The Trouble with Tweens: MTV Struggles to Reach Elusive Audience

Today's teens and tweens (ages 8-12) are constantly on-the-go. Between cell phones, YouTube, Myspace, Facebook, video games and iPhones, it's increasingly hard for marketers to know where to turn to target tomorrow's core customers. This group of sophisticated spenders is not going to be reached with the Toys "R" Us catalogs and Saturday morning cartoons their predecessors thrived on.

While earlier groups of teens were known as the 'MTV Generation,' referring to their lack of attention span and attraction to flashy, fast-paced content, this generation seems to be rebelling against traditional teen-magnet MTV. What used to be a sure-fire way to reach young minds is now losing ground, according to Wired's analysis of Viacom's Q2 earnings reports.

To help combat this problem, MarketingVox has put together a collection of tips on seeking out and reeling in the tween audience. According to their piece, 33.3 million teens were in the US in 2003, with discretionary spending power (allowances, gifts, earnings from odd jobs) totaling $42.3 billion and was projected to increase by 1.7 percent year over year.

Top motivating factors for tweens?

• The need to belong
• The desire for power
• More freedom from parents (but not too much. That parents approve of their choices is still important to them)
• The desire to have fun — sensory stimulation is crucial to a product's success

Check out the rest of the MarekitngVox How-To for more tips on targeting tweens.

Image: National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign

Don't Listen to the Voices in Your Head

Advertising has moved to a new realm... invading your thought. So next time you think you hear voices in your head... it may just be Coke telling you that you're thirsty.

Companies are beginning to use hypersonic sound - a targeted beam that causes anyone who crosses it's path to hear a message in their mind.

Freaky.

Clive Thompson writes about his first encounter with this futuristic advertising medium in this month's Wired. He writes:

"Trolling down the street in Manhattan, I suddenly hear a woman's voice.

'Who's there? Who's there?' she whispers. I look around but can't figure out where it's coming from. It seems to emanate from inside my skull.

Was I going nuts? Nope. I had simply encountered a new advertising medium: hypersonic sound. It broadcasts audio in a focused beam, so that only a person standing directly in its path hears the message. In this case, the cable channel A&E was using the technology to promote a show about, naturally, the paranormal."

Yes, it's pretty cool... fascinating, actually. But is this new invasion of our thoughts ethical? Or even legal? Thompson also examines the greater world of emerging brain technologies... leaving us feeling that we're losing our grasp on what may be our only true sanctuary... our own minds.