Weekly Reads – M is for Millennials and Mobile

Millennials. Mobile. You can’t set foot into any coffee shop, marketing department or corner office without overhearing these two topics being discussed, debated, strategized and agonized over. This week, we dive into both of these subjects with viewpoints and insights from all ends of the spectrum, starting with a CMO and a 13-year-old.

Social Marketing

AdAdge: How to Get Millennials to Love Your Brand
Millennials continue to not only be one of the most desirable targets for brands to market to, but they are also one of the most generalized and misunderstood. AdAge recaps the recent research by Barkey that looked into how brands can market to the constantly moving target that is the Millennial.

Facebook

Mashable: I’m 13 and None of My Friends Use Facebook
Everyone is on Facebook. Everyone is leaving Facebook. Everyone is (fill in the blank) Facebook. There are a lot of different conversations out there in regards to Facebook and how users are engaging with the medium. This op-ed piece gives an insightful take on how a 13-year-old New Yorker views Facebook, other social platforms and her rational on why she chooses to engage or not engage with them. At GFM we believe this debate is yet another reason why it is so critical to understand who your audience is and where they are interacting with your brand.

Twitter and Facebook

eMarketer: Mobile User Bases at Facebook and Twitter Keep Growing
28 million and 100 million. That’s the number of people who will use their mobile phones to access Twitter and Facebook, respectively, at least once a month in 2013. With social access via mobile increasing exponentially, brands need to think about how this affects not only their content strategy but their “tab strategy” as well. When it comes to Facebook, the inability for a user to access tabs on their mobile device needs to be a consideration as marketers build out their strategic plans.

YelpVerge: Yelp Finally Adds Option to Write Reviews From iPhone App
This is not an old headline…we promise. Yelp has just now announced that users can finally write a review…in the app…on their mobile phone! Yelp had long held the notion that “quality reviews” were best penned on a computer and not in the spur (or heat) of the moment but this announcement clearly marks a change in that philosophy. Brands should keep an ever vigilant eye on their Yelp profiles in the coming weeks as this announcement is sure to draw a horde of new reviews. With this in mind, brands should be ready to engage their social customer service response strategy to ensure the best customer experience.