Shift of focus from Millennials to Plurals – What you need to start thinking about

Millennials, the term coined by William Strauss and Neil Howe, or Gen Y refers to anyone born between 1982-2004. All brands big and small are writing lengthy briefs and burning mid night oil with their agencies to target this segment. A lot of information is available about them – interests, group dynamics, general tendencies, how each one wants to be and is unique. The Millennials have been called the “all about me” generation, social generation, selfie generation, each research house comes up with a new but same insight about these not-so-young youngsters. There is already a struggle in selling to them; as their buying patterns are so very different, so much so, that they (Millennials) have rendered the traditional sales funnel void. Social and Digital can come in at any and all stages of the sales funnel. Millennials are immune to advertising / push messaging / product placement / traditional marketing and PR tactics. Mobile marketing has seen a major boost and a new trend of trying to use social influencers to market is picking up. New social channels are coming and going every few months, and new social stars rise every-day thanks to YouTube and other social content sites.

Millennials are starting to grow older now, like myself some are now in their early 30s, are young parent. Their disposable income is growing, which is good, but who actually controls the house-hold spend, what are the factor that are affect their decisions to spend. Millennials were mainly born with a bullish persona, risk takers and not afraid of the changing new world. As time has gone on, we have seen not 1 but multiple recessions, we have seen countries go bankrupt, mass terrorism attacks and threats. A lot of the generation has leaned to curb its bullish tendencies and are passing on a much more conservative thinking to the next generation.

So let’s talk about the new generation. As you might imagine, they're got a new name in mind for the generation that's following the Millennials. Since its still young days, no one name has emerged as the standard, some experts are calling this new cohort, with its oldest members just entering their teen years, the "Pluralist Generation" — "Plurals," for short, among the other top runners so far are - Generation Z, Generation I ( where I stands for Internet as proposed by Bill Gates, Gates has used the term to refer to children born after 1994, describing them as the first generation to grow up with the Internet) and Re-Generation.

Now some would say that Millennial were the first generation of Digital Natives — unconsciously competent users of both computers and of the Internet. But that’s not to say that the Plurals’ haven’t been shaped by a major technology leap forward: in their case, they are the first unconscious participants in an era when everyone has access to everything, everywhere, at all times. This is the generation of mobile technology, wireless communication, and constant content exchange.

15 years ago not all computers had internet, let alone mobile devices having wi-fi. Today every computer is connected to the Internet, and over 70% of the worldwide population have smart mobile devices. With billions of mobile users worldwide and a massive global network, small mobile devices with significant computing power have become a routine part of day-to-day life for people of all ages. The combination of a smartphone’s intuitive interface and thousands of apps for iPhones and Androids aimed at young children has fast made it a child’s favourite plaything. As the mother of a 4 year old believe me I tried to keep my son away from TV / mobile / tablets for as long as I could but like everyone else I’ve been passing my phone to the little one sometimes as tools to educate or at others as a gadget to pacify. Just looking at my son’s school friends and my own friend circle (sample size of around 50 families)

• All 4- to 7-year-olds use a smartphone or tablet for a minimum of 1hr a day
• 80% of all 8years and above have a personal mobile device
• 90% of households with children aged 4-12 have a tablet and multiple mobile devices

The last decade or so has seen a plethora of application and platforms giving us easy access to content in multiple forms: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Line, Vine, Snapchat, Wechat, and the list goes on… These are just a small sample of technologies that found their way into our vocabularies and day-to-day lives. Add cloud computing to this proliferation of content and resources and content become accessible — anytime, anywhere. Many applications that were previously expensive or unavailable are now free to anyone with a web browser.

For Plurals access to unlimited content, endless activities and games are a fact of life.

• Over 70% of 4-6 year olds use the Internet
• 90% of tweens (10-12) play online games
• Younger children spend over 10 hours a week playing games or consuming video content

Legions of physicians and academics will be studying the implications of all this technology on children’s brains and thinking skills for years to come — often with sharp disagreement on the dangers and benefits. My interest is how swimming in this digital soup has shaped the young generation’s view of the world. What assumptions have they formed? I can make the below observations:

Always connected: Perpetual connectivity is the underlying assumption for them. Technology is how people meet, express ideas, define identities, and understand each other. They will not be tolerant of any disruption in service, for any reason what so ever, they expect it to always work and be there like the air they breathe.

Options (not obligations): Because technology is so intimately intertwined with the Plural’s sense of self, they control it in a way that older individuals often don’t. While Boomers or X’ers may feel obligated to respond to the technology, the Plurals’ use the technology with choice – on their own schedule, at their own pace.

Anonymity: By connecting online, there is a reduced need to connect face-to-face. Many have friends they’ve never met with whom they interact regularly. This creates a strange sense of anonymity — they can be everywhere or no-where if they choose to post or, depending on their preference, not post. Physical appearances have been replaced with avatars.

Confidence and control: This is a generation that is used to asking big questions — and is confident of finding answers. Be it political, humanitarian, scientific or philosophical questions. They have had the experience of digging deeply into a burning question because they have access to a mountain of information.

Test, beta and move on: They lack patience to wait for continuous testing, once they have an idea they want to make it and try it, share it. It’s a generation of Beta products and ideas. Angel investors / Kickstarter will see a much higher traffic in terms of ideas coming in asking for funding, as everyone thinks of better way to do everyday things. The lack of patience also mean they tend to move on and get bored very easily.

Already Plurals are starting to take an active role when it comes to how the household income is spent, they are actively learning from the previous generations, and each other. They want to and are motivated to make a difference in the world. So I for one will keep my observation-hat on and continue to see how they develop, as a mother I have vested interest in my kids’ future. As a marketer I am very curious to see how the business world evolves to face this new challenge. I foresee some very interesting times ahead.