Teenage Brains Although you know your teenager takes some chances, it can be a shock to hear about them. One fine May morning not long ago my oldest son, 17 at the time, phoned to tell me that he had just spent a couple hours at the state police barracks. Apparently he had been driving "a little fast." What, I asked, was "a little fast"? "That's more than a little fast," I said. He agreed. He did, however, object to one thing. "Well," I huffed, sensing an opportunity to finally yell at him, "what would you call it?" "It's just not accurate," he said calmly. " 'Reckless' sounds like you're not paying attention. "I guess that's what I want you to know. Actually, it did make me feel better. My son's high-speed adventure raised the question long asked by people who have pondered the class of humans we call teenagers: What on Earth was he doing? Through the ages, most answers have cited dark forces that uniquely affect the teen. Ten-year-olds stink at it, failing about 45 percent of the time.
McCann on Millennials, Social Media, and Brands Call them the FB generation. McCann Worldgroup’s newly completed global survey “The Truth About Youth,” which polled 16-to-30-year-olds, concludes that millennials live in a new “social economy” in which the power of sharing and recommending brands cannot be overstated. (Past generations defined themselves by material possessions or experiences.) This group, according to the study, lives outloud, emphasizing public self-definition, life narration, and broadcasting via blogging platforms, digital cameras, and cheap editing and design software. In the words of one study respondent: “If there are no pics, it didn’t happen.” McCann also found that respondents in Brazil, China, and India, where emerging consumers are forging fledgling brand loyalties, feel most strongly about telling friends about brands they like. The agency’s takeaway: Brands should follow the top five traits young people said they look for in their social friends. The biggest mistake marketers make?
What Makes Millennials Happy? As if life weren't complicated enough in an era of technological and economic flux, today's 18-25-year-olds must also cope with unpredictable shifts in gender roles. It's one aspect of the culture wars in which no one is granted the safety of non-combatant status. However, a newly released survey of millennial-generation adults by Euro RSCG makes it clear that the tensions don't reliably play out the way you might guess. And the attitudes of young-adult women differ significantly from those in evidence a couple decades ago amid a more us-against-them phase of feminism. The survey finds female respondents (and many of their male counterparts) taking it as a non-negotiable given that women's role as the "second sex" is a thing of the past. Women who wish for a persistence (or revival) of such distinctions ought to be pleased by many findings of the survey, which found plenty of differences in the attitudes of American millennial women and men. Continue to next page →
McCann Worldgroup - Truth About Youth Millennials will benefit and suffer due to their hyperconnected lives Overview of responses In a survey about the future of the internet, technology experts and stakeholders were fairly evenly split as to whether the younger generation’s always-on connection to people and information will turn out to be a net positive or a net negative by 2020. They said many of the young people growing up hyperconnected to each other and the mobile Web and counting on the internet as their external brain will be nimble, quick-acting multitaskers who will do well in key respects. At the same time, these experts predicted that the impact of networked living on today’s young will drive them to thirst for instant gratification, settle for quick choices, and lack patience. A number of the survey respondents argued that it is vital to reform education and emphasize digital literacy. These findings come from an opt-in, online survey of a diverse but non-random sample of 1,021 technology stakeholders and critics. Here is a sampling of their predictions and arguments:
The Fear Factor One of us: Microsoft anthropologist Danah Boyd gives a lecture in Australia on teenage Internet behavior. Are young people different because of technology? Microsoft senior researcher Danah Boyd says not so much. Adults worry about what young people get up to on the Internet, but Boyd says what happens there is no more than the usual coming-of-age stories about socializing, sex, experimentation—only now those stories are being written on the Web. Businesses see young people through a similarly clouded lens, says Boyd, who has been hailed as the first anthropologist who is a member of very Internet tribe that she studies (she graduated from high school in 1996). Like any other workaholic Internet commentator, Boyd herself is overconnected and overcommitted. TR: What do businesses want to know most about young people today? Boyd: Companies both fetishize youth and are condescending toward them. What are the questions businesses should be asking?
Millennial Consumers: Engaged, Optimistic, Charitable [STUDY] A study comparing Millennials with non-Millennials sheds light on some of the key behaviors and attitudes of the generation. Currently numbered at 79 million — and growing in influence — Millennials are expected to outnumber the Baby Boomer population 78 million to 56 million by 2030. The Boston Consulting Group recently surveyed 4,000 Millennials aged 16 to 34, as well as 1,000 non-Millennials aged 35 to 40. Here's a summary of the key takeaways of the survey, and what marketers and companies need to keep in mind as the generation continues to become more dominant. Millennials are actively engaged in consuming and influencing In contrast to the stereotypical view that they are lazy and entitled, Millennials are extremely optimistic about the ability of business and government to influence global change. Millennials are also more likely than their non-Millennial counterparts to broadcast their thoughts and experiences online, and to contribute their views to user-generated content.
The Millennial Consumer Move aside, U.S. baby boomers. The Millennial generation is bigger than you and growing in influence. (See Exhibit 1.) Now numbering 79 million (compared with the boomers’ 76 million), U.S. Millennials—people between the ages of 16 and 34—have been the subject of abundant analysis and commentary, mostly revolving around their avid use of technology, changing media-consumption habits, and entry into the workforce. Less has been written about Millennials as consumers. Millennials’ expectations are different from those of previous generations, and companies will need to rethink their brands, business models, and marketing accordingly. Although the youngest members of the Millennial generation are still economically dependent on Mom and Dad, older Millennials are beginning to enter their peak spending years. The first of two reports, this overview of Millennial consumers explores who they are today and what they think of themselves and the world around them.