No time like the present

Tags: events | marketing | Streetscape

Marketing to young people is a lot like buying birthday presents. If you're a marketing professional or you understand young people well, you may feel that you can make educated guesses and be pretty sure of success. But to eliminate all doubt you should ask the young people what they want. Find out more about Streetscape's marketing toolkit and how it can help you market your project to young people.

In my last article I talked about how you can liken marketing to throwing a birthday party.I explained that the best party in the world would be a disaster if you forgot to invite the guests.And I showed you how you can make sure that the guests come to your party over all others.Well this month I want to talk to you about something else that's critically important: buying birthday presents.

There are two ways that most people choose what to buy someone for their birthday.If you feel that you know the person really well or that you're particularly talented at choosing gifts, you may decide to buy the person a surprise present.They will have no idea what they're getting and, if you get it right, it'll show them just how well you know them.But if you don't know the person very well at all or have been out of touch for some time there's a big chance you'll get it completely wrong!

The second option, and my personal favourite, is... ask them!Or if you want to preserve the element of surprise, ask someone who knows them a lot better than you do.It removes all the risk and guarantees that your present will be a success.

Marketing to young people is a lot like buying birthday presents.If you're a marketing professional or you understand young people well, you may feel that you can make educated guesses and be pretty sure of success.But to eliminate all doubt you should ask the young people what they want.

Now this can be as simple as having a conversation with a focus group picked from your target audience. Share your ideas with them and listen to their feedback.I mean really listen!And act on their suggestions.But at Streetscape we take it a lot further.By actively involving young people in making all of the marketing decisions, from the planning stages right through to design and production, you can be sure of a campaign that will hit the target first time and give you maximum results.Young people know young people a lot better than you ever will.

In the myplace Marketing Toolkit I will show you dozens of techniques for involving young people in decision making processes.All of the techniques are fully participative and focussed on the learning outcomes for the young people involved.And they'll help you get it right first time, saving you a fortune in 'near misses.'

People will wonder how you became such a 'gifted' marketer.

John Davidson, Streetscape

The marketing toolkit will be available on the myplace website in mid-February.

Find out about the next seminar being held in April.