How Youth Is Redefining Media Consumption
I’ve been having an identity crisis for years now. First, I graduated college. Then, I found out Wisniewski may or may not be my last name. Then, I discovered I’m no longer an Aquarius, and today my world was rocked once more. I just learned that Nielson has coined a new term to describe my generation of Americans from the age of 18 to 34: Sorry Generation Y, we are referred to as Generation C — at least by Nielsen.
This leads me to wonder: Who am I?
But I digress. Regardless of semantics of what generation I’m a member of, Nielsen’s latest data shows that Generation Me is redefining media consumption – and that shift is of great import to banks who say they want to “be” wherever their customers are. In other words, the data shows that the group is more connected online and more into the digital devices than any other age group.
Indeed, the Nielsen and NM Incite’s U.S. Digital Report, which came out this week, found that the group represents an “outsized portion of consumers watching online video (27%), visiting social networking/blog sites (27%), owning tablets (33%) and using a smartphone (39%). Nielson also found that Generation C is the largest group of smartphone owners and tablets in America.
Though Generation C is defined as connected to technology, the challenge for banking marketers is how do you grab our attention? I’m probably ignoring your TV ad as I’m browsing Twitter on my iPad, for example.
“Their ownership and use of connected devices makes them incredibly unique consumers makes them incredibly unique consumers, representing both a challenge and opportunity for marketers and content providers alike,” blogged Nielsen.
Still, the data across all age groups showed some encouraging news for financial services companies wanting to break into the loyalty scene: 29% of smartphone owners use their phone for shopping-related activities and more than half of mobile users are repeat visitors to daily deal sites. Furthermore, Nielsen data shows that 24% of all consumers search for/using online coupons in the past 30 days.
