6 Lessons Higher Education and Ed Technology Has Taught Me About Millenials Marketing

There’s been more marketing research done to study Millenials than any other generation of American consumers. I’ve read my share of the studies, but the greatest lessons I’ve learned have been on the job at the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) as senior vice president of marketing and PR, as marketing consultant to two other colleges, and CEO of ed tech startup Vireo Labs.

Here are my top 6 lessons (so far):

1. Be nimble. Before I made the move to higher education I co-founded a fashion and lifestyle startup built on the Twitter platform targeting early adopter Millenials. As we were releasing our second product the core of our targeted consumer was still very much in love with Facebook and flat out dissed Twitter. Four or five months later, after I had taken over marketing at SCAD, that all changed very dramatically. Teenagers and young adults started leaving the suddenly parent heavy Facebook for the easier and more mobile friendly Twitter world. These platform shifts will continue to happen so pay attention and organize your teams to be able to react to major media consumption shifts like this. Case in point: Snapchat. You don't get it, but they love it.
2. Have a point of view. Perhaps this is part of my personal opinion mixed in with the lessons this job has taught me but as the research has suggested Millenials have a more global view of social, political and financial issues than generations that preceded them as teenagers and young adults. More than anything they have a point of view about issues small and large that my generation simply didn’t start thinking about until much later in life. Trying to get your brand’s point of view in agreement with that of this generation would be a mistake. However, appearing to be neutral is a bigger mistake. It shows your company has no conviction and hints that perhaps your organization hasn’t bothered to give it any thought -- which makes you neutral. In this very noisy, always on world neutral is invisible.
3. Account for family influencers. Remember that these are young adults who still rely on parents and other family members to make big decisions. This is especially true for making decisions about big-ticket items like college. The consideration to go to college runs very broadly into familial networks (i.e. legacy, heritage and location) but very specifically to mom. The lesson for college and non-college marketers alike is that when targeting Millenials you must address the conversation they will be having with parents and others in the family. Build a relationship with that influencer through the medium or channel of their choice – which will not be the same channel. See my note about Twitter and Facebook above. (Forget what other studies tell you: The #1 concern parents have is the safety of their son/daughter on your campus. Address that in all your communications and make sure you have a great public safety department or find another job.)
4. Test your message. Millenials are nothing if not professional multi-taskers especially when it comes to media consumption. Gaming. Social media. Music. YouTube. Text messages. Chats. Email. All are used on multiple devices at a pace that makes us old farts rather dizzy. If your message is not on target immediately it is ignored. Unlike my generation (who disdained advertising and marketing as a rule) Millenials actually like to interact with great marketing but your message and content has to be framed within a worldview they already have. This is true for every consumer, but more so for the generation who has grown up with the unsubscribe button at their fingertips right out of the womb.
5. Email is not dead. Coming into my position at SCAD, I thought that email was irrelevant to our targeted consumer compared to search engine marketing and social media. I was as wrong as rain on a parade. Email can play a critical role in your communications strategy and media mix, but it has to be integrated and phased in with other content on social and the web. In my opinion, email to Millenials must be an opt-in and introduced well after they’ve started to engage with your brand or school. It cannot stand on its own and less is definitely more. For people over 45 years old SPAM is mildly annoying. To Millenials SPAM is evil incarnate and why many don't bother installing email on their phones. A year into my first higher ed gig, my team launched an email campaign (tied to other content) to an already used and very large list of teenagers and we drove prospect conversion rates by almost 400%. We were very selective about the messaging, creative and time of delivery. It can be done.
6. Print publications are dead. I am writing this in a hip coffee shop (clearly, I'm out of place) where I am easily the oldest customer; and I just did a lap around the room. Not a single Millenial has the print edition of the Wall Street Journal or New York Times (or any print publication for that matter) open. As a 47-year-old who started my career in a New York PR/Ad agency, I love the feel of the New York Times in my hands. It makes me feel like a better person just clutching it let alone acting like I’m reading it in public. But I’m not my target audience, they are. So, when it comes to launching an integrated marketing/PR campaign for Millenials save that earned print media push for their parents. And, if you're currently spending money on billboards, let's just call it what it is -- activity not to be mistaken for achievement in recruitment marketing.

For those in higher education. For marketers in higher education, these learnings have particular gravitas in that during my time in and around this space, its clear that colleges are still grappling with organizational design issues that would allow them to move quickly (with one voice and value proposition) across all media to address this fast moving generation of would-be customers. In my post and in talking with many other senior level administrators at other major universities an integrated marketing/communications function that is aligned with IT and sales is still the exception, not the rule. Your prospective students aren't comparing you with other schools, they are comparing you with the experiences they have with Apple, Snapchat and Red Bull. Universities and colleges need to embrace change and reorganize with the idea that the CMO really needs to be the Chief Everything Officer in order for your school to be relevant and engaging to this and future generations of students.