Target Marketing Teens

Teens can be tricky to market to sometimes. Sometimes they can be easy to market to, but other times they can be extremely skeptic and it not affect us at all.

Marketers wanting to market to teens need to know exactly what they are marketing, and be aware how teens respond to marketing in that exact area. Different things need to be marketed different ways to different teens. A good angle for most things with most teens is to market that your thing is the best, coolest, and newest; make them feel they have to have it because everyone else does, and most of the time you have them. But marketers have to be careful that their product matches that image. If you market your product as the coolest, newest, sleekest thing, and it looks boring or normal – you’ve missed the mark for teens.

Some other teens are much trickier to market to, however. Some teens are not interested in the slightest about the next big thing and being “cool”. Some teens are only interested in what they need. But do not be deceived  Even these teens can be marketed to, and can be convinced to buy something if you hit just what they want and how they want it. If marketers are looking to market to these teens, they need to do their research and find out exactly what they want and how.

Marketers must also be very careful WHAT the product they are offering is – some products teens would have no interest in whatsoever. Having a product that teens do not want will tank your marketing – unless you are really lucky and market it just right so they THINK they absolutely need it.

Also if you have an amazing product that teens want and will love, but market it wrong – you’ll be screwed. Good rules to keep in mind that generally work for teens in general are; fun, cool, trendy, popular. And if you can find some really new cool way to market something; even better!

 

How I respond to media

My response to media in the world is kind of a mixture of things.

Disbelief, annoyance, disgust, disinterest and similar feelings is one response. Disbelief for what I’m being told, disbelief for what is being shown; annoyance at the amount of incoming media to my brain. Absolute disgust and anger at the over-sexualization and inappropriateness in media. The way that most advertising will try to sell anything with sex, and have no shame. The way ads like Calvin Klein are not only sold with sex – but sold with images that represent rape and male dominance. I hate the way all media portrays women; and the messages it sends them.

But I also have positive reactions to media as well. For example music; I really enjoy music, though my response to it is also again mixed. Most of the mainstream Hollywood music I am disgusted with – all of the men singing all about women and getting them in their bed and money, cars, and stuff. All the girls whining about boys breaking up with them – *cough* Taylor Swift *cough.

Advertising also can pull me in sometimes. Catchy commercials are really the ones that get me. Things like Hotwire.com (“H-O-T W-I-R-E – Hotwire dot com!“), the DQ commercials, Old Spice; basically anything I can talk along with or memorize.

So basically my responses to media very much depends on the form of media, what it’s saying, and some days; just my mood.

Though if I really really had to sum it up in one-two words, I would say I’m critical, or a sponge. I am very critical of media; the way women are portrayed, whether or not it is being sold with sex (because all media is sold, no matter what form of media it is), is any persons or group being excluded or put down, etc. But on the opposite side I can also just be a sponge that is so naive it believes any advertising that says “this is the best thing ever and it will do this better than anything else and you need it now!”.

An interest I have: Polyvore.com

Polyvore.com is a website I am interested in because of the variety of things you can do on it. I originally joined it solely to make outfit sets for my fan fiction I was writing, but eventually I began discovering other aspects of the sites. I joined groups and entered contests, and eventually discovered art sets and began making those. Now I only make art sets.

Polyvore is used many different ways for different people. Many people use it for its original use; fashion sets, and some have even discovered careers using this avenue. Some others use this site for just the reason I originally joined, and some role-play and write stories right in the descriptions of their sets.

Something I discovered that some other people do is to use it as an outlet for art therapy. I discovered a group of abuse survivors who use Polyvore to make art sets that are a way to process their abuse memories and flashbacks. I became friends with a few of them and met my two best friends this way. Talking to many of them, they have found it a very effective outlet for this use, and some have even shared this with their therapists and their therapists use this in therapy and give them assignments on Polyvore.

I decided to try art sets for myself, and have and do use Polyvore as a sort of visual diary. You can put descriptions on these sets where you can write long descriptions, so I make an art set and write a diary sort of description with it. I also use it purely for fun and make pretty art sets.

A few times in the past I have also used Polyvore to do assignments for teachers if it is a visual assignment  For example, in my previous focus program, Studio LC, I made a few advertisements on Polyvore.