The Biggest Youth Marketing Campaign of 2008

The undecided bloc has shrunk from 14% to 7% and the polls are showing Obama ahead by a furlong as the race rounds the final bend. Both sides know that the biggest risk to Obama's election is youth voter complacency. We are about to see the the biggest youth marketing campaign of the year: Get Out the Vote. Many of these efforts rely on celebrity influence: Comedienne Sarah Silverman is asking young voters to visit or call their relatives in an imaginative effort called The Great Schlep. Her video calls for young people to visit their relatives in Florida and convince them to vote for Obama. If you can't visit, call (mini-Schlep). The Great Schelp was featured on Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood and on Facebook. Hip hop artists, The Beastie Boys, are staging a series of get out the vote concerts featuring Sheryl Crow, Norah Jones, Ben Harper and Crosby & Nash. The concerts will be held in three swing states: WI, MN and VA. T.I., Ludacris and Ne-Yo will tour the country to educate potential young voters for two special episodes of 106 and Park that are scheduled to air in October. A MySpace- and HeadCount-sponsored contest among colleges to see which can sign up the most voters. Death Cab will perform on the winning campus.

Will all this effort make a difference? We won't know until election day. What is apparent is that getting out the vote could make the difference in who wins.

Gallup figures released today (10.19.08) look at the race according to two scenarios. In the traditional approach, voters' intention to participate in the current election as well as their voting history in previous presidential elections is considered. This method shows Obama leading McCain by just three points, 49% to 46%. The second approach considers only voters' self-professed likelihood to vote in 2008, and does not factor in whether they voted in past elections. This approach assumes new registrants and infrequent voters will turn out on Election Day to a greater extent than has been the case historically. Using this approach, Obama leads by seven points, 51% to 44%, twice the margin as the first scenario. No wonder Obama is concerned about complacency, despite his clear lead in the polls.

Shop the Vote: Marketing the Election to Millennials

Are Millennials engaged in this election? Opinions are divided (see earlier blogpost and comments). But whether they care or not, getting out the vote is a marketing issue -- and a marketing opportunity for those interested in reaching Millennials.

First there was Rock the Vote; now there is Shop the Vote. Shop the Vote is a partnership between the filmmaker who brought us "18 in '08", a documentary that provides a picture of this year's 18-year olds and why they should care about this election. I haven't seen the film, but would like to. A 6-minute CNN video (accessible from the home page, with film creator, David Burstein, yielded a great quote representing the message of the file: "I understand your cynicism." 18 in '08's web site is worth visiting. It describes its missions as a "peer to peer youth voter engagement and mobilization organizationsing the film as a voter registration vehicle." The site is comprehensive and engaging, a great example of Millennials talking to Millennials.

The other partner in Shop the Vote is Access 360 Media, which describes itself as "a premier multi-platform media network that connects to more than 173MM young adult (P12-34) consumers each month in the places and through the communication channels that matter most to them: In-store, Online and Mobile." In-store partners include Journey and FYE.

A visit to Shopthevote.org provides many opportunities to get involved in the election:

Links to Obama and McCain campaign web sites

Download mobile media wallpaper and signups for election news delivered to your cell phone

Register to vote

Participate in a poll

Upload videos

The main purpose of the site, no doubt, is capturing email and mobile numbers in exchange for debate alerts and other relevant content -- and presumably ad messages. It's not clear how successful this effort has been, or will be. But as a creative approach to engaging Millennials in the election -- and exploiting a marketing opportunity at the same time -- I admit it is impressive.

Who Cares? Millennial Engagement in Election 2008

There's universal agreement that the youth vote is critical to the outcome of the 2008 election, but how engaged are Millennials? Engagement is a tricky thing to measure, but just released data (9.23.08) from Pew Research sheds some light. First, the table shows a strong trend among 18-24 year olds for going 'newsless'; 34% say they watch no news on a daily basis, up from 25% in 1998. (Presumably news on the Comedy Channel doesn't count as 'news', although I'm not sure.) While over 9 out of 10 18-29 year olds say they intend to vote, only 7 out of 10 say they 'definitely plan to vote' and less than two thirds say they voted in their precinct last time they had a chance, and only 4 out of 10 say they 'always' vote. These figures are even lower for 'cell phone only' respondents.

Given these figures, it's clear why the candidates are focusing on social media to engage young voters. Obama is doing far better than McCain, but the gap is closing. According to Hitwise, Obama gets about 56% of the total candidate web site traffic. As of Sept. 9, Obama boasted 510,799 MySpace friends, compared with McCain's 87,652 friends, a more than 5-to-1 lead in number of friends, but down from a 7-to-1 advantage in August according to Live Research. Obama also has a sizeable leads on Facebook with 1,726,453 supporters to McCain's 309,591. Obama's Web site has twice as many videos posted to his official YouTube channel and far more YouTube channel subscribers, by an 11-to-1 margin. But what is surprising to me, is that these figures aren't higher, given the penetration of these media among young people.

