Social Commentary

Boomers and Millennials: Destined always to be different … or on the same trajectory?

Phillip Nones Advertising, Business, Demographics, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

NeuroWhen it comes to advertising, it turns out that the Baby Boomer generation sees things quite a bit differently than the Millennial generation.

In fact, based on neuromarketing research conducted last year by Nielsen NeuroFocus, generational differences account for some interesting neurological contrasts between Boomer and Millennial brains.

The research results also point to how companies might find it wise to tweak the design and presentation of their advertising based on the age levels of their audiences.

Consider these distinct differences found by Nielsen NeuroFocus in its research:

Brain Function: The Boomer Brain likes repetition. Boomers also tend to believe that information that is “familiar” is true. On the other hand, the Millennial brain is more stimulated by dynamic elements such as rich media, animation, and lighting that cuts through their “perception threshold.”

Distractions: Boomer brains are more easily distracted, whereas Millennials are adept at dealing with “bleeding-over” communications such as those found in dynamic banner ads and in contemporary magazine layouts.

Attention Spans: Boomers have a broader attention span and are open to processing more information, whereas Millennials prefer at-the-ready, multi-sensory communications. (And “impatience” is their middle name.)

Colors: In advertising, contrasts gain the attention of Boomers in advertising. With Millennials, it’s more the intensity of the color palette overall rather than contrasts within it that does the trick.

Humor: The Boomer generation prefers lighthearted, clever humor in advertising messages – positive and not mean-spirited. Boomers also like relatable characters that aren’t much younger than themselves. Millennials tend to prefer offbeat, sarcastic or slapstick humor – basically, the kind of humor that many Boomers find offputting or even offensive. Making special effects and other visual hi-jinks part of the shtick attracts the attention and interest of Millennials, too.

It turns out, there’s some real science behind these findings, too. Nielsen NeuroFocus reports that when people are in their mid-50s, distraction suppression mechanisms tend to weaken. Even as early as the mid-40s there are dramatic declines in neurotransmitter levels – particularly serotonin and dopamine.

How does that manifest itself in situations where we see “Boomers behaving badly?” Dopamine declines can lead to thrill-seeking behaviors to compensate. And a drop in serotonin levels can lead to the feeling that “something is missing” – thereby leading to classic midlife crisis behaviors affecting a person’s professional life and personal relationships.

… And as we know, that often doesn’t end up particularly well.

But here’s the more central takeaway from the research: Boomer-Millennial differences don’t turn out to be so much a function of differing world views; it’s more a function of the aging process itself.

So look for the Millennials to begin responding more like Boomers in the coming years.

Are comment sections on news websites on the way out?

Phillip Nones Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

Trying to tame “the world of horrible Internet awfulness.”  (David Tarp, CEO, Tumblr)

Online CommentsOne of the most empowering aspects of the Internet is its ability to foster online interaction and feedback, wherein “regular people” have a megaphone in addition to journalists and writers on publisher websites.

But there’s an ugly side to the public dialogue, unfortunately: There’s an awful lot of verbal “dirty laundry” that gets put on display.

It’s sort of like taking younger children to the state fair or a sporting event — and then trying to shield them from the loud profanity (and worse) that they overhear.

The fact is, you can’t get away from the coarseness on online comment sections – particularly if the news content pertains to political or socio-cultural topics.

It’s often a “drive to the bottom” where social norms and common decency fall by the wayside in the name of airing grievances or settling scores.

It extends to less potentially inflammatary zones beyond polarizing politics, too.  Researchers have found that people who read the same news story about a new technology, but who are exposed to different sets of coments — one set fair and the other nasty — have completely different responses to the news story itself.  In the research, commenter anonymity and the ability to strongly attack a news story without the need to back it up with facts, caused ill effects that were neither accurate or fair.

The researchers dubbed it “The Nasty Effect.”

For some time now, Internet news and information sites have tried to strike a balance between access and interactivity on the one hand … and civility and decorum on the other.

