Be more Social – The Ford Fiesta Movement

I’m a big believer in the fact that youth brands wanting to connect with those born after 1979 have to be more SOCIAL in the way in which they engage. In order to mobilise ‘followers’ they need to invite them in, give them something to do, empower them in some way. But most importantly , give them something worth talking about, or CHANGING. The Ford Fiesta Movement campaign has been around for a few months and has started to hit its straps. It’s a social media campaign to launch the Ford Fiesta in America. In terms of youth, they themselves are helping to CHANGE peoples negative perceptions of the brand. Alot of work to be done here.

one of the Fiesta Movement 100 change agents

Essentially they’ve recruited (via youtube auditions) 1000 ‘change agents’, who have each been given a new Ford Fiesta (a year before they actually launch) and have 6 themed adventures (1 a month) to complete. It’s a great example of a big brand being more social in the way it engages with youth and letting the community co-create content. They just facilitate the interaction in their cool little car. Will it work? Maybe. Is it ballsy? Yes. Ford deserves a bit of credit for pushing something new into the social media space and having a god. Whether  it’s an actual ‘movement’, I don’t think so as they’re not really changing anything important to youth if we’re honest…. but it’s a great example of leveraging a fan base as being your message carriers and creating a social idea.

One Young World – collaborative creativity to change the world

Global youth are now empowered like never before via the social web, but also probably because there’s so much crap going on in the world. Youth marketers like myself often talk about how we can use creativity to create conversations with youth and build our brands we work on. But the real challenge/opportunity is how we can use our creativity in collaboration with the leaders of tomorrow to create real global change. My old boss David Jones/ CEO of Havas has created One Young World - a brilliant initiative whereby 1500 Under 25yr olds are going to get together next February in London to come up with ideas on how they can influence the world positively for their generations and beyond.  Potential delegates can submit a video on the OYW  youtube channel as to what they would do to change the world. They’ve got some heavies like Kofi Anna and Bob Geldof behind it, so that will assist in making the idea very social in nature as the OYW tribe has these guys to inspire them. It’s brilliant, and I wish I was five years younger so I could go. This is Part 1 and 2 of Davids’ speech at Google Zeitgest where he speaks about what One Young World is all about.

He uses words like ‘collaborative creativity’ which I think are spot on and really capture how Generation C behave and want to interact with brands and each other in todays environment.

Teens hardwired for risk taking behaviour

Nice little program on ABC last night ‘Whatever – the science of Teens’ which was all about how it is  scientifically proven that teens are chemically hardwired for risk taking behaviour. I used this argument as part of  my ICE APG paper back in 07. Some of the areas the program covered:

• Teens avoid social risk at all costs, falling out with the tribe is always to be avoided
• Maintaining their social reputation drives risk taking behaviour
• They fear social isolation.

Teens are chemically hard wired to take risks

 When teens take physical risks, large amounts of the neuro chemical DOPAMINE are released from the brain. Dopamine is the feel good chemical and this fix gets them coming back for more. Drugs like ecstasy, Speed and particularly ICE releases masses amounts of dopamine, hence young people getting addicted on these drugs and also why many drug related comms strategies are based around ‘social isolation’ as this is the No.1 fear for teens.

So there is a chemical reason why a brand like Red Bull is one of the best youth brands in the world. They know that youth are hardwired for risk taking behaviour and seek social reward for this behaviour.  So being the brand leader in this space and inspiring youth with energy culture and risk taking behaviour (from moto x, x alps, freestyle skiing, surfing etc) they give youth a teen tribe to belong to, thereby delivering the ‘social reward’ of inclusion.

4320 LA – V Australia taps into the Obsessive Lifestreaming Disorder trend

The first campaign that brings ‘Obsessive Lifestreaming Disorder’ to life. I wrote about it here in Feb, and now airline V Australia have created a cool little little campaign called 4320LA whereby they follow 3 mates on their trip from Sydney to LA.

