How to Market to the Millennial Generation

By Maria Valdez Haubrich

Is your business marketing to young adults? If not, maybe it’s time to start. Why? Because the Millennials (sometimes called Generation Y or Echo Boomers) is bigger than the Baby Boom generation was. For anyone who knows what kind of spending power the Baby Boomers had (and continue to have), the reasons to target Millennials should now be abundantly clear.

A recent study from Barkley, Service Management Group and The Boston Consulting Group, American Millennials, has some useful information about this vast and potentially profitable pool of consumers. Here’s some of what they found:

Millennials are socially conscious. Twenty-six percent of them (compared to 9 percent of non-Millennials) are aware of cause marketing campaigns. That means getting involved with a cause that’s authentic for your business can be a great way to appeal to them.

Millennials love their mobile devices. In particular, they’re taking to mobile shopping, and 50 percent of them (compared to 21 percent of non-Millennials) will research products on their smartphones while shopping. Make sure your business has a presence on the mobile Web.

Millennials don’t watch TV. Well, they do—just not on TV. Some 42 percent watch TV shows on their computers, 40 percent use DVR and 26 percent use On-Demand services. The good news for small businesses is that instead of spending on pricey TV air time, you can focus on online advertising or other, less expensive ways of getting your brand online. Consider social media: Since many Milllennials watch TV while checking out Twitter or Facebook, this is a good way to get your message in front of them for free.

Millennials care about fashion. What’s more, they want your salespeople to care about it too. If you sell clothing or accessories, your store clerks need to be wearing the gear. If your salespeople aren’t fashionable, Millennials will pass the store by. No matter what you sell, this means your front-line employees need to embody your brand.

Millennials operate in groups. More than other age groups, Millennials like to shop with friends or family members in tow. And even when their friends aren’t physically around, Millennials use technology and social media to get instant feedback and opinions from their social circle on what to buy, eat or do.

Image by Flickr user Mike Adams (Creative Commons)

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 3rd, 2011 at 6:00 am and is filed under Generational Marketing, Marketing, Small Business, small business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.


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