With each passing year, the market demographic is changing. Millennials are quickly becoming the majority in most markets. Marketing techniques, that have previously worked with Baby Boomers or Gen X, don’t work on millennials.
Not knowing how to sell your product or service to them is causing a lot of issues.
Millennials have been actively blamed for destroying industries, including the diamond and housing industry because they love avocadoes. However, blaming the millennials isn’t going to help. It overlooks a major problem which is that most businesses no longer know how to sell to them.
If you’re in the same boat, the following are a few tips on how you can sell well to millennials:
1. Appealing to Their Emotions
Millennials are an emotional lot and you’ll see that anything they have an emotional connection to will sell more. Instead of looking for ways to sell more, think of the overall message you are conveying. Body positivity, inclusivity, and social rights are all areas that incite an emotional response and connect with millennials.
Nike’s marketing highlights how millennials respond. Their campaigns which featured Serena Williams and Colin Kaepernick earned them consumer loyalty and also increased sales.
2. Pay Attention to Your Message
Unlike the last generations, you cannot pull the wool over the eyes of millennials. This is because they’ve grown up seeing the impact of wrong marketing and the negative messages they have. Millennials will react strongly to marketing mistakes.
Dove’s campaign is all about body positivity and inclusivity but, they’ve also faced backlash for racism, boxing women into categories and also harming perceptions of women. Using Dove’s products doesn’t make one feel suddenly beautiful so have a campaign based on that message is a bit unrealistic.
3. Match Your Communication to Them
Look at the platforms that millennials use for communication and then match your marketing according to it. Social media plays a bigger role in their lives than TV, radio or even magazines. With more mobile platforms available now, marketing to millennials means that you dedicate almost 60% to 70% of your energy to this area.
Use of channels like Facebook Messenger, email and live chat is common. Additionally, millennials like bite-sized yet detailed information. They’re constantly bombarded with so much that they usually flit from one thing to another. You only get a few seconds to make sure that you’re doing it the right way.
4. Add Value to Your Products
The buying power of millennials is much different than baby boomers. It is noted that millennials are the only generation that earns less than their parents. It’s not surprising to see why. Most millennials have student loans and debt to deal with.
They’re also trying to work with a damaged economy that’s still recovering from the great recession in the late 2000s. This has lead to the creation of consumers who seek value in their products. Millennials have mastered the art of being thrifty. They want products that offer them amazing value for their money and they always do their research.
With these tips, you can easily understand millennial buying behavior and market your products better too.
