Millennials are a diverse and ambiguous group, with an undetermined age range from early-80s babies to those born in the early 2000s. The one thing this group does have in common is their swift adaptability to the advancement of technology and everything the digital world has to offer. Identified as “digital natives” by the Pew Research Center, Millennials cling to technology as a means to communicate and socialize, as well as function in society as people in the workplace and school. When it comes to getting their attention, the internet is your best friend.
How to Earn the Attention of Millennials
Perhaps business owners’ biggest tool for engaging with a Millennial audience is social media. Be all over it. There exist a variety of platforms in which your business can find its social media niche: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are your down-to-business basics: everyone is on them (and should be), they serve as directories and menial ways to update your followers with information, events, and pictures, both formally and informally; Instagram, YouTube, Vine, Pinterest, Snapchat, and Tumblr are your next key players, as they are heavily used for picture sharing, video sharing, idea sharing, and more. Younger people are all over these sites and there are a plethora of advertising and engagement opportunities to be found here.
The next step? Once your social media presence is big and banging, link your pages to your website–which should be updated, responsive, and–to put it succinctly–pretty. It’s all about a simple, modern, aesthetic, and the youthful experts at Houston Web Design Agency can design a site for you, or offer you some easy-to-maneuver templates so that your web presence reflects who you are, but not your age (should you fall somewhere outside the Millennial realm).
On a similar note, and bear with me here: know how to hashtag. There are many a hashtag atrocities on the web, and a Millennial can sniff out a bad one from a mile away. The entire premise of hashtagging is to link to an idea or topic that other people are talking about on social media outlets so that you can join in the conversation and engage with and increase your following. Here are some hashtag tips:
- No spaces
- Spaces between words within one hashtag will break the link.
- Incorrect Example: #Millennials Rule
- Correct Example: #MillennialsRule
- Spaces between words within one hashtag will break the link.
- No punctuation
- .,/?;:”[{]}&*^%$! are all a big nope. They will break the link!
- No emojis
- They will either break the link or not create a link at all, which completely defeats the hashtag’s purpose.
- Tag things that people will be searching for, so whatever it is that you posted will get noticed.
- Tag relevant and highly searched trends and terms, for instance, the weekday trends:
- #SundayFunday
- #MotivationMonday
- #FollowFriday
- #ThrowbackThursday
- You can also make up your own hashtag, so long as it is relevant, relatively simple, and nobody else is using it to talk about something unrelated.
- Do NOT tag your name (unless it’s your business name or you are Kim Kardashian) because literally nobody cares.
- Tag relevant and highly searched trends and terms, for instance, the weekday trends:
Last but not least, you have to establish some sense of brand loyalty. Millennials like to express and define themselves by the shoes they wear, the phone they use, and the beer they drink. They like to talk about it, tweet about it, blog about it. Engage with your Millennial clients by creating something for them that they won’t be able to stop talking about online, and then continue that engagement with them on the web sphere yourself.
Need Some Help on the Web?
If the internet seems like a scary place, and you don’t know where to start, you may need a talented and internet-savvy Houston web design and marketing agency to help you along. Our agency specializes in internet brand management, SEO, content creation, social media marketing, and more. We can get you to the place you need to be and, as Millennials, we can help you grab their attention. Call us at 1-800-440-6190 or fill out one of our online forms.