How are young people affected by content marketing?

By 2nd September 2015 Social Media Marketing No Comments
social media marketing

With the first Tuesday of Cannes Lions Festival in France came the announcement of a collaboration between the respective associates of Snapchat, Daily Mail and WPP: the development of Truffle Pig.

Intended to target a young generation of consumers, the marketing venture will create social content for brands through advertising, millennial appeal and global coverage. Determined to ‘bring a unique take to digital marketing’, this social interpretation is set to be fast-paced, real-time and continuously spontaneous: just like the target consumer.

 

Why target the younger generation… and what’s a truffle pig?

The truffle pig finds the ‘rare and tasty’, explains John Steinberg, CEO of Daily Mail North America. Intending to ‘satisfy people’s appetite for great storytelling – and inspire brand engagement, loyalty and sales’, the software will combine the ‘best in media, content and user experience’, to welcome a new market to the industry.

There is no doubt that ‘generation x’, are affected on a daily basis by varying markets: from student-discount boasting clothing websites to the hype of recent app releases. Targeting this market is made easy through the power of social media, with young adults connected to various social platforms at all times of the day: Instagramming, Snapchatting, Facebooking, Tweeting and other sorts of ‘ings’.

 

Sniffing out the sponsors

Truffle Pig are capitalising on this technological crowd with the hope of triggering a realisation in the younger market that they are consumed by content marketing everyday, possibly without realising. Geofiltering may seem to the excitable Snapchatter a means to showcase a 4am trip to McDonalds, but with sponsored geofilters applied to more than 1 million messages every day, this serves a much wider marketing purpose – spreading brand advertising with ease, all through the power of rebellious midnight Big Mac cravings.

As the Financial Brand notes, marketers are becoming renowned for ‘dumping’ corporate blasts on social media, which may detract a potential audience. If Truffle Pig can combine their access to this ‘audience [that] spends money’ with a humanistic approach to content marketing, it’s likely the brand will satisfy gen x’s appetite.

 

Should we forget about everyone else?

Well, no. It’d be foolish to assume that those aged 30 and below are the only ones engaging with social media, and so influenced by content marketing. Though they may be natives to the digital age, they’re not alone. In fact, The New York Times recently published an article suggesting that there’s a danger in focusing the entirety of marketing on the younger generation. Apparently, companies harping after ‘twenty somethings’ in an out of place context (that being content marketing), resembles ‘the desperation of a nerdy teenager who, smitten with a prom queen, forlornly asks ‘why doesn’t she love me back?’.

Eradicating the potential of this market, to prioritise a younger group will surely become problematic as the current ‘next generation’ become the old. Ultimately, as this millennial generation progresses to welcome a new breed, there will be necessity for fresher forms of marketing. ‘Millennial focused brands’, says Daniel Newman of Forbes magazine, ‘will have to change their game to stay relevant’. Do we segment certain marketing techniques to specific age groups, such as Truffle Pig depicting the young for their video marketing?

Though its emergence may sound niche, quirky and as simple to enjoy as a Snapchat story, there are more mums, grandpas and ‘Margaret from next door’s’ discovering these ‘young’ trends on a daily basis, becoming as valuable assets to content marketing as their younger, shinier teenage offspring.

 

Want to find out more about the power of social media and how we can help? Visit our social media marketing page.

 

 

Image courtesy of LaunchGuru