Marketing Done Right | 3 Brands That Understand How Millennials Work

A couple of weeks ago we announced our yearbook theme, which is, wait for it: ‘Millennials’! Over the years, our preferences changed from sitting in front of the television to living our lives through our smartphones. We are changing the way advertising and marketing are done, and encouraging business to join us online.

The millennial generation makes marketeers think twice before creating advertisements, because of millennials’ power to change a brand image online just through a comment. Traditional businesses have started to move to online platforms in order to keep up with ‘the fast-changing generation’. A few years ago, individuals started writing ‘blog posts’ in order to express their personal opinions on topics they are passionate about or simply to display an activity they love doing, such as singing or creating makeup videos – soooo millennial – and decided to share this with others through the means of social media. Nowadays, these individuals are known as ‘influencers’. They have obtained millions of followers, made a career online and influence the lives of many in both small and major ways. Sometimes, these influencers even have more followers than some countries’ population! Therefore, brands have discovered that we like to talk about our experiences, such as those with different products. Businesses took notes and started contacting influencers for endorsing their products. According to previous research, we millennials trust bloggers and YouTubers more than we trust advertisements. Ha! Go figure! We totally changed the game.

In this article, we will take a look at 3 brands who do marketing ‘right’ and who managed to make us feel like they are really thinking about us. By making us millennials feel special, they gained loyal customers and fans willing to spread the word online about how good their products are (we share the word through photos on Instagram, of course!).

Let’s start!

1.   Making millennials participate and start the discussion online – Coca Cola knows what’s up! Do you remember those Coca Cola bottles with the names on it?! Well, they found the most popular millennial names and printed them on their bottle packaging, resulting in a huge discussion online among teens who were very excited to find their names. Apparently, after this marketing stunt, their sales had grown by 2%.

2.   Giving us something unique (like we are!)- By offering millennials a unique product and encouraging us to decide what we pay for based on our needs and wishes, brands will definitely get our attention. This is the case of Ipsy, a monthly subscription box of 5 beauty samples personalized to the customer based on their skin, style and other preferences. It was created by a youtuber who supposedly (or at least she was among the first ones) started the influencer move, Michelle Phan.

3.   Millennial creativity on the brand story – If a brand wants even more customers, they should let them take the lead and spread creativity. Starbucks boosted their brand awareness and sales once they started the “White Cup Contest”. The contest invited people to draw on their mostly white coffee cups and share them online with the hashtag #WhiteCupContest. The winner got 300 dollars, but for the company this campaign was priceless.

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