The Stanford Daily, in an article yesterday titled "Just How Political Is This Place?", quotes Evan Purcell '09 as saying "it's diffcult to stay informed; politics isn't a big social presence here." My daughter at Notre Dame reported the same lack of interest when I asked how students were responding to the Palin pick. "Mom, we're in a bubble." While I am sure some campuses, like George Washington University in DC, are more passionate about politics, neither candidate should overestimate the 'engagement' of today's young voters in the election -- at least for now.

Millennial Media: Campaign News Sources

What media do Millennials rely on for election news? Political marketers addressing the youth vote would be wise to avoid overreliance on Internet media. Among the 88% of Millennials who are actively seeking or at least paying attention to the 2008 election, there is as much reliance on old fashioned TV news as on flashy Internet web sites. According to a May 2008 study by Crawford, Johnson, Northcott, a respected audience research firm, “Even with all of the media options available to Americans, television still rules – at least as a source for presidential election information.” CJN's research shows National, Local and Cable TV News are the three most relied upon media sources for election news across every age group -- including 18-29 year olds.

What about Internet media, surely young people are more likely to turn to the web for news than their parents or Gen X’ers? Reliance on Internet media for election news across all four age groups polled reveals a surprisingly complex dynamic. It’s not as simple as 'young = Internet, old = TV'.

• Across all four age groups, news organization web sites are the most heavily relied upon. • Those under 45 are more likely to rely on ISP news pages than those 45 and older.

• There is no age difference in likelihood of relying on candidate email, political web sites and local TV web sites.

• The largest age differences are in reliance on YouTube and social networking sites, which skew strongly young, but have fairly low penetration even among 18-29 year olds (less than 1 in 5).

What Do Millennials Think of Sarah Palin?

Evidence is mounting that Sarah Palin is making an impact on young voters. While it's not clear whether he selection changed anyone's mind about the candidates, she seems to have emboldened those who already favored McCain to speak out.

Gallup data has shown for months that about a third of 18-24 year old voters are for McCain. However, youthful McCain supporters have been, at least until now, less passionate about their candidate than Obama supporters. A quick glance at the candidates' friends tallies on Facebook shows Obama leading that 'race' by nearly a million friends. However, Sarah Palin has already gathered two-thirds as many friends as McCain. Nancy Meinhardt of Miami, wrote on her 'wall' on August 30, "I think that Sarah Palin is a great choice. McCain was not my 1st choice but after seeing his choice for VP I am sold and ready to work full time on his campaign."

The Wall Street Journal, in an article titled "Palin's Entry Gives GOP Ticket Shot at Capturing the Youth Vote" (9.11.08), reports that 32% of 18-34 year old voters say that McCain's choice of a running mate makes them more likely to vote for him, compared to just 17% who say the same thing of Obama's running mate choice. The Journal goes on to say that Palin makes supporting McCain 'cool' -- or at least less uncool:

"She reminds me of my friends", said Allyson Wartick, 20, a sophomore at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Just two weeks ago, the mood on campus "was definitely, 'Obama is the cool place to be,'" said Jennifer Kacerosky, 21, senior a the University of Florida. This past weekend, though, she went to a football game sporting a McCain-Palin button, and "it was, 'Where'd you get that? I need that!'"

What makes Palin appealing to Millennials? Here are some hypotheses:

First, Sarah is an overnight celebrity and Millennials relate to that -- after all they have grown up believing anyone with talent can become a star (see earlier post "I want to be a star" for more on that subject).

Second, it may be that Palin reminds Millennials of their Moms. This generation is remarkable for its good relationships with their parents, they respect what their Moms have accomplished.

Another hypothesis is her social conservatism is appealing, at least to some young voters. Pew says 46% of 18-30 year olds believe abortion should be banned or limited.

Maybe it's because, at 44, Sarah is young herself. Her achievements don't seem that out of reach, and her particular brand of feminism, which features life-work balance, is in sync with young women's own aspirations for having it all - marriage, family and career.

Whatever the reason, the Sarah factor has made predictions of Obama's lock on the youth vote a little less certain.

Brand McCain: What Will It Take to Win Millennials?

The latest Gallup poll shows Barack Obama leading John McCain 56% to 35% among 18-29 year olds. By now, Obama's strategy of mobilizing youth is generally acknowledged to be the edge that can/will win the election. Recent articles in Ad Age and Newsweek do a great job of analyzing Brand Obama's singular appeal to Millennials. Andrew Romano, a 25 year old associate editor for Newsweek traveling with the candidates, first wrote about Obama and Millennials back in February, in an article titled, "He's one of us now," he wrote, ""how fully and seamlessly he embodies the attitudes, aspirations and shortcomings of the generation that's rallied around him." Today, Ad Age features an article, "What Obama Can Teach You About Millennial Marketing" that praises Obama's 'brand management': "Mr. Obama's brand management, unprecedented in presidential politics, shows pitch-perfect understanding of the keys to appealing to the youngest voters."