In many cases, the quest has been frustratingly difficult. Here’s what some publishers have said about the issue:

“There’s got to be a better [way] to interact without comments taking away from the article or denigrating the people who are reported on.”  — Craig Newman, Chicago Sun-Times

“One of the worst things about writing in public is fielding random ad hominem attacks … in the space in which you’ve poured out your precious thoughts.”  — Ev Williams, Medium

“Even a fractious minority wields enough power to skew a reader’s perception of a story.”  — Suzanne LeBarre, Popular Science

As a result, now we’re seeing more instances of publishers and bloggers killing their comment sections completely.  Consider these examples:

… As of this month, the Chicago Sun-Times has axed its comment capability for the foreseeable future.

… The much anticipated March 2014 launch of Vox (Ezra Klein’s news venture), doesn’t provide for feedback comments.

… The same goes for The Dish, Andrew Sullivan’s website.

… Popular Science shut down its comment sections this past September.

… Atlantic Media’s Quartz business site hasn’t ever allowed comments on its site since its launch in 2012.

… And neither has Tumblr.

But it seems rather unrealistic to think that comments sections can be banned from the Internet outright. That would be like trying to put the genie back in the bottle.

Instead, a via media approach may be what the Huffington Post has done. This past December, it implemented a policy wherein commenters must use their Facebook accounts and real names in order to post a comment on Huffington Post stories.

Those who wished to continue posting comments under pseudonyms have had to “appeal” for the right to do.

The goal? To make people think twice before publishing strongly worded comments — the kind that say as much about the poster as they do about the object of their commentary.

Despite the predictable howls from some readers who feel that the right to express an opinion without fear of reprisal is a big part of the appeal of the Internet, four months later the Huffington Post sees the move in positive terms.

The publisher’s community director Tim McDonald reports that the number of “faux” accounts in its system has gone way down – and the quality of discourse is up.

With this approach, perhaps “shameless” needn’t upstage  “shame” after all — and the benefits of interactivity and debate can be preserved at the same time.

Affluent consumers around the world: More similar than different.

Phillip Nones Advertising, Demographics, Marketing Communications, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

Moods and mindsets converge.

worldwide affluent consumers

As the world becomes more interconnected, it’s having an impact on the mindsets of marketplaces. A confluence of perspectives appears to be happening.

A good case in point is affluent consumers. The idea that rich or affluent people are something of a homogeneous segment was put forth about 10 years ago in Robert Frank’s book Richistan.

The author contended that affluent consumers are united by shared characteristics and shared experiences that are becoming progressively more distinct from middle-class consumers.

In fact, he posited that Affluents had implicitly become their own country (“Richistan”).

Since then, we’ve had a global recession or two … along with social unrest on nearly every continent. Have the sociological trend lines changed?

A recent analysis of results from an Ipsos MediaCT survey of affluent consumers in ~50 countries suggests not.

Commenting on the research findings, author  and journalist Stephen Kraus writes, “Affluents continue to form a globally coherent segment marked by cross-border similarities in attitudes, lifestyles and marketplace preferences … this analysis also finds a remarkably consistent demographic, psychographic and media profile among Affluents around the world.”

Regarding the consumption of media, Ipsos found that affluent consumers are using mobile devices and digital media far more than before – not at all surprising since this segment is also noted for being early adopters of new technologies and products.

But even with the big growth of mobile and digital, Affluents’ use of traditional media has declined only modestly. Overall, the segment is more engaged in media than ever before, with the newer forms of media usage “layered” on top of older ones.

For companies that market “high-end” products and services to the affluent segment, it’s actually becoming easier to apply the same messaging and marketing across multiple countries and cultures – with allowances for language differences being made, of course.

Despite all the convergence that’s happened, some attitudinal qualities of affluent consumes continue to distinguish themselves between different cultures, however. For example, the Ipsos survey found these differing characteristics:

  • Growth in luxury purchases is strongest among affluent consumers in the Asia-Pacific region.
  • Latin American affluent consumers are particularly enthusiastic users of social media – and international media in general.
  • American affluent consumers are strong in spending on recreational activities such as golf, tennis and skiing.

And European Affluents?  Well, they’re more subdued in their economic optimism – and their spending – at the moment.

 

Fast Fade: Unpaid brand posts on Facebook are getting rarer by the day.

Phillip Nones Advertising, Branding, Business, Marketing Communications, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Lower ReachIt was just a matter of time.

