTAR. “It’s generally a highlight for most students in the course of their year, and it seems to me that the numbers really aren’t that far off than they have been in the past, making Cancun and Acapulco still relevant.”
Part of the rock star experience includes express check-in at the hotel and VIP express entrance to the best bars and clubs for the brand ambassador plus one guest. (At spring break, where lines are long to get into coveted clubs, this perk is priceless.) The brand ambassador and their guests are directed to a ROCKSTAR VIP area with private waiter service. They also have special access to A-list performers. ROCKSTAR culminates its VIP treatment with an exclusive dinner.
During the day, ROCKSTAR hangs out at the pool and beach with the crowds. It has a branded stage on which it runs contests daily and sends out waiters to give out the product chilled in branded mini coolers. The goal is to have its brand ambassadors and their guests get back to campus and tell their network of friends all about ROCKSTAR. Last year, the brand distributed 250,000 cans of product on campuses and at Spring Break, and gained 40,000 Facebook friends.
This is going to be an unusually short post (as it’s nearly midnight and youth marketers need their beauty sleep, too), but I wanted to note that Skittles is now forwarding to Wikipedia. For those keeping score, that means Skittles’ homepage on Tuesday was Twitter, Wednesday was Facebook, and Thursday is devoted to Wikipedia. (One can only guess that YouTube is on tap for Friday.) I think this confirms that yesterday’s move by Skittles to redirect their website to Facebook was not, as some claimed, a response to the occasional foul language that appeared on the Twitter feed, but a calculated decision to ride the buzz wave. (It remains to be seen if pointing their homepage towards Wikipedia is good enough for another day of news.) I said it yesterday, and I’ll say it again: I think this represents a bold and well-executed embrace of social media by Skittles. Will it reap long-lasting benefits? No, not necessarily. But it certainly got us talking. Just do a Google Blog search for “skittles” and you’ll see what I mean.
(While we’re on the topic of Google searches, I would also suggest doing a Google News search for coverage of the Skittles campaign. I was surprised to find that “traditional media” was really quiet on the topic. There were a few articles — one in The Wall Street Journal, for instance — but they essentially stopped paying attention after the Twitter-linked version of the site went live. This is definitely one of those stories where blogs are hands-down doing it best. I haven’t found a single “real” news story mentioning the move by Skittles from Facebook to Wikipedia.)
For those of you who are just stumbling upon this now, check out our posts about the Skittles social media campaign from Tuesday and Wednesday which provide background and (in our humble opinion) some analysis worth reading about the implications for youth marketing and the Gen-Y set. Oh, and as always, let us know what you think about this new development. You’re going right now to write on Skittles’ Wikipedia page, aren’t you?
Another day, another development in the much-discussed Skittles campaign put together by the globe-spanning Agency.com. (For those of you who need to get up to speed, check out yesterday’s post which details its roots.) Today, when I directed my web browser towards www.skittles.com, I was expecting to see the Twitter feed that has garnered so much attention. Instead, gone was the Twitter feed, and in its place appears Skittles’ Facebook fan page.
Some have suggested that this redirection towards Facebook was a result of some nasty comments that found their way into the Twitter stream. Other marketing wisemen and wisewoman (YMC included) see this as a well-timed move to keep the buzz machine rolling. Remaking your homepage in the form of a Twitter stream is innovative, but the shock value is short lived. By transforming the campaign just a few days in, Skittles is maximizing the media attention. If they made the change three weeks from now, once everyone (and their marketing-savy mother) had heard about the campaign, we would all respond with a collective shrug. Oh, neat. But by making a radical shift in the middle of the media frenzy, they guarantee another round of articles and blog posts (not unlike this one) calling out the campaign and sparking new discussion. And even the dissent, and their has been a fair amount of it bubbling up around the blogs, is ultimately a win. People (just like us) are engaging in a lively chat — and Skittles is undeniably at the center of it.
It’s worth mentioning a word about the implications of the Facebook specific strategy, as well. As of this writing, the Skittles fan page has 588,466 Facebook users that have signed up to be “fans” of the brand. Just like that, Skittles has half a million (likely majority Gen-Y) Facebookers, which they can reach out to in a number of interesting ways. A few months from now, I would not be surprised to see Skittles leverage that fan group to create some attention-getting digital campaigns that allow users to interact with the brand. (Think along the lines of Burger King’s Facebook campaign.)
And, mark my words, that fan page is going to be three times larger before this story has died down. Because remember: every time a Facebook user joins the fan page, their decision to join that group is reported in their “News Feed.” While this may sound insignificant to those who don’t live this stuff everyday, the implications are huge. Presence in their personal News Feed means that all of their friends have a chance to see that they’ve joined, and many will, at the very least, check it out for themselves. This is why Facebook is so powerful. It combines the viral power of the internet with what is essentially peer-to-peer marketing.
What are your thoughts on the new developments? I think I’m going to go grab a bag of some delicious rainbow-colored candy.
Before we begin in earnest, a quick note about the weather: if you’re an East Coaster, you know that this weekend was a godsend — a brief and otherworldly reprieve from winter. Those of us at the Washington, DC, office enjoyed weather in the low 60s, and this week promises to bring highs near 70. (Those stuck in YMC’s Boston headquarters have been less lucky. Sorry guys.) All of this is a reminder that Spring Break is fast approaching. It’s probably time to cut back on the calories and start shopping for those new swim trunks. (And if you’ll allow me a brief and shameless plug, I might add that if you’re a brand, and you’re interested in a Spring Break experiential marketing campaign, the time to act is now. We’re only weeks away from kicking off the Spring Break season, and these campaigns don’t build themselves!)
In non-weather news, our friends at YPulse share some hard data on the growing trends towards social media marketing for major American brands. While this shift towards social media marketing has been well documented, it doesn’t make the numbers any less striking. Consider how far social media has come: just a handful of years ago, blogs were seen as the preserve of political obsessives, tech fanatics and live-journaling teens. Fast forward to 2009, and 39 percent of 500 Inc. companies and 13 percent of Fortune 500 companies have an officially sanctioned and regularly updated corporate blog. (What I haven’t found, thus far, is a complete list which corporations are blogging. If anyone out there has a definitive list, I’d surely be interested in seeing it!)
More interestingly, though, for those of us who spend our time marketing to Millenials: American colleges are leading the way in social media communication. This likely doesn’t come as a huge shock to most of you. According to a recent survey, 41 percent of colleges have a blog, and 48 percent of colleges are maintaining a video blog. In total, 86 percent of college admission programs are using some form of social media. Scan through the whole study, found here, to see changes that have taken place in social media usage between 2007 and 2008 alone. For those who get turned off by charts and graphs and terse academic prose, the main take-away is simple: more school are using more forms of social media to reach out to students than ever before. And, more and more, they’re doing it in a way that’s true to YMC’s model of “engaging and authentic”: unlike in years past, more schools are allowing comments on their blogs. In short, they’re seeking to begin a conversation with students and potential students — they’re not just talking at them. And that, after all, is the magic ingredient in effective youth marketing. If you can create an interactive experience — be it physical or digital — that allows Millenials to engage with a brand in an authentic fashion, you’re going to be successful.
