I’m a millennial and I don’t understand marketing’s millennial obsession
In this guest post, John Dawson believes brands should remove their myopia when it comes to millennials.
If you’re in media, advertising or communications, it can often seem as though there is no one alive over the age of 35. No one.
The only people that are still alive on Earth are 18–35 year olds… it’s their [our?] planet now… they are the millennials (that name has such an iRobot feel about it, as though they can only see through a snapchat lens and talk with bots while living in a VR world).
As some context, I recently spent two weeks in New York for the NewFronts where the biggest digital publishers in the world present their annual strategy to advertisers in the hope of luring their media spend. What became clear very quickly was the all-encompassing emphasis on millennials. It was a race to see how quickly and how often a company could mention the word and ‘own the demographic.’
The way that everyone talks about these ‘millennials’ is as though they are some sort of new species that have been bred to bring about the death of the economic system, not through revolution like previous generations but through ad avoidance.
I’m waiting for the headline: “We’ve found one. A millennial. Now on exhibit at the Natural History Museum.” Because it does feel as though the entire industry is focused on the hunt for this audience above all others, as though their value to advertisers and media companies trumps all others… I’m not convinced by this.
But it’s easy to see how we’ve come to this point. In the world of thumb-stopping headlines, everything is either absolutely incredible or entirely fucked (especially in trade press). You either get millennials or your brand has no future… I don’t think this hyperbole is beneficial for anyone.
I believe the millennial obsession is a distraction for many businesses. I also think that this obsession plays into the hands of the biggest digital media players. Instead of dealing with fundamental changes to their operating conditions that affect their entire audience, many media companies are busy chasing their youngest (and not necessarily most valuable) with the blinkers on.
But am I just losing my mind? Am I just a hysterical millennial? Well let’s look at the data.
First, references to millennials have had an enormous rise. Yes, that is to be expected as the word is coined, and the generation comes into its own, but the velocity of the rise suggests mass proliferation of the term across culture which disproportionately affects the communication industry’s perception of the demo.
And then, onto search. Again, huge growth in the last two years which isn’t surprising.
But look where that interest is coming from… advertising, tech and political hubs of the US. Millennials is a fascination that fuels itself.
Anyway, what is the reality in Australia? Again, let’s turn to the data. Very easy to see what the make up of the country is from 1971–2015. The country grew from 13.1 million to 23.8 million at an average rate of 1.37% per annum.
What gets interesting is looking at population growth with demo’s broken out as a percentage of the total population.
The biggest growth in demographic composition?
As you’d expect from a mature economy, there’s been an explosion in the ‘old’ (no offence).
I’m not trying to suggest that millennials do not matter — for some brands they are the most important audience for their business. But what I do believe is that the obsession that we have with this demo above all others is detrimental.
In a time of huge change in the communication’s landscape and immense media fragmentation, it’s easy to preference technology over the consumer. Change is new, shiny, attractive but can be distracting.
What we must do in the marketing profession is keep our focus on people. The people who buy our products and build our businesses. The people who we must connect with in the same way as we have always done — through emotion and story.
John Dawson is a strategist at Mindshare and will be appearing co-moderating How to Make A Career Out of Ideas at Vivid Ideas on Sunday May 29th. More details here.
Firstly, “in the world of thumb-stopping headlines, everything is either absolutely incredible or entirely fucked” – LOL!
Secondly, millennials are broke and baby boomers are the richest generation ever! I’m going after Saga Holidays and Tena Lady as clients!!
ReplyBob Hoffman’s been banging on about this for years…no difference.
It’s as if millennials are the only ones who use smartphones…
As an aside, they seem to be the only ones who use them while walking on the road, and the subways, eating and taking a shit.
ReplyIn the late 90s, Singtel was so obsessed with cultivating a ‘young’ brand, they created a youth brand and even bought in Virgin Mobile.
ReplyJust because a demographic exists and ad agencies produce fancy powerpoints to make them the next growth segment doesn’t mean there’s any money in them.
If they were that viable, singtel’s youth brand and virgin mobile would still be in Singapore.
They lost millions in search of a mythical segment experts said existed.
nothing really insightful about the article unfortunately, it’s what most people have been saying since the “millennial” terminology was born.
Reply@Hmmmm – As opposed to your deeply insightful comment? Thanks, but if “most people” had been saying this since the terminology was born then I, and the rest of my colleagues on here, wouldn’t have had to sit through so many presentations and roundtables over the last 5 years about millennials. This article is a reaction to the fact that most of the industry has done little else but talk about millennials since the terminology was born.
ReplySuperbly put – John Dawson, you make us think!
ReplyWilly Sutton had the right idea about targeting.
ReplyWhen he was asked “Why do you rob banks?” he answered ‘Because that’s where the money is”.
For some industries, millennials are the banks.
ReplyFor others, millennials are just piggy banks.
“I’m not trying to suggest that millennials do not matter — for some brands they are the most important audience for their business. But what I do believe is that the obsession that we have with this demo above all others is detrimental”
That sounds like an eminently sensible perspective, backed with some interesting data. All of which makes for a nice, readable, informative post. Well done, John Dawson.
ReplyHave your say