Raising Funds for Japan

Taking advantage of our extensive UK network, Youth Media got on board with current efforts around the world to assist in raising funds for tsunami-stricken Japan. Designers gave up their time at no cost to produce poignant messages encouraging students to help the Red Cross and these are currently being run across our university network thanks to participation by all our partner institutions.

A big thank you to our University Partners and designers for reinforcing the spirit of goodwill so reminiscent of the UK.

The Power of Interaction

Several ideas have been put forward for the success of Viral Marketing through New Media streams. The latest of these ideas highlights user engagement as the key point to a campaign’s success. A recent article on reelseo.com discusses the idea and truly raises questions and thoughts about human interaction with the marketing around us.

At some point in our lives, we have all been taken in by a simple sports related question game or have shot a duck or two in the hope that we would magically acquire acceptance by a major brand. This just goes to show how intrigue and interest bring about the sharing of data. This is no truer than on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. Our quest for more ‘followers’ means we link ourselves to campaigns and opinions which relate to the social group we wish to be a part of. We continue to reproduce links on our accounts on behalf of big organisations. Why do we do this? Is it due purely to our wanting to be associated with the product in question or by people we don’t know? Or is it because we are interacting in the process and becoming part of the marketing team?

Our interaction with the campaign is what drives it. The feeling of being associated with others to a product or service of high reputation is merely the outcome of a well designed marketing strategy. We cannot escape from the fact that our interaction is key to the success of the product we choose to market ourselves. A viral campaign rests on audience interaction and campaigns are designed with this very much in mind.

The chart below shows how marketers view their social media usage, with the majority wanting to build a campaign on audience engagement:

Perhaps the biggest question that arises is how engagement will be used in the future. Will campaigns continue to become more interactive? Will Viral Marketing become a greater part of the world’s leading companies’ marketing plans? How will Apps and games help to drive this in the future? It remains to be seen, but what is clear is that the power of interaction and audience engagement is too great a tool to be ignored. It will be fascinating to see the evolution of marketing and how Viral will combine with Video to create interactive platforms for engagement. We are effectively becoming part of the greater cycle within marketing and it turns out we are pretty convincing sales people, particularly when it comes to convincing our own social network.

Why the Youth are Attracted to Social Media

Practically everyone has a Facebook account these days and it's no secret how powerful this particular social media platform has become, particularly when it comes to today's youth. Marketers have no choice but to tap into the range of channels that form the basis of peer to peer communication. If you want your brand to be noticed and reinforced through word of mouth then it needs to be where people spend their free time socialising with friends. Check out this interesting article on suggestions to brands about targeting young consumers using social media:

http://www.utalkmarketing.com/

Viral Marketing and targeting the Youth Demographic

Anyone in the advertising world will know just how powerful something as simple as word of mouth can be, especially when it comes to engaging your consumer base and reinforcing brand loyalty. You just have to sit on a train and listen to a bunch of teenagers talk about their latest mobile phone purchase to know how valuable conversations like this are to a brand like Apple or Nokia. Not only are young people invariably aware and in touch with all the latest technological developments, but they are highly influential when it comes to affecting the brand awareness of their parents, who undoubtedly go out and spend a good deal of money on gifts to keep their techno savvy kids happy.

Anyone watch World Wrestling Entertainment? You might recall the viral marketing campaign that promoted the return of Chris Jericho to the ring in 2007. A series of 15 second videos were used containing cryptic messages and biblical links related to the wrestler . The campaign then spread virally through the internet and numerous websites.

Just a year later, the film The Dark Knight launched a marketing campaign that combined both online and real life elements into a virtual reality game – this included gathering masses of Joker fans, launching scavenger hunts around the world and the design of websites that allowed fans to vote for political offices in Gotham City, a Gotham news network, a Gotham travel agency and so on and so forth.

Another successful campaign has to be Will it Blend? Tom Dickson, founder of Blendtec is the star of Viral Video Classics on YouTube where he blends anything and everything, from an iPhone to a Bic lighter. Gaining over 3.5 million views, the series has developed a cult like following, inspired merchandise and even a tagline on popular discussion sites.

Last but not least, Burger King’s Whopper Sacrifice campaign on Facebook was notorious, even though it lasted just under a week. Users who added the application to their account were challenged to sacrifice ten friends and they would be sent a coupon for a free Whopper. While you aren’t usually made aware of being de-friended, the app sent an email letting the person know they had been sacrificed for a free burger. Facebook soon intervened, but not before over 200,000 friendships had been sacrificed and the legend of a marketing campaign founded on sacrificing friends was born.

