MOBILE89.CO.CC: Ypulse Daily Update: What 'Happy' Means To Students, Lessons From The Morgan Stanley Teen Intern & More

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Ypulse Daily Update: What 'Happy' Means To Students, Lessons From The Morgan Stanley Teen Intern & More

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Ypulse Daily Update 07.14.09
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Ypulse Essentials: Nissan Cube, 'My Fabulous 15,' NAACP Gets Younger At 100

Posted by meredith

'iPhone on wheels' (Nissan's new campaign for the Cube emphasizes the social and entertaining aspects of the car, i.e, another "essential mobile device." Also the Boston Globe dives into other carmakers' approach to indifferent young drivers) (MediaPost, reg. required)

- J.C. Penney makes a back-to-school push (for teens with a new website. Plus MediaPost, reg. required, looks at how college students spend their money, and what brands get them to spend it) (Reuters)

- My Fabulous 15 (Verizon targets Hispanic teens with a contest to win the Quinceanera of their dreams. Also British teens call for an affordable way to watch BBC shows on their phones) (Revolution)

- NAACP celebrates centennial with a new wave (of youth activists, reporting the number of members under 25 as "significantly higher." Plus, check out the live blog for the "80 Million Strong" National Summit for young Americans) (BET) (Future Majority)

- 'Miss O launches virtual world (the tween social network expands with virtual world. Also Wired questions the "life lessons" taught by a new wave of tween girl games)

- Anna Sui's Target line does without 'Gossip' (forgoing the heavy product placement on the show after Target execs express concerns over the scandalous content. Also "Hard Times" a new scripted series from MTV draws comparisons with HBO's series "Hung." Hmm. Also Universal Pictures releases a tamer version of Bruno for UK teens) (Daily News) (Reuters) (Los Angeles Times)

- 'The perils of teen travel' (Daily Beast reports on the dangers of studying abroad)

- Skate the web (Adverblog pays heed to Nike and Converse for their low-key collaborations with skate sites. Plus Sunkist launches a charity campaign to "refresh the lemonade stand" on Facebook)

- Born to boomerang (Hyphen Magazine on why Asian American Millennials moving home is nothing new) (Hyphen Magazine)

Posted in: Ypulse Essentials

Can Students Be Both Happy & Stressed?

Posted by anastasia

I can't remember who once told me the word "fine" as in "I'm doing fine" is actually an acronym for F-d up, insecure, neurotic and emotional. The idea being that many people might say they're "fine" when they're really not. I thought about this after reading an article about MTV's latest "happiness" poll and what a a child and adolescent psychiatrist added as a cautionary note. The press spin on the poll (I haven't seen the actual research) is that young people are "happy" -- in fact "happier" than last year -- despite the tough economy. From the article:

The poll showed that 73 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds were generally happy with life, compared with 66 percent in 2007, even though more of them, including Lagrappe, think they'll have a harder time finding work, buying a house and raising a family than their parents did.

Compared to 2007 results, the poll, which included young people ranging in age from 13 to 24, showed respondents are less happy with the amount of money they have — 36 percent to 31 percent, with 53 percent saying they believe it will be harder to find a job than it was for their parents, compared to 30 percent two years ago.

Fifty-nine percent said they'll have a harder time buying a house, compared to 41 percent in 2007, and 48 percent said it will be harder to raise a family, compared to 36 percent in 2007.

Of respondents ages 13-17, 75 percent said they were happy, up from 65 percent two years ago and 72 percent of those polled from age 18 to age 24 said they were happy, up from 66 percent in 2007.

The psychiatrist interviewed added that the tough times could be heralding a return to less materialistic means of being happy, i.e. focusing on relationships vs. our addiction to material goods. But he also raised the issue I alluded to in my opener:

Part of the reason for the disconnect between happiness and the new economic reality could be the definition of happy, Rosenfeld said.

"It's much too simple a term, and I think our teenagers and young adults are far more complicated," he said.

And, in this country, people may be afraid to describe themselves as unhappy.