Once Facebook ramped up its advertising program in order to monetize its platform and mollify its investors, unpaid posts by companies and brands were sure to be the collateral damage.

Sure enough, the recent monthly stats show that the “organic reach” of unpaid content published on company and brand pages on Facebook has been cut in half from where it was just a short time ago.

To illustrate, look at these stark figures gathered in an analysis by Ogilvy of 100+ country-level brand pages measuring the average reach of unpaid posts:

  • October 2013: 12.2%
  • November 2013: 11.6%
  • December 2013: 8.8%
  • January 2014: 7.7%
  • February 2014: 6.2%

What these stats show is that within the span of less than six months, the average reach of unpaid brand posts dropped by nearly 50%. 

To go even further, an anonymous source familiar with Facebook’s long-term strategy is claiming that its new algorithm could ultimately reduce the reach of organic posts to 2% or less.

Actually, the reason for the squeeze is more than just Facebook’s desire to increase advertising revenue.

Here’s a dynamic that’s also significant:  A Pew Research study conducted in mid-2013 found that the typical adult American Facebook user has around 340 friends.

That average is up nearly 50% from approximately 230 friends in 2010.

Of course, more friends mean more status updates eligible for feeds … and Facebook’s not going to display them all to everyone — even if it wanted to.

Also, Facebook users “like” an average of 40 company, brand, group or celebrity pages each, according to a 2013 analysis done by Socialbakers, a social media analytics firm.  That translates into an average of ~1,440 updates every month.

Compare those figures to five years ago, when the average number of page “likes” was fewer than five … yielding fewer than 25 monthly updates on average.

Clearly, there’s no way Facebook is going to to be able to display all of these updates to followers.  So … the content is squeezed some more.

The final nail in the coffin is the rise in “promoted” posts – the ones that brands pay dollars to promote. It’s only natural that Facebook is going to give those posts priority treatment.

Thus, the hat-trick combination of more friends, more likes and more promoted posts is what’s causing “organic” brand posts to go the way of the dodo bird.

In retrospect, it was only a matter of time before a major social platform like Facebook would seek to monetize its program in a big way.

In some respects, it’s amazing that the free ride lasted as long as it actually did …

Gallup Confirms It: Kids are Costly

Phillip Nones Demographics, Economics, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

childAnyone who has children – present company included – knows intuitively that raising them isn’t an inexpensive proposition.

The education expenses alone are enough to make some people blanch white at the prospects of child-rearing.

And now we have even more proof of the high cost of having kids. The Gallup organization has just completed a telephone survey of a large sample of American adults age 18 and over – more than 172,000 of them, in fact.

When Gallup asked these respondents how much they spent on purchases “yesterday” (excluding normal household bills and major purchases), it discovered that those without kids under age 18 reported average daily spending of ~$80.

For those with children under the age of 18? They spent ~$110 on average.

So it’s a pretty significant difference of 35%+ more.

Gallup found similar dynamics at work even when comparing adults within the same income groups.

In every income segment, average daily spending levels were lower for adults with no children … spiked for those with kids under 18 … and then dropped back again when children are over the age of 18.

The reasons for the added spending aren’t difficult to figure out, of course. In addition to basic necessities like food and clothing, there are entire categories of spending that come into play for families raising children: extracurricular activities, athletics and sports, entertainment, toys and so forth.

Gallup also discovered similar “bell curve dynamics“ at work when comparing adults within the same age groups. Whether you’re younger or older, your daily spending rises when you have kids under age 18, then drops back down again.

The bottom line: Having kids is costly.  But they sure do make life interesting, don’t they?

For more Gallup survey results, click here.

To understand changes in U.S. demographics … check right at home first.

Phillip Nones Economics, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

American HouseholdsJust because the housing bubble of the mid-2000s resulted in foreclosures, a down economy, and more young people moving back in with Mom and Dad … don’t believe that more fundamental demographic changes aren’t continuing to have a long-term effect as well.

This is underscored by newly published data on American households issued by the U.S. Bureau of Census, which breaks down statistics on the more than 121 million households in the United States.