Click here if you’re interested in learning more about how Youth Media can help launch a campaign in the heart of the student market.


(Information courtesy of Top One Report)

How brands are competing to lead with creative innovation

With so much competition in the advertising world, it seems that brands are having to pull out all the stops to be as creative as humanly possible. The youth market is moved by innovation, arguably more so than any other demographic. Check out this link to some of the most interesting ad campaigns from around the world courtesy of Designers Couch:

http://designerscouch.org/show_article/119/eight-interesting-ad-campaigns.html

Why is Graduate Recruitment so important?

Companies and corporations spend a lot of money each year on recruiting new talent because they understand that graduates inject a certain amount of fresh blood and offer new insights into company policies and practices having just received an education in some of the top institutions in the country. It is also an opportunity to mould an energetic, eager to learn, highly charged intellect into a valuable asset to the business. They are, after all, the future managers and directors of the company.

So what are the key skills that recruiters are looking for in a graduate?

• Motivation and enthusiasm
• Ability to work well in a team
• Excellent communication
• Flexibility and adaptability
• Proactive initiative
• Desire to learn and grow

With the economy still in recovery after a massive recession, businesses have had to pull back on their purse strings and budgets, particularly those for graduate recruitment have been cut severely. Another consequence of the recession has been a job market flooded with redundancies and graduates unable to find work. In speaking to agencies, a resounding trend seems to be that recruiters now face a problem of quality versus quantity when it comes to their pool of candidates. Not only have clients cut their spend, they are now demanding more value and return on their investment. So the question is how do recruiters overcome these issues in a flagging economy?

Measurability, now more than ever, seems the key to any marketing or recruitment campaign and digital appears to offer that sought after return on investment. Campaigns need to be highly targeted, whether it’s placing a banner ad on a youth oriented website or sending out emails to a database of registered students. Youth Media takes it a step further and offers targeted email campaigns sent through heads of department to student academic email addresses, adding a personal touch and ensuring it comes from a trusted source to encourage more opens and higher click through than other forms of e-marketing. Click here to find out more.

How do brands reach today’s youth?

Advertisers and marketers alike know full well how the constant innovation and evolution of technology has complicated the planning process, especially when it comes to that elusive Generation Y. David Benady published a really interesting article about the trends involved with reaching the ‘Cyber Generation’ (Youth marketing: four trends in reaching the CyberGens). Below is a summary of four key points he makes:

1. Hyper-Fragmentation
While young people today may well be able to tailor their environments on their own terms, this has also resulted in a state of ‘hyper-fragmentation’ where they now crave a sense of belonging and are constantly on the lookout for communities in which to anchor themselves (social networks ring a bell?) With the usual strongholds of religion, politics and family dynamics eroding, brands can provide a sense of community and there are high returns if the reward is the right fit.

2. Open Source Society
The youth genuinely feel in control of their media, which means that there is no longer a passive acceptance. In fact, a demand for more open structures from organisations has developed in its place. The implication for brands is that they now need to be completely transparent and allow young people to feel ownership of the brand. Rather than adopting a know it all attitude, brands need to take a more passive stance and offer rewards for engaging.

3. Rewired: Generation Now
The web has created a culture of convenience where people now have access to information at their fingertips, which has its pros and cons. A quick search doesn’t require much hard work, so the youth are impressed by brands that do their ethical work for them. Also, the less commitment a brand demands the better. Initiating interaction is the key to engagement.

4. Celebrity Me
Social networks have created a ‘celebrity me’ syndrome where young people are obsessed with knowing what people are doing, where they’ve been and with whom. Brands need to tap into this resource and enhance this ‘celebrity’ status. We’ve all heard of the power of word of mouth – now imagine that combined with cyber space. When you think that young people on social networks often have over 200 friends and they can spread the word much faster than a brand, you get an idea of how valuable peer-to-peer communication really is.

Youth Media are experts in the provision of communication solutions targeted at the heart of the student market. Our YouthWire platform sits on the desktop of student PCs in areas of study and offers a prime opportunity to bring your brand to the fore of their attention. Why not have us design an app to sit on the platform and encourage that all important interaction? For more info, click here.