Let’s get introductions and pleasantries out of the way. Please let me introduce you to the Millennial’s …. aka Generation Y, Net Generation, Echo Boomers, Generation Next, MTV Generation, Facebook Generation. The term most associated with Millennial’s is Gen Y. Gen Y is the offspring of Gen X, both literally and figuratively. Born between 1982-1995, Gen Y’ers are the kiddos that grew up with the internet. The Millennial’s are coming is a video everyone should watch. So it all stands to reason that video would be the perfect portal to their pocket (PPttP).
Businesses and brands are needing to find new and creative ways to engage consumers. Eyes and views are great numbers to boast. But does it actually translate to sales? The most recent example is the Old Spice Guy and the tactics they used to reach consumers. It was innovative, extremely personable and highly effective. Effective in what sense though? The amount of engagement and viewership they received on a national level was a press number that would have been in the millions. That free press worth millions did not translate to direct sales of product though. And thus the true million dollar question rears it’s ugly head: how do you utilize video to make viewership convert to sales?
eMarketer ran a story today about how Evenflo is utilizing online/web marketing to reach and engage millennial parents with a campaign called “The Savvy Parent’s Guide”. Here are some quotes from that piece and Chris Craig, the CMO of Evenflo:
“Webisodes are perfect for an online and social-media-driven campaign. They are conversation starters online and off.”
“Our objective is to find millennial parents where they want to be found, where they expect to be found and engage them the way they expect to be engaged.”
Online marketing done right can be immensely effective. Understanding each medium in which the message is delivered is a key differentiator when marketing a product or company within the social networking and/or social online space. KPI (key performance indicators) for the likes of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter are all going to be different. You need to mimic the mannerisms of those who have been successful in a particular space, because you can quickly save time, money and avoid failures by allowing the path laid by those early adopter companies to show you the road map. This doesn’t guarantee likened success rates, ROI or even clicks — but it allows for the barrier to entry to be lessened.
Here are five quick tips to make put yourself in front of millennial’s with video:
1) Keep video’s short
- 30 seconds for anything entertainment focused
- 2-3 minutes if explaining a product
2) Overload video with value add
- With a video you give me the option of returning whenever I want, and watching — not having to read something.
- The questions that I would call and talk to Suzzie in Bangladesh about your product or website, you can have Sarah from New York explain in a video
3) They are savvy, they can find anything on the internet, so appeal to their taste buds
- Whether it’s YouTube real, Facebook friendly, TMZ shocking, Twitter quick, or Maxium sexy — hit at least ONE of those tastes
- Use what sells to your advantage or someone else will
4) Keep the video as interactive and current as possible
- This is the real-time generation, I expect you to be in the know
- If the news story is fresh in my mind, it increases the likelihood I run out the door and purchase that day
5) Give them the power to share
- Make your video easily shared across my entire social sphere
- Rewards for sharing give you phenomenal staying power
Engagement is a word that gets thrown around like a football amongst industry experts. However it can be boiled down to this simple philosophy: make it something that matters to me, and let me share it with everyone I know. Anything above and beyond that is just retainer-talk from people giving you advice. They make a living off of over-talking the simplest of things because that is the job of validating yourself to new or current clients. We are heading into a more results driven online world. As the power of the share explodes, click-through-rates and eyes start to become second fiddle. Harnessing the consumer to do the “work” for you is free marketing that isn’t quantified by any of the current metrics available. Video is the portal to the millennial’s pockets — and your ROI is the free marketing you receive with a few simple clicks on their end. That’s double-dipping. But the good kind.
About Ryan Cox