As of 2012, the average size of the U.S. household stood at 2.55 people.  That’s a decline of about one person per household since 1950.

What’s contributed the most to the decline of this average has been the increase in single-person households.  According to the Census Bureau, those households now account for more than a quarter of all households in the country:

  • One-person households:  ~27% of total U.S. households
  • Two-person HHs:  ~34%
  • Three-person HHs:  ~16%
  • Four-person HHs:  ~13%
  • Five-person HHs:  ~6%
  • Six-person HHs:  ~2%
  • Seven or more persons per household:  ~1%

In fact, the number of single-person households has gone up five-fold since 1960.  A major part of the reason is the large percentage of older Americans (age 75+) who live alone – more than half.

That compares to only a quarter of households headed by people under the age of 30.

Other interesting factoids from the Census Bureau stats reflect some of the changing social mores in American society:

  • There are nearly 8 million unmarried couples living together – more than double the figure less than a decade ago.  (It was ~2.9 million in 1996).
  • Married households now make up fewer than half of all households.  (In 1970, that percentage was over 70%.)

But one demographic statistic does seem to reflect the consequences of the recent economic recession and the contraction in the American labor force:  As of 2012, only ~52% of married couples have both spouses in the labor force, which is down from ~56% reported in 2000.

United States Bureau of CensusThese new stats come from the U.S. Census Bureau’s latest Annual Social & Economic Supplement to the Current Population Survey, the data for which was collected  in March and April 2012 from a nationwide sample of approximately 100,000 addresses.

You can view additional findings here.

Social Branding: Reality-Check Time

Phillip Nones Advertising, Branding, Business, Marketing Communications, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

social brandingWith all of the attention marketers have been paying to social media, it’s always helpful to look and re-look at information that gives us clues as to how customers are actually interfacing with brands in the social sphere.

Statistics published in a just-released report titled Digital Brand Interactions Survey, based on research conducted by web content management company Kentico Software, gives us a reality check on just how [non-]essential social media actually is in the greater branding picture.

The Kentico research queried approximately 300 American consumers age 18 or older via an online survey administered in February 2014.  Let’s start with the most basic finding:  the degree to which consumers “like” or “follow” brands on social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram:

  • No brands followed on social media:  ~40%
  • 1 to 10 brands followed:  ~39%
  • 11 to 20 brands followed:  ~7%
  • 21 to 30 brands followed:  ~6%

Considering how many different brands the typical consumer encounters in his or her daily life (dozens? … hundreds?), following ten or fewer brands on social media represents only a very small proportion of them.

Yet that’s exactly where four in five consumers are when it comes to social branding.

So … how do companies get into that rarefied group of brands that are, in fact, followed by consumers?  Here’s what the Kentico survey discovered:

  • Already interested in the brand and wanted to stay informed:  ~40%
  • Followed on social media to receive special offers:  ~39%
  • Followed because of a recommendation from a friend or family member:  ~12%
  • Didn’t really know the brand before, but wanted to learn more about it:  ~8%

These results suggest that the notion that social branding is an easy way to attract new customers may be flawed.  Instead, social branding is better-suited to deepening brand engagement with existing customers.

Money talks as well (discounts or other special offers) – and be sure to offer them often.

kentico logoIn another piece of evidence that points to social branding’s relatively weak ability to drive incremental sales … Kentico found that ~72% of its survey respondents “never” or “hardly ever” purchase a product after hearing about it on a social network.

An equal percentage of respondents have “never” or “hardly ever” had brand encounters online that altered their already-existing perception of those brands.

So it would seem that much of the “heat” generated by social branding may be adding up to very little “light.”

On the other hand, there is also some good news for brands in the social realm:  The incidence of people “unliking” or “unfollowing” brands is quite low:  Only about 5% of the survey respondents reported such actions.

When that does happen, it’s often because a brand has been publishing too many social posts – or the content of the posts themselves is uninteresting.

The biggest takeaway notion from the Kentico research is to remind us to maintain a degree of skepticism about the impact of social branding – and to understand that in most cases, social media activities are going to remain the “ornaments” on the marketing tree rather than be the “tree” itself.

In fact, that’s probably the case even more now — as consumers become bombarded with ever-more marketing messages from ever-more brands with every passing day.

