The New Global Teen Customer: Well Connected and Tough To Reach

Energy BBDO just released a new GenWorld global teen study (PDF here). It reveals some fascinating insights into the present generation of teens. Here are a few highlights:

• These kids are connected to each other and the world. As the report says, “They are hyper-informed. In the developed and developing world, this age group is regularly involved in at least a couple of the following activities: talking on a cell phone, text messaging, going online, using search engines, email and IM.
• They engage in regular family communication, but they are also part of larger social networks that are enabled by the activities above. Adults are often unaware of just how broad and deep these networks might be.

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More On The Movie Theater Industry

The movie theater industry is facing a big challenge from big-screen in-home TVs, DVDs, IPTV and social trends. It was explored previously here and here. A CNET story yesterday shed more light on the obstacles facing theaters. The CNET article draws a parallel between the movie industry and those issues that have fundamentally changed the music industry.

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Precious Time

Technology, relative prosperity and human inventiveness have given many people in this world a fast-growing and diverse array of options regarding how and where to interact with media. Choices seem to expand at an accelerated rate, yet the time available to take advantage of this panoply remains constant. We all have 24 x 7 x 365 x whatever. Media options will continue to proliferate; available time will remain fixed. Our time is defined by our biology, and further constrained by the spin and orbit of our planet that defines our clocks and calendars. We all consume, in one fashion or another, every second that is available.

What media choices were available a generation ago?

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Just Push The Easy Button

The Staples ”Easy Button” advertising campaign is one of those rare pieces of communication that works itself into the public vernacular.  It reminds me of Wendy’s “Where’s the Beef?” slogan with Clara Peller back in the ‘80s. That line even found its way into the presidential campaign of Walter “Fritz” Mondale.

It’s human nature for people to want the easy button. These days I know plenty of marketing people who would like to have one. There’s all that competition out there.  You have CEOs, CFOs and boards of directors asking for accountability in marketing. There are time-crunched, empowered consumers ready and enabled to ignore or avert boring, irrelevant messages. You can hear the marketer’s cry, “Hey, this is tough...let’s just push the easy button.”

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Knowledge Wants To Be Free

Amazing things happen when technology empowers people to set knowledge free.  For the set-up question check Seth Godin’s short post here.

Here’s the answer.

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