Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, (June 25, 2015)
Millennials make purchases based largely on anxiety or empowerment, and understanding those emotional drivers may become the biggest key to connecting with them, according to a study. For Millennials, staying connected with friends and family by sharing their emotions on social media has become a daily way of life, but marketers aren’t using these signals to connect with brand fans.
The Networked Insights study analyzing more than 68,000 consumer conversations across the social Web for three months found emotions are most closely tied to buying decision in categories such as technology, auto, travel, and finance. While the findings focus on the Millennial generation (between the ages of 18 and 32), the responses seem more in tune with consumers in general.
Brands try to use social media sharing to their advantage, but few focus on the emotions in social posts. When Millennials talk about buying cars, for example, empowerment drives the emotional conversation 74% of the time, with the most common emotions being success, love and hope. On the other hand (which makes sense) fixing a car causes fear, stress and confusion.
Travel causes nearly as much anxiety (25%) as empowerment (34%) for Millennials, so traveling on an international flight produces both stress and desire.
The findings suggest marketers should track the data in tweets and Facebook posts, photos and videos posted online, and consider building campaigns around the emotions Millennial shoppers express when talking about their products and services.
In another study from Retale focusing on parent from the Millennial generation, dads tend to rely more heavily on the tone of product reviews, which they check more often than moms. In fact, 53% of dads say they use a smartphone primarily to check product reviews, and 47% said they use a smartphone to research products.
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