The next best thing to finding the elixir of eternal youth is to figure out how the young work. For marketers keen to capture a committed audience, millennials represent the ultimate prize: engaged with the world, earning money, eager to spend it.
But what if millennials weren’t all the same? What if they didn’t all have the same viewing habits, beliefs or preferences, like we’ve been told they do?
One of the gifts of data-driven marketing is the freedom to reject common stereotypes. And as it turns out, millennials aren’t all self-interested social media slaves who think all advertising is evil. They also hate being bunched together into a single group.
To respect your audience, you first have to know them. So let’s dispel some misconceptions about this all-important tribe courtesy of Yume’s new report, “Millennials: Evolved,” drawn from a survey about millennials’ relationship with advertising.
Millennials enjoy doing what other human beings do, and that includes sitting on the couch watching TV. In fact, millennials are more likely than older generations to watch TV shows—though less likely to get those TV shows via cable. And their attention spans aren’t short. On the contrary, long-form television keeps them rapt.
Some may say, millennials are young and young people are spontaneous. Therefore, millennials are spontaneous. This might seem logical, but it’s wrong. Millennials think carefully about where they spend their money and are willing to put in the research before buying. In fact, they’re more likely than the average shopper to consult reviews. But when they do splurge, they spend big—whether they can afford to or not.
The stereotype is that millennials are a chattering class who spend their days in front of screens multitasking via obscure emojis, but they actually crave real-life interactions, believe it or not. Tech-Savvy Savants, singled out in the report as one major core group of millennials, keep up their strong social connections primarily by face-to-face interaction, rather than on social networks. Another group was twice as likely as the average person to say their peers have the largest influence on their purchasing decisions.
Brands increasingly think that they have to compete on price because of the internet. But millennials do indeed have morals and loyalty. They’re more likely than the general population to agree that they’re loyal to certain brands and stores, and their purchases can more readily be swayed by how closely a brand’s politics and values match their own.
Ad blocker adoption continues to rise as millennials take the blame, but hold up a moment: Millennials are happy to watch video ads that are likely to better inform purchasing decisions. In fact, for a generation supposedly dead-set against all forms of advertising, they’re surprisingly welcoming of it: Over a third of Tech Savvy Savants say they enjoy commercials. And if you win them over, you can reap the benefits. Cross-training Cord Cutters, another subsection from the report, are twice as likely not just to click a link, but also to share it.
Whatsapp, Viber, Instagram, Snapchat: The list of platforms, websites and apps where brands have to capture the all-important millennial eyeballs has become as long and mind-numbing as a good old TPS Report. In reality not all millennials are digital omnivores. While older millennials, aged 25–34, tend to be on every platform going, younger millennials are more discerning, dropping out of Whatsapp entirely in favor of more niche services that suit their needs. Spending a marketing budget with similar sense can pay dividends.