Where does this leave Brand McCain? Well, he needs to play catch up for sure, but all is not lost. Fortunately, there is more than one way to appeal to Millennials, as many marketers are discovering. Here are some ideas for Brand McCain as it attempts a "Millennial Makeover".

1. Emphasize Authenticity. Many Millennials voted for the first time four years ago, and many of them voted for McCain. Millennials value authenticity above all. Obama, according to Ad Age may have the smoothest brand, but McCain should emphasize his willingness to take the unpopular stand, when it is true to his values.

2. Downplay Age. The age jokes have to go. The lack of technology, the fact he is proud of never having done a Google search. Vietnam for these voters is what WWII is for Baby Boomers -- WAAAY before my time. Half of all Millennials aren't even aware that their generation has been labeled. They don't think of themselves as a 'generation' yet, just as young people working on their resume and figuring out what impact they want to make on the world.

3. Tell Stories of Personal Altruism: Focus on John and Cindy McCain's personal rather than only political efforts to make a difference: John and Cindy McCain have real track record of jumping in when their personal money or compassion can make a difference, as they did when they adopted a child from India and encouraged others to do so. They need to stop being modest about these deeds, or let someone else tell their stories.

4. Talk About Economic Opportunity. Millennials are deeply concerned about their personal economic future and ability to maintain the standard of living their parents enjoyed. As they begin to make paychecks, they are experiencing the real impact of high taxes. As a business owning, wealthy, successful American family that has managed to do good while making a personal fortune, John and Cindy McCain should in a good position to speak to Millennials' economic aspirations.

5. Show Them Your Team: Millennials are famously collaborative and team-oriented. They understand that leadership is about who is 'on the bus' and how they are managed. By making wise choices and allow Millennials to peek inside the inner workings of Team McCain, the leadership story will resonate more deeply.

Millennials: Six Surprising Facts

After three months of blogging about Millennials, it seems appropriate to ask what have we learned about them that differs from common wisdom? While we agree with many of the mainstream conclusions about Millennials - they are more collaborative, tech savvy, ambitious and self-confident than previous generations, I would like to take moment to challenge a few 'myths'.

1. Millennials are cash strapped and debt ridden. (5.22.08) In 2006, households headed by 18-24 year olds had earnings before taxes of nearly $29,057, up from just $20,120 in 2003. Their earnings grew 7.5% 2005-2006 alone compared to a 1.1% jump for total households. While that is not a whopping salary, consider that less than 10% of 18-24 year old men are married, 50%live with the parents. This may help to explain why, according to the BLS, they are heavy spenders in virtually every category other than food and housing. Within many of these categories, they are more likely to purchase the luxury brand, like imported or craft beer, rather than the mainstream brand.

2. Millennials and Boomers make good partners. (5.19.08) While it's true Millennials enjoy stronger relationships with their (mostly Boomer) parents than most other generations, they prefer working with Gen X'ers who they believe have more to teach them in the workplace. In fact, our research shows that Millennials have little respect for tech-challenged Boomers. Perhaps Hogwarts provides a good metaphor; in the Harry Potter books, the kids are the crusading and effective wizards, while the professors seem a little behind the times and inept.

3. The way to reach Millennials is through social media like Facebook. (5.19.08) Social media is more social than media. Millennials do not use social media to shape their buying and tend to ignore commercial messages. MySpace and Facebook lowered their sales goals by 11 and 13 percent respectively. EMarketer has also lowered its forecast for social media ad spending by 12%. Much more experimentation will be needed to bring brands directly into the application experience rather than relegate them to a banner or group, such as Slide's branded 'SuperPokes'.

4. Millennials are no more socially liberally than other generations. (5.29.08) According to Pew (2007), each generation tends to be more liberal than its predecssors, but Millennials are even more socially liberal than Boomers were at a similar age. On Super Tuesday, 58% of younger voters self-identified themselves as 'Liberal'. This is happy news for Brand Obama.

5. Millennials are drinking more beer compared to earlier generations of young drinkers. (5.26.08) Not true! According to Nielsen, U.S. 21-30 year olds are forgoing beer in favor of wine, with beer dropping 12 percentage points in this age cohort over the past 10 years compared to a 6 percentage point drop among over 30's. Instead, Millennials are embracing the wine culture in record numbers. This contrasts with France, where Millennials are losing interest in wine. Mon Dieu!

6. Millennials are cynical and mistrusting of institutions. (5.21.08, 6.04.08) According to Pew, Millennials put more faith in government and business institutions. Their faith in business is growing, while that of other cohorts is decreasing. The gap is even more pronounced when it comes to government effectiveness.

7. The Ultimate Millennial personna is an entrepreneur. (5.12.08) This is more true of Gen X'ers than Millennials, who tend to be more idealistic. Their goal is to 'make a difference' as well as be successful. Clues to the Millennial Persona may be found in some of the TV shows they watched growing up. There are a remarkable number of fifties style through backs and 'princesses' where the kids are smart, gifted, special and uniquely successful - Lion Witch and Wardrobe, Nancy Drew, High School Musical. There are also a surprising number of 'princesses' and average kids by day who become rock n roll stars by night.