That “Nigerian Prince” e-mail scam? It’s as old as the hills.

Phillip Nones Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , ,

scamsMost people I know have received at least one of them over the years:  a heartfelt plea to help some poor soul in a foreign land who is in need of assistance.

And if you help, you’ll be duly rewarded – with enough cash that you can quit your job and retire early.

… All this for simply delivering a few thousand dollars in funds up-front.

It’s amazing that people fall for these sorts of scams – but they do.  Some folks can’t see beyond their dreams of avarice, no matter how sketchy the premise.

And the fact that these schemes have been pumped into seemingly every e-mail inbox in existence over the past 15 years or so proves that they work on some level.

It turns out that this isn’t just some phenomenon of the e-mail era, where mass solicitations can be done for practically no out-of-pocket cost.  (Or even in the FAX era before that.)

In fact, this “advanced fee” swindle – and variants of it – dates back half a millennium.

… To the year 1588, to be precise.  That’s when the so-called “Spanish Prisoner” scheme appeared for the first time.  Here’s how it went:

A fraudster sends someone a letter purportedly on behalf of some wealthy aristocrat who is imprisoned under a false name in a Spanish jail cell.  The letter-writer claims that he can bribe the guards to allow the prisoner to escape – but needs money up-front to pay the bribe.  The letter recipient is asked to provide a specific amount of funds for the jailbreak – with the assurance that the freed nobleman will repay ten-fold the funds later.

scam letter
Appealing for advance fees: Same old scam, but in an earlier era …

Despite the 500-year span, this story doesn’t sound much different from the “Nigerian Prince”-type appeals most of us have received in recent years.

Proving how resilient the swindle is, in 1898 the New York Times reported on a particularly scurrilous scam that was circulating in the United States at the time.  The March 20, 1898 edition of the newspaper described the scheme as follows:

“A man in the country receives a letter from a foreign city … The letter is written on thin, cross-lined paper such as is used for foreign letters, and is written as fairly well-educated foreigners write English, with a word misspelled here and there, and an occasional foreign idiom.  The writer is always in jail because of some political offense.  He always has some large sum of money hid, and is invariably anxious that it should be recovered and used to take care of his young and helpless daughter by some honest man …”

There was even a short story written on this very topic by mystery author Arthur Train which appeared in Cosmopolitan Magazine in 1910.

How did the “Spanish Prisoner” story migrate to Nigeria by way of New York?

The answer has everything to do with the end of colonial rule in the former French and English colonies of West Africa.

Immediately following Nigeria’s independence in 1960, the highly corrupt successor regime plunged the country into political and economic chaos – there’s really no other way to describe it.

Even the discovery of offshore oil riches did little to alleviate the country’s ills (and in fact may have contributed even more to the sky-high levels of corruption and malfeasance).

Then, in the early 1980s the oil boom fizzled, leaving in its wake a shattered economy and a population in desperate need of money.  Soon, the “Spanish Prisoner” saga morphed into the “Nigerian Prince” story — and we were off to the races.

Other nations in the region weren’t immune to the same impulses:  Ivory Coast, Senegal, Gold Coast/Ghana, Upper Volta/Burkina Faso all experience similar growing pains as young countries, with the attendant social strife.

Sometimes the scam stories took on different permutations:  romance scams, lottery schemes, work-from-home swindles … and they were perpetrated in two languages (French and English), with FAX machines (and later e-mail inboxes) targeted in the United States, England, Canada, Australia, France and elsewhere that were inundated with appeals.

But Nigeria was – and continues to be – the modern-day epicenter of such frauds.

In fact, the very term the U.S. government uses to identify these advanced fee schemes is “Nigerian 419 scam,” which refers to Section 419 of the Nigerian criminal code.  It was added by the Nigerian judiciary to cover fraudulent activities of this type once they became so ubiquitous.

Human nature being what it is, advanced-fee scams like the “Spanish Prisoner” or “Nigerian Prince” will never die.  As long as there are people longing to “get rich quick” – on both sides of the bargain – we’ll see it continue to pop up.

