learn from breakaway brands

satisfy the 10 cravings of a new generation of consumers

With keen analysis and smart case studies, Lisa Johnson has cracked the code of this elusive group of consumers. No matter what industry youre in, youll gain lots of insight and tons of great ideas from this book. - Daniel H. Pink, author of A Whole New Mind For those who want to know what the wired generations want to consume and experience, this book provides plenty of insights. - Publishers Weekly is fascinating book reads like a novel, and is hard to put down once you start reading. Any corporation marketing toward the X and Y generations will greatly benet from Johnsons book. - Martin Lindstrom, brand futurist and author of BRANDchild and BRANDsense

10 Cravings of The Connected Generation

Shine the Spotlight
Extreme personalization gives marketing a new face
The Connected Generation is clamoring for personal recognition. Theyre itching to stand out, stand up, and be celebrated with their names in lights (or print or pixels). Brands that tap into this powerful need with highly creative efforts will get not only great buzz, but a whole new level of loyalty and brand ownership to match.

Keep it Underground
The rejection of push advertising and the rising influence of peer-to-peer networks
The Connected Generation has grown up feeling saturated with advertising and marketing. They are suspicious of ordinary push campaigns and gravitate toward integrated, contextual offerings from trusted friends and members of their networks. A select group of people discovers something new, from shoes to bands to politics to neighborhoods, and translates it to satisfy a much wider audience. This is the way of the underground.

Build it Together
Connected citizens explore their creative power and influence change
There are currently one billion people connected online around the world. With so many people conducting large portions of their lives online, weve only just begun to tap into the power of web-based networks. The Connected Generation is becoming intoxicated by their growing ability to spark change both as consumer groups and end users. This awareness is spurring mass creativity and launching a power shift away from companies and into the hands of consumers.

Raise My Pulse
Adventure takes its place as the new social currency
There is a new premium placed on venturing into the world, collecting exotic adventures and memories, and pushing personal limits. Customers are seeking highly interactive encounters that teach and challenge and in the process, give them personal insight and explore who they are. Today, more brands are responding to this craving for adventure by offering fresh, unique, and easy-to-access experiences. From stiletto shoemaking classes to test-driving new careers, it has never been easier to raise your pulse.

Bring it to Life
Everyday activities are orchestrated to deliver a dramatic sense of theater
From beverages to designer fashions to dinnertime solutions, brand theater is popping up in virtually every industry, as savvy companies deliver compelling and entertaining new experiences. Brand theater allows companies of all kinds to create emotional connections with their customers. It takes typical experiences a few steps forward by engaging the senses, the imagination and the spirit, and transforms routine experiences into riveting entertainment.

Make Loose Connections

The new shape of families and social networks
The Connected Generation has embraced technology to build social and professional networks with a brave new structure. This generation is rejecting traditional associations and club-style memberships in favor of loose connections that more accurately reflect their interests, lifestyles and busy days. Brands need to understand how to interact with these powerful new social structures if they want to stay hot and stay in the loop.

Give Me Brand Candy

Everyday objects get sharp, delicious, intuitive design
Design has emerged as a sign of the good life. The look and feel of objects, places and things is becoming increasingly important. Design is shifting paradigms and spurring people everywhere to rethink established products and industries. Design, along with its strategic twin, innovation, has become a vital tool to stand out and stay strong in an increasingly competitive market.

Go Inward
Spiritual hunger and modern media find common ground
Increasingly, the meaningful life is defined as the spiritual life, and spirituality has become a dominant value among todays consumers. Companies and media channels are introducing new products, services and forums to support this spiritually hungry generation. The Connected Generation has embraced modern media and blurred the lines between secular and sacred, finding spirituality in all aspects of their lives.

Filter Out the Clutter

Editors and filters step into a new role of prominence
In a world thats inundated with choices, editing is a critical market phenomenon and an important process in our daily lives. Consumers rely on editors to sift through the raw data and identify the top picks. As a result, many savvy brands are learning to build editing mechanisms into their brands, products, and websites. In todays global world, it feels good to be in the know, and to avoid costly and frustrating purchases.

Give Back
Redefining volunteerism and the meaning of contribution
Theres a new spirit of volunteerism in the air, led by a young, Connected Generation that has new ideas about how to give back. Todays volunteers want to give their time and talent instead of simply writing a check. Modern volunteer associations combine fresh structures with fun people and a chance to make direct, meaningful connections with the community. These new giving models are igniting a generation and making their volunteer efforts convenient, high impact and more emotionally satisfying.

Mind Your Xs and Ys Satisfying the 10 Cravings of a New Generation of Consumers

Todays 18-40-year-olds make for a notoriously elusive group of consumers: theyre savvy, sophisticated, and particular. Theyre all but immune to traditional advertising and have an instinctive sense of quality and fair pricing. Inundated with choices, they are drawn to brands that satisfy not just what they need, but what they crave. These breakaway brands are experiencing exponential success, fueled by a passionate and connected community. Readers will learn how: A university football program SHINES THE SPOTLIGHT on blue chip recruits, producing the surprise class of the year. The program lands many of the nations top players despite its lackluster performance in the previous season. A young musician and his friend tap into the power of LOOSE CONNECTIONS to collect 54 million new friends and a $580 million payday in just two short years. An established automobile manufacturer rejects its traditional push marketing approach and KEEPS IT UNDERGROUND to produce the youngest and most successful new automotive nameplate for Gen X and Y. Mind Your Xs and Ys (Simon & Schuster, 2006) proves that the buying habits of 18-40-year-olds can be anticipated. Based on groundbreaking research, this book pinpoints the new rules of engagement for the connected generation and delves deep into established and breakaway brands to identify the ten core cravings for adventure, high-concept design, new families and social networks, and personal storytelling, among others at the heart of the Gen X and Y psyche. Packed with fascinating case studies from every major industry, revealing statistics, and interviews with dozens of maverick thinkers and hundreds of consumers, this revolutionary book analyzes the scope of each craving, how it drives specific buying behaviors, and offers relevant data that illustrate its impact. Mind Your Xs and Ys equips anyone who wants to reach these consumers brand managers and their advertising, online, creative, packaging, events, and promotions teams; small business owners and their marketing staff; advertising agencies and specialists with the know-how to transform market research into profitable strategies. Members of Generations X and Y are the most coveted and hard to reach consumers in the marketplace. Mind Your Xs and Ys is a master class in how to create compelling brands for this Connected Generation.