4320LA 4,320 tweets in 3 days to promote V Australia's Syd-LA route

They spend 3 days in LA tearing up the town, equating to  4,320 minutes, and their task is to ‘tweet’ every minute of that experience.   The end prize is some Virgin Atlantic tix. The thing I like about this idea is that it taps into Generation C’s need for REAL TIME content and DISCOVERY. It’s real, authentic, and most 20 somethings will probably be interested in a little crazy Tinseltown adventure. Apologies to Matt for prematurely bagging him out, the tweets have gotten better man    It’s one of the better campaigns that uses twitter as a delivery platform.  Despite the fact that fuck all Under 25′s in Australia  use twitter, it doesn’t matter,  youth will follow it on their website where the real interaction and brand narrative is. V Australia has started an interesting conversation with 20 somethings who are their primary target for this campaign. Nice work boys from Droga…Fabs, Nick and Sudeep, take a bow,

The Future is Retro – guest post by Allison Cenna

I love how some retro brands have totally reinvented themselves, like Converse, Mini even brands like Adidas and Puma tapping into the old school. A colleague of mine, Allison Cenna at DDB Chicago has done loads of work into how brands are reconnecting with their retro roots. She’s written a great paper on it here and she agreed to do a little post for me.

The global success of Transformers movie franchise, proves retro is a money spinner for brands

Hi, I’m Allison Cenna from Chicago. Thanks for the guest post, Dan.

Over the past year I’ve spent a lot of time studying retro brands and developing a research paper about their youth appeal. In the States, brands like PBR, Transformers, Rubik’s Cube, and the Street Fighter video game series have been resurrected and met success.

The big question I kept asking as I researched these brand stories: What makes certain retro brands attractive to Millennials? And how can marketers revive others for lasting appeal? My paper outlines a set of rules to help retro brands connect with today’s youth:

Allow for Rediscovery:

 Retro brands offer old-school cool and authenticity that’s hard to replicate. But in-your-face marketing tactics can be a tough sell with savvy Millennials. Figure out how to let them find and embrace your brand themselves – discover and adopt it in their own way.

Connect with Timeless Values:  

Simplicity, identity, membership, independence, authenticity, and fun are increasingly important—especially today.

Stay true, but contemporize:

Successful retro brands modernize. But they stay true to heart of what made them popular. Classic appeal, contemporary features.

Create a community:

Successful retro brands give fans something to share with each other. This creates a swarm of advocates that propels the brand.

There’s some really insightful stuff in the paper, so check it out. I particularly believe in the areas of REDISCOVERY as I genuinely believe brands these days wanting to connect with youth have to be unexpected, surprising, spontaneous and let them discover your brand narratives across different media touchpoints, as opposed to slamming it down your face.

Axe Double Pits to Chesty- straying from the brand idea

I loved working on Axe at BBH, learnt alot there and met some great people. That’s why it pains me to say that I’m not a huge fan of the relatively new ‘Double pits to chesty’ campaign.

 The strategy here is pretty simple, as the brand grows older, every few years they have to educate a new generation of pubescent teens on how to use body spray, so this is an education job. They’ve used a whole series of  sports (tandem diving, skating, moto x, juggling) to bring this idea to life.The Axe brand has and always will be about giving guys the edge in the mating game. Unfortunately, apart from a token end shot with a hot chick, this ad (or the others) doesn”t hit the mark. The problem for me is that although the product is central to the ad, the role of the product giving guys the edge in the mating game is incidental. This feels generic and dare I say it, won’t start much conversation amongst youth. There are loads more interesting moto x /extreme sports clips on youtube right now.  I can name at least 20 youth brands (let alone the leader of extreme sports Red Bull) who have created real content in this vein that’s far more engaging and spreadable for youth. 90% of the work on Axe stays true to the emotional core of ‘attraction’ and giving guys the edge in the mating game, in my opinion this feels like a weird place for Axe to be.. Expecting a bashing from my old workmates now, but I’ve got to keep it real.

