By Caroline Scarborough
Getting tech savvy kids and teens to buy online is sort of like taking
candy from a baby, right?
Wrong, says John Barbour, CEO of ToysRus.com, an online venture
successfully targeting "tweens" – young people between the ages of 8 and 18 – the first
generation to grow up with the Internet as a part of their lives.
"Kids are tough customers," said Barbour. "The children and teen market
represents a wide age span, for example, and there are challenges to
marketing and selling to each age group."
Shifting Buying Habits
Speaking at the recent Jupiter Communications "Digitial Kids" conference in
San Francisco, Barbour said the Internet is helping create unprecedented
shifts in young people's buying habits. These shifts, added Barbour, are
sending online outlets scurrying to create Web sites and marketing
campaigns that appeal to young audiences.
In the wireless realm, Disney.com is one of the first companies to provide
a service for the younger set. In partnership with Japan's NTT DoCoMo,
Disney is providing entertainment for DoCoMo's i-mode mobile phone service.
Called Disney-i, the service features four selections: a daily Disney
character screensaver, a daily Disney song, online games featuring Disney
characters, and news and product information in "Disney Fan Magazine-i."
More than 650 Internet and marketing professionals, from a range of
companies including Barbour's parent company Toys R Us, the Cartoon
Network, Disney, and Mattel, attended the Digital Kids Conference to learn
how businesses can connect with young audiences. Among conference topics:
privacy issues, e-commerce solutions, gender-based interests, and content
strategies.
Teens Don't Dawdle Online
Despite the challenges, the under-18 market is a lucrative sector.
According to a recent Jupiter Communications and Media Matrix study, 15
percent of teens buy online and are expected to spend $500 million this
year. By 2005, Jupiter predicts teens will spend $4.9 billion online.
Jupiter analyst Stacey Herron said Internet retailers may find it difficult
to market to teenagers because teens on an average spend less than half the
time online than adults do, in both number and length of sessions.
Teens, for example, spend an average of 303 minutes online per month,
compared with the adult average of 728 minutes per month, according to
Media Metrix research during June. Researchers attribute the lower rate of
time online to teens' active schedules and the need to share computer
equipment with other family members.
Teenagers also view the Web as entertainment or a communications device
– a TV with 30 million channels, Herron said. Not surprising: teens
do not consider the Internet as a productive, time saving tool.
Among other key findings:
This year, teens will spend approximately $4.1 billion in
"Web-influenced offline spending," with that figure hitting $21.4 billion
by 2005.
The older people are, the more time they spend online, with teens aged 12
to 17 spending an average of 303 minutes online over eight days per month,
young
adults, aged 18 to 34, spending an average of 656 minutes over 13 days per
month, and adults aged 35 to 49 spending an average of 804 minutes over 15
days per month.
According to Media Metrix's June research, boys visited more sites than
girls, surfing 301.2 pages versus the girls' 271.
15 percent of teens today actually purchase products online, buying
mostly low-priced items such as CDs, albums, books, and clothing.
49 percent of teens said they use the Internet to research goods
and products and then purchase them offline. Teens also go online to
research higher priced items like computers, gaming consoles, and software.
Boys primarily use the Net for technology-related activities such as
playing games, creating Web pages, and downloading software.
Girls generally are "goal oriented" surfers, spending their online time
reading magazines, doing homework and chatting or messaging friends.
Girls are more likely than boys to look for familiar offline brands while
online. Their favorite overall site: Seventeen.com.
Businesses targeting teens must evaluate their Internet content and offer
elements that appeal to teens in order to capture any part of their limited
online time, said Anya Sacharow, Jupiter's analyst for the kids and teen
markets. "Strong branding and alliances with online networks sway teen
girls; teen boys are technophiles largely and will look for any aspect of
gaming."
One mistake online retailers often make, added Barbour, is to ignore the
real power source. "Moms," he said, "still have the final word when it
comes to spending, whether online or in stores."
