Social Thinking for Mobile Part 2 of a 5 part series of presentations. To download all 5 parts -> http://www.YouthMobileAge.com

1. PART 2/5
SOCIAL
THINKING
The Youth Mobile Age: 50 Key Youth Trends 2011

3. What is The Youth Mobile Age? Graham Brown
mobileYouth
If you want to know how it’s going to be
tomorrow, look at how it is today with young
people. World over we see future usage pa<erns,
business models and technologies being
explored, adapted and refined by youth. Where
would we be without SMS, BBM, Facebook and
MP3s? Youth discovered them first.
In this 5 part series I’ll share with you those
ideas and insights gained from the frontline
with a li<le help from some industry friends.
We share with you ideas that will shape the next
decade.

4. Muhammad Faisal – Youthlab Indonesia
29 Contributors & Ngaruiya Githegi – Teenwise Media
Thought Leaders Seth Godin ‐ Author
Andrew Grill – Digital strategist
Bernard Hor – Summer Sands Malaysia
In this 5 part series we share quotes Tony Hsieh – Zappos
and ideas from the following youth Marc Kornberger – Student Village
marketers, media and mobile experts: Andrew Mackinnon – Taboo
Kenichi Nakaya – Trimtab
Mikko Ampuja – 1530 Research Jake Nickell ‐ Threadless
Freddie Benjamin – mobileYouth Marlon Parker ‐ RLabs
Graham Brown – mobileYouth Jan Rezab – Candy Tech/Social Bakers
Ian Calvert – Instant Grass Bre< St Clair – Google SA
Ged Carroll – Ruder Finn Kaustav Sengupta – Ingene
Samyak Chakrabarty ‐ Concrea Julia Shalet – Digital Youth Project
Joseph Ciprut – Youtholding Kei Shimada – Infinita
Andres Colmenares – WabiSabi Lab Ian Stewart ‐ Converse
Vipe Desai – Monster Energy Peter Van Stolk – Jones Soda
Trevor Edward ‐ Nike Ian Vo<eri – Valero`

5. As a standalone country, mobile owning youth would be
the largest in the world – with 1.6 billion in 2011.
Youth spent more on mobile in the last 10 years than they
have on music and movies combined in the last 50. Undl
now, few people have asked the quesdon why?.

7. Social Thinking
puts everything
into its social
context.
It’s not what we
buy but why. It’s
not what we’re
buying but what it
does for us.

8. Social Thinking is challenging everything we know about
brand, adverdsing and markedng.
Winning the game is no longer about the depth of your
markedng budget but your capacity to understand and
fall in love with people rather than strategies

9. KEY QUESTIONS
Why do youth buy your product?
Does your markePng emphasize the
Big Idea, Features or the Social Benefit
of the product and brand?

11. Wherever there are people there is a need to connect.
We are like water, we always find our way back to the ocean.

12. We are driven by our most fundamental social needs:
the need to belong and the need to be significant

13. KEY QUESTIONS
What is the Social Currency
of your product?
How does it help youth belong?
How does it help youth be significant?

15. Your brand and technology are one
of many tools in their Universe

16. Mobile is slowly changing how we see the world; no longer are our
relaPonships defined by geography, they’re increasingly defined by
interest. In dme, it’ll challenge our nodons of kinship and empathy.

17. “In every culture and every
genera;on young people first
explore technology to create a
personal space apart from their
parents.
It’s just the same as when we
used to smoke behind our
parents backs in previous
genera;ons, now teenagers have
a private messaging channel with
a lingo that’s not understood by
older people.”
Kaustav Sengupta ‐ Ingene

18. If we look at the most popular
technologies of the last
decade –
Facebook, SMS, BBM, Twi<er,
Mobile –
you’ll find each is a tool that
helps young people do what
they’ve been doing since the
50s.
Old behaviors, new
technologies

19. KEY QUESTIONS
How does your product and brand help define a
Personal Space for youth?
How can you emphasize this in your
product development and markePng?

21. Teen smoking rates in the US
only started falling in 1998
despite 30 years of public health
programs. 1998 was the first
year teen mobile phone
ownership emerged into the
public sphere.
At the emoPonal level we are
simply maximizing our social
currency and trading one
product for another.

22. Every where you turn you find evidence of our social nature.
We are born to connect. Being social isn’t a “nice‐to‐have” it’s
a survival skill. So when you build walls to stop them
connecdng they’ll find ways to tunnel under or break through

23. As soon as youth lose control of the product to
old people it loses its appeal.
Now in Indonesia, even the “Tukang Bakso”
owns a Blackberry so youth are turning to iPads,
iPhones or even Samsung Galaxies to maintain
the same level of social currency. BB cannot take
its success in Indonesia for granted…
…unless it reinvents itself it will
go out of fashion as quickly
as it came into it.
Muhammad Faisal, Youthlab Indonesia

24. KEY QUESTIONS
What products are you displacing
to become popular with your young customers?
Which products
outside your category
could displace you?

26. If anything, this is the Disconnected GeneraPon – young
people who leave their family homes, towns and head to the
big city in search of opportunity. They live in single bedsits or
houseshares full of strangers. Surrounded by 30 million
familiar faces they find themselves alone

27. Every new technology gets a
chance but only a few stay the
course.
If it can provide a be[er way
to belong, a be<er way to be
significant than what’s
already out there, then youth
will invest their dme into it.
Our role is to facilitate the
discovery and innovaPon not
the educaPon

28. KEY QUESTIONS
Are you sPll talking about “Digital NaBves”, a
“Connected GeneraBon” or “Technology Addicts”?
How does your markePng empathize with their
social condiBon and offer a soluPon to it?