What Aussie kids are talking about

Came across this little study by Cartoon Network. They spoke to almost 1,500 7-14yr olds across Australia on a whole range of topics from favourite brands, to media consumption and lifestyle. Here’s a snapshot of what boys and girls are talking about. No big surprises here. Boys are talking about gaming, content, sports, youtbe channels as they get older. Girls are into Hanna Montanna, more social networking, fashion, music. One key finding was that using social networks doesnt really kick in for boys until age 13, as they are spending more time face to face playing sports…excluding playing online networked games like Xbox 360 (which probably doubles as their social networking).

What Aussie kids are talking about in the school yard and digital playgorund

Youth as Cyborgs

This post is based on some great thinking from Sally. Todays youth in 1^st and 2^nd world countries are now CYBORGS – completely dependent on technology to make them more efficient and social creatures. They can’t function unless they are part of a collective cyberspace where technology dependence helps them belong.

Youth as Cyborg

These teens and 20 somethings have internalised technology, so much so that the lines between the real and cyber world are completely blurred. They are intravenously fed by a constant stream of content and conversations. Youth have shifted the way their self identities are formed and created via Facebook, Myspace etc. They do this via profiling and putting on an external ‘cover’ to the world, these online identities often mask the real person, and are created to ’fit in’  with the digital tribe, but also create a persona that is liked and admired by their cyber networks. Just like a cyborg, there online identities are perfectly crafted and it’s all putting on a ‘better version of my real self’ online.

Cyborgs can adapt to their environments, and todays youth this by having splintered personas, one minute I’m an ‘Indie’, next minute i’m a ‘Hippster’, the next a ‘Surfie’. They are the ultimate chameleons.  Mobile phones are replacing the young peoples MEMORY.  Think about it, teens have their friends phone number in their mobiles, they have calculators, they have cameras to capture moments, to do lists, they can TIVO a program..their memories are turning to mush as all this technology symbiotically replaces their memory structures. When a teen loses his/her mobile, they feel as though they’ve lost a part of their identity. In addition to all of this, think about how youth use ipods as fashion accessories, they use them as both ‘armour’ to protect them from social interaction (mobile as personal shield to the world) as well as portraying an image to the world. Also, the songs they listen to become embedded in their minds, further fusing their digital mind.

The last element is ‘mixed reality’ – as alternate reality technology becomes more widely available we’ll see young people become more and more engaged with proximity based technologies which help them engage with locations and each other.

My Nokia World 2009 youth presentation

I’ve been asked to speak at this years Nokia World conference in Germany in September. I’m pumped, but a little nervous as well, will be a big audience, but I’m looking forward to sharing my views. I’m presenting on how youth brands are using social media to effectively engage young people. Specifically I’m talking about ‘tribal ideas’ and some principals that brands should think about when they are looking at how they mobilize youth around their brand. As Gareth Kay says, it’s all about ‘social ideas’ first and foremost, the channels should take care of themselves. I’m gonna be talking about culture jamming, open source ideas, youth as cyborgs, weak links vs strong links in communities, velocity of ideas and of course, i’m going to bring some new thinking to the table on my favourite topic… Generation C. Lots of work to do on it so do let me know if you have any thoughts

10 observations on how the best youth brands behave

Here are a few thoughts that’ve been kicking around in my head about how the best youth brands behave and engage with youth:

1. Stand for something important

2. Be true and authentic, no one likes a try hard

3. Never forget your roots…’retro’ is back in

4. Stay focused and never ever believe your own hype

5. Be discovered…never push

6. Deliver on your promise at every single touchpoint

7. Never ever take yourself too seriously

8. Invite young people in to take co-ownership of your brand

9. Spark conversations and create culture, never hold a mirror up to youth, they’ll get bored and move on

10. Help them belong to a community..help them express themselves through that community and connect with other likeminded youth