Advertising to kids with Social Media

August 11th, 2010 Posted by joshuasinason in Business, Findings, Friends, Marketing

As I’ve said here many times before, the medium you choose is just as important as the message. Even though Twitter is one of the most visited websites in the world, that doesn’t mean it’s going to be worth your time to build there. I’ve had to talk more than a few people out of using Twitter to launch a campaign because I felt it was a waste of time to start there. Ideally you should be using Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube and connect them but we’ll focus on where to start at this time.

To put it plainly, twitter was tailor made to advertise to kids. Hot Topic started out as a small cult boutique store and has ballooned into something huge; one of the major reasons is because they know how to use Twitter to build a community for kids and tweens. They know that they want to see funny pictures and videos (What other corporate owned twitter is going to post a picture of a gorilla playing a Gameboy?) and they want to play games and win prizes. On top of that they use Twitter to share the latest music and fads that are coming to there store. They promote autograph signings and other events so that their audience knows what they have coming out. They have built themselves up as an indispensable resource for an audience that wants to stay on top of the latest trending topics.

Another page that is good with kids is Six Flags. One thing that a lot of old Advertising professionals fail to realize is that kids are exposed to the latest tech from a very young age so they know how to do things like upload photos practically from the age of 5. Six Flags takes advantage of this by collecting fan pictures and building a collection of fan made advertising material made by kids for kids through their twitter presence. They’re always encouraging followers to upload “Twitpics,” and holding contests based around the best pictures. The more pictures they get the more online content they have, and the more followers they have, which in turn gets them more pictures. It’s a virtual circle of ever increasing ad revenue. A lot of companies are seeing the value in this and I know a few companies that have someone managing fan uploaded pictures and videos fulltime. That’s definitely an undervalued area of online advertising. Online Pictures and Video are like gold in search engine optimization.

The Field Museum sees the value of getting younger kids interested in their group. After all if kids control one thing it’s what the family does on a sunny Saturday afternoon. They know if they can get kids interested the parents are going to jump at the chance to take them to a museum. They have interesting facts, contests and news about the latest promotions and events; all designed to hold the attention of the most finicky youngster.

The major challenge of advertising to kids on Twitter is that you are as far away from the purse strings as possible, your message has to grab their attention and, not only do you have to be their first choice, you have to have a message that makes parents want to spend money too. It’s like being a salesmen and giving your sales presentation to a secretary, It can be a great presentation but if it isn’t strong enough for it to translate again when they tell the person with the money about it you aren’t getting the sale. It’s a challenge but if you can do it all in 140 characters you have a tremendous upside.

It can be really hard to get demographic tracking on kids. Really the only way to track them is to look at women over 35 because that’s usually where mothers who spend money on behalf of their kids are. With Twitter you can get a good grasp on what the younger demographic is thinking and what their spending habits are just by asking questions. Remember, Twitter is just as useful as a focus group as it is as an advertising medium and companies that use twitter wisely talk to, and follow, their fans.

indyposted.com/36817/top-10-companies-using-twitter-effectively

www.clickz.com/clickz/news/1727218/twitter-hires-first-ad-sales-executives

www.mycustomer.com/topic/marketing/regulations-rights-and-wrongs-social-media-marketing/111559