30. In Japan, we used to talk about the “Nabe” ‐
the communal cooking pot used for cooking
stew‐like dishes where all the ingredients are
boiled collec;vely. We say ‘Nabe wo kakomu’
meaning ‘we sit around the Nabe’.
It isn’t just an act of doing, it’s also a feeling ‐
the feeling for the goodness that bubbles up
/
from the clay pot ‐ the collec;ve goodness
shared by all through chaQng, cooking
together and sharing an Asahi beer or Shochu.
Every day we look for new ways to reclaim this
feeling lost to modern living…

31. Ask them and they’ll tell you
it’s because it’s “cool” or
“fun” but care to venture
deeper and you’ll discover
each new twist and turn in
their evolving behavior is an
opportunity to reclaim their
lost social connecPvity.
Each is an opportunity to plug
into something bigger that
makes them feel a sense of
belonging and significance

32. Young girls in India are
adop;ng the symbols of
success tradi;onally associated
with their fathers as a sign of
“arrival” and empowerment.
That’s why the most devoted
Blackberry owners are Indian
females ‐ in their late teens and
early twen;es ‐ those hungriest
for success.
Samyak Chakrabarty ‐ Concrea

33. KEY QUESTIONS
To what extent are you recreaPng
the essence of the Digital Nabe
for this generaPon?
How are you helping them
reclaim social connecPvity
lost to modern living?

35. For 20 years we’ve been training MBAs in concepts like
“brand management” and all of a sudden, these ideas and
skills are becoming worthless.
Just as we’ve moved from lifedme employment to lifedme
employability our long term security will be based on our
ability to shik the locus of control from ownership to
facilitaPon

36. We’re not in the
business of keeping
media companies alive,
we’re in the business of
connec;ng our
customers
Trevor Edward VP Global Brand
Nike

37. KEY QUESTIONS
Are you managing or facilitaBng the brand?
Does your brand live in
the “brand manual” or
in the acBons of your people?
Do you see yourself as
brand owner or custodian?

39. We’ve grown used to selling
content – some narraPve
about the brand that our
agency dreams up.
We now have to start
thinking about Context –
how that brand helps
customers connect with
each other

40. Content is only as good as
the Context it creates

41. We need the social currency
you create with your events,
projects and communiPes

42. Content is easy to source
and unlimited in supply.
We need to focus on
context because
reladonships are valued
and limited by nature. The
best brands today are the
also the best
Context Creators

43. A whole generadon of young
people are growing up who
couldn’t care less about
Nokia.
For them, Snake and the 3310
mean nothing. Concepts like
Brand Equity stand for li<le.
Brand choices are shaped by
the simple quesdon “what
have you done for me lately?”

44. KEY QUESTIONS
How can you evolve from being
a Content Creator to being
a Context Creator?
What kind of Context
can you create for youth
based on exisBng projects and assets?

46. This isn’t about
product anymore,
it’s not important ‐
it’s about the
packaging ‐ the
social packaging.
How will you help
me belong? How
will you help me be
significant?

47. The most powerful insights
lie in the success formula of
brands that have commodity
products. Soda, aker all, is
just fizzy water and sugar
with a few added
ingredients.
People don’t drink the soda,
they drink the can – the
whole package of
connecPvity.

48. Don’t sell
T‐Shirts
Sell a
community
Give everyone
a voice

49. Are you helping them connect with each other or are
you sdll trying to sell stuff to them?

50. KEY QUESTIONS
How are you helping them
connect with each other?
How are you creaPng a
plaNorm for social behavior?
What could you learn from brands
outside your category
who excel in the creaPon of social packaging?

52. Spend a day in their world and things start to make sense. You
become more confident about making decisions based on
customer insight. You rely less on data and more on insPnct.

53. How many dmes have you sat in a meedng
or presentadon when someone piped up and
talked about “my 13 yr old daughter” as an
example of how mobile use is changing?
The answers are out there right under our
noses but then we blindly go and spend a
fortune on useless Focus Groups as if that is
the “proper” way of
generaPng insights.

54. When was the last Pme you exchanged a day in the office for
a day in their Universe?

55. KEY QUESTIONS
How can you increase your team’s exposure to
their social universe?
Where would you get your insights from
if you didn’t have to rely on Focus Groups?

58. What Next?
Here’s a few ideas to maintain momentum
1) If you haven’t done so already download all 5
parts (sent by mail, 1 a week) at
www.YouthMobileAge.com
2) Join us on our 200k mile journey into youth
culture in 2011 www.mobileYouthtour.com
3) Throughout 2011 we’ll be posdng interviews with
contributors to this report at www.mobileYouth.tv
4) If you need data, stats and charts for download
head to www.mobileYouthreport.com

59. WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?
DOWNLOAD ALL 5 PARTS OF THIS 200 SLIDE PRESENTATION
WWW.YOUTHMOBILEAGE.COM

60. Download Charts, Data and Stats on
Youth Mobile Culture
http://www.MobileYouthReport.com