About the Authors

Lisa Johnson is the co-author of Dont Think Pink and CEO of The Reach Group, an
international marketing consultancy which helps companies create more compelling brand experiences for women (ReachWomen.com) and the connected generation (ReachGroupConsulting.com). A leading corporate trainer and brand consultant, Lisa has worked with top companies nationwide and has up-to-the-minute knowledge of market forces, trends and consumers buying minds. Her marketing concepts have appeared in Harvard Business Schools Working Knowledge, the New York Times magazine, The Chicago Tribune and on NPRs Marketplace. SoundViews named her first book, Dont Think Pink, one of the top marketing books of all time.

Cheri Hanson is president of the Reach Group (ReachGroupConsulting.com) and a

sought-after writer, journalist and content strategist. She is the West Coast correspondent for Quill & Quire magazine (Canadas answer to Publishers Weekly) and writes a weekly publishing trends column for the Vancouver Sun. She is also the co-author of Earn What Youre Worth (Penguin Group). As a copywriter and content strategist, Cheri has collaborated with award-winning companies in a diverse range of industries including tourism, technology, marketing, publishing and sporting goods.

Lisa Johnson

Cheri Hanson

A Conversation With The Authors

Cheri: In the past you have written about
marketing to women. Why did you want to focus this new book on Generations X and Y? seeking a fascinating new type of connection with select brands that win their heart and and capture their imagination. Theyre a powerful group because they will quickly spread the news about ideas, brands and services that they love and hate. This generation is incredibly savvy, so they will bypass all forms of push marketing. Theyve got MP3 players and podcasts, so they dont want to hear radio ads. They use TiVo to eliminate commercials. Many get their daily dose of news off the internet rather than by reading the newspaper.

Lisa:

Younger women (and men) are technologically fluent, which dramatically shapes and influences their relationships with brands. For example, Baby Boomers buy a lot of music, but the Connected Generation changed the way we find, sample, purchase, and share music. From the advent of Napsters file-swapping technology to MP3s, iPods, and sites such as MySpace, Gen X and Y have restructured the entire music industry. Baby Boomers are now following in their footsteps. In other words, the Connected Generation is the one to watch. My first book, Dont Think Pink, was based on research, training, and years of experience in the marketplace as an expert on women consumers. Mind Your Xs and Ys was built on a treasure hunt and the desire to crack a code. This is something we wanted to learn to keep growing and to become even more relevant to our clients.

Cheri: So, if theyre pushing all these messages away, what are they pulling into their lives? Its the stuff they crave the stuff theyre passionate about and then they share it with their networks. This new paradigm definitely affects marketers.

The new market is based on a pull philosophy, where customers pull in anything that they find interesting things that they crave.
Lisa: Its a brand thats experiencing suc- Lisa: Thats what makes the cravings so
cess beyond anyones expectations. Customers drive major growth through their passion for the product or service. The brand leaders arent exactly sure why its working, but something big is happening. Its a lucky place to be. As we talked to these breakaway brands, most could identify some of the key elements of their success, but there were many other pieces that they couldnt put their fingers on. We realized that while all these breakaway brands fulfilled at least one of the 10 cravings, most were satisfying 3, 4, and even 7 or 8. Regardless of the industry, the parallels started to emerge. interesting. Theyre a litmus test. You can apply them to any business, industry or organization, and they still ring true. It doesnt matter whether youre a rock band, you sell cars, you make yogurt, or you run a non-profit organization or a health clinic. The cravings still apply.

Lisa:

Cheri: Thats true. We also decided to refer

to Gen X and Y as the Connected Generation. Lets talk more about that distinction.

Lisa: Well, whenever we hear about Gen

X and Y, its always in the context of their differences. Who works harder? Whos closer to their families? This project was fun, because we set out to see what was similar and true about both groups. Theyre connected to technology, and theyre connected to their social and professional networks around the clock. They are also

Instead of fighting it, we need to wake up and say that yes, the market has changed and Im willing to change too. The old push model (go big, go loud and get in front of them often) has turned upside down. The new market is based on a pull philosophy, where customers pull in anything that they find interesting things that they crave. The Connected Generation is active, not passive. Theyre highly engaged and theyre creating their own solutions.

Cheri: They also provide a vocabulary to

discuss events, ideas and developments that on the surface might seem disconnected. Theyre fun, because people quickly see themselves I do that too or thats exactly how I feel. Its like one of those fuzzy 3D puzzles that your eyes suddenly snap into a clear image.

Cheri: We spoke to hundreds of people in

the connected generation, but the answers really started to emerge by studying breakaway brands. Lets talk about these fascinating companies. What do you consider a breakaway brand?

Cheri: It felt like everyone was in a process

of discovery and they were all hungry for the answers. No one said they had it figured out.

Is Your Brand Connected?

The Reach Group is a boutique consultancy that provides fresh insights and clear thinking about the connected generation. Through books, speaking, training, research and content strategy certifications, we help you mix a potent cocktail of content, community and commerce that will engage the modern marketplace.

the connected brand

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