My gut says this is probably more likely, or at least that there is a lot more complexity behind young people self reporting that they are "happy." As the psychiatrist said, "Everybody's supposed to put on a happy face. I don't find teenagers to be unhappy, but I do find them to be quite concerned about the future, quite concerned about finding their place in the world." mtvU's recent study of college students, which is available online, gives you an idea of how young people can feel both happy and optimistic while also being quite stressed.

For marketers, the message is to focus on products for youth that can make them happy on a budget. The message for anyone who cares about young people is even if they say everything's "fine," ask a lot more questions to find out what's really going on and figure out how you can help them manage the increasing amounts of stress in their lives resulting from the economy -- whether they're happy or not.

For more coverage of youth marketing, go to the Ypulse Youth Marketing Channel sponsored by Youth Marketing Connection

Posted in: Ypulse Essentials | Youth Marketing

About What The 15-Year-Old Morgan Stanley Intern Said...

Posted by meredith

"Put a skeptical 15-year-old on your payroll." For those of you who weren't in attendance at the Ypulse Youth Marketing Mashup, these words of wisdom were spoken by youth guru and Mashup keynote speaker Josh Shipp as advice to any brand with an interest in the demo. And don't they seem prescient now?

If Matthew Robson, the skeptical 15 year old intern behind for the sensation-inducing media report on teen habits, wasn't being paid by Morgan Stanley before, the job offers are surely rolling in now. From the Financial Times:

" [The report was] one of the clearest and most thought-provoking insights we have seen – so we published it", said Edward Hill-Wood, executive director of Morgan Stanley's European media team.

'We've had dozens and dozens of fund managers, and several CEOs, e-mailing and calling all day.' He said the note had generated five or six times more responses than the team's usual research.

On the one hand, it's an encouraging turn of events. To generate that type of enthusiasm from fund managers and CEOs, not to mention incite a media frenzy, all simply by formalizing the commonplace practice of... asking the intern. I mean, haven't teens and twentysomethings always been the de facto in house youth experts in the office?

That's why, less notable than the insight itself [well-trodden territory for those of us who live in the youth space] was the credit and credibility Robson was awarded for his work. Sure, it had the trappings of a publicity stunt -- offering the inner workings of a real, live teen to inquiring minds of the financial industry -- but I couldn't help but appreciate the transparency. From the report's introduction:

..we asked a 15 year old summer work intern, Matthew Robson, to describe how he and his friends consume media. Without claiming representation or statistical accuracy, his piece provides one of the clearest and most thought provoking insights we have seen. So we published it.

Say what you will about the findings (more on that in a bit) that came out of the unscientific methodology, but the effort to recognize and reward young employees (or future employees) seems like a step in the right collaborative direction. Especially for an old-school intergenerational company like Morgan Stanley and the conventionally non-youthy space of finance.

That said, before other similarly conventionally non-youthy businesses take the cue and follow suit, let's hope this other piece of sage advice floats their way: interns are not the definitive litmus test of teenage taste. They are a starting point, and a great one at that, but one teen and their friends can't take the place of research. A couple sticking points from the report:

Personal tastes vs. fact. To his credit, Robson mostly sticks with general terms, but when he does get specific, for instance parenthetically reporting on the popularity of anime -- "Many teenagers use YouTube to watch videos (usually anime which cannot be watched anywhere else)" -- I feel skeptical and slightly frustrated with the language that nonchalantly implies the observation as fact. The same goes for his note that "Teenage boys (generally) watch more TV when it is the football season, often watching two games and related shows a week (for a total of about 5 hours of viewing)."

Subtle shifts get lost. After the report that came out just yesterday on UK teens downloading from file-sharing sites less and streaming more, Robson's lack of emphasis on this trend with his note that, "a large majority (8/10) [of teens are] downloading [music] illegally from file sharing sites" stuck out as off the mark.

Of course, "real" research has its own problems, as we've discussed before on Ypulse. All the more reason why companies should ideally do both -- talk to their interns or kids and looking at research critically -- to create an approach based on a combination of the two.

For more campus coverage, visit the Ypulse Campus Channel, sponsored by Campus Media Group.

Posted in: Ypulse Essentials | Youth Marketing | Campus

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