Hey Teen, Give Me a Call
If you are trying to reach teens, you know you probably should not buy a newspaper ad. That was true in 1976 and today. You just don’t see kids pulling out the newsprint to find something to do or for information.
If you are a college trying to reach teens or business recruiting teens for jobs, there are some new changes coming in how you approach this audience. Research by YouGov found that most teens prefer to hang out in person with friends, but a growing group, nearly 1 in 5, prefer video chat over face-to-face.
We are all using more and more mobile platforms to communicate, but teens are absolutely addicted to their phones. The platforms teens prefer are Facetime and Skype. According to the study, “female teens were more likely than males to prefer video chats over real-life meetups” but the difference is only 4 percentage points difference.
So what does this mean? Well, don’t ask those teens to come into an interview, you may just want to interview them over Facetime. You may want to make sure the people who are reaching out to teens also are up on Facebook Live and Skype–definitely, don’t ask them to give you a call.
Mark Mathis
Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle. After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant. He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.” Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.” One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College. Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board. Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.