It’s proof yet again that despite the technological leaps we’ve made in communications over the centuries – from couriers and pages to postal delivery, FAXes and e-mail – basic human impulses remain the same.  You can scam in any language … use any technology … and find a “useful fool” no matter where and when.

At Times Square, it’s “location-location-location” when it comes to advertising.

Phillip Nones Advertising, Branding, Business, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The building at 1 Times Square in New York City is nearly 100% vacant.

One Times Square Building (2010).
One Times Square Building (2010).

But if you’re the owner of the building, why should you even care?

That’s because the building takes in a reported near-$25 million per year in advertising revenues – thanks to the digital signage on the building being rented to top brands like Anheuser-Busch, Dunkin’ Donuts and Sony (among others).

Media, Sports & Entertainment Marketing Officer Blaise D’Sylva of Anheuser-Busch keeps it pithy:

“There’s a statement we make in being there – and we think the placement we’ve got is outstanding.”

Of course, there’s more to it than simply “making a statement.”  According to the Times Square Alliance, each year more than 100 million pedestrians pass through Times Square.

Moreover, foot traffic volume is running ~90% higher compared to 1996.

I’m quite sure these traffic volumes are central to any go/no-go advertising decisions being made by the big brands.

Where night is day: Times Square advertising.
Where the night is as bright as day: Times Square advertising.

The Wall Street Journal reports that billboard signage in Times Square is actually the priciest outdoor advertising in the world.

Considering its location at the intersection of “high traffic” and “high trend,” marketers think it’s an investment worth making — and the rates they’re willing to pay proves the point.

Bitcoin currency: You’ve got a long way to go, baby.

Phillip Nones Banking, Business, Economics, Social Commentary, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , ,

bitcoin

Whether it’s defaulting to preparing the same half-dozen dinner recipes, always taking the same travel route, or preferring traditional hyms and liturgy at religious services, humans tend to be creatures of habit.

Of course, there will always be the minority who revel in being the first to try out novel communications technologies … adopt the newest fashions … or take advantage of the latest investment schemes.

But most people would prefer to hold back and let someone else take the plunge first.

That’s precisely where things stand at the moment with the Bitcoin alternative currency.  The “virtual currency” has been around long enough so that it’s now getting coverage in the “popular” press … and there are even a few folks who have begun using it as an alternative to established currencies.

Indeed, for the past year now, a few national retailers and chain foodservice establishments have been accepting payments in Bitcoin currency.

But a just-released survey that queried consumer attitudes about the new-fangled currency – referred to as a “crypto-currency” by some – underscores how steep a climb the Bitcoin has before it can ever be considered a viable alternative to the Dollar or other established currencies.

TheStreet, a digital financial media company, commissioned the survey which was conducted in January 2014 by GfK Custom Research North America’s OMNITEL unit  A total of 1,005 telephone surveys were conducted with Americans age 18 or older.

Let’s start out with the most basic finding from the survey:  Three out of four respondents aren’t even familiar with the Bitcoin term.

So right off the bat, that’s a major hurdle.  The Bitcoin may have been the subject of numerous press stories and broadcast reports, but the news hasn’t seeped into the larger market consciousness to any great extent.

NoNext … even after the concept of the Bitcoin was described to them, the survey respondents remained distinctly chilly to the idea:

  • Nearly 80% would “never consider” using an alternative form of currency like the Bitcoin.
  • ~80% would rather own gold than Bitcoin currency.

Did the survey uncover different attitudes based on the age of the respondents?  Yes – to a degree:

  • Just under one-third of young respondents (age 18 to 24) would consider using an alternative form of currency like the Bitcoin … versus only about one in ten seniors (over age 65).
  • ~15% of the young respondents would prefer to own Bitcoin over gold … versus only ~4% of seniors.
  • ~57% of young respondents feel that Bitcoin currency helps the global economy … while just ~14% of senior feel the same way.

The main takeaway from the GfK/OMNITEL research?  Bitcoin proponents are going to have to keep plugging away for a good long time before positive public perceptions of an alternative currency take hold — including needing to focus on the most basic educational elements.

Considering the level of financial literacy out there … good luck with that effort.

If any readers have ever used Bitcoin as a currency and would care to comment on their experience pro or con, please share your thoughts here.