There’s an interesting report at Pew Internet on Teens and Technology which is the second this week that highlights the opportunities for tapping into the younger internet using market. Here’s a snippet of their introduction:
‘The number of teenagers using the internet has grown 24% in the past four years and 87% of those between the ages of 12 and 17 are online. Compared to four years ago, teens’ use of the internet has intensified and broadened as they log on more often and do more things when they are online.
Among other things, there has been significant growth over the past four years in the number of teens who play games on the internet, get news, shop online, and get health information.
Not only has the number of users increased, but also the variety of technologies that teens use to support their communication, research, and entertainment desires has grown. ‘
This kind of thing really bothers me. It ends up leading to things like the Secret Sparkle site, which is a fake blog that continuously links to other P&G products. They even have fake commenter for good effect. They got heavily blog-mobbed when they started because they decided to launch the site even after admitting that marketing the product to young girls was a bad idea, because deodorant can be dangerous for younger people to use.
I grew up in the era where children became a such a huge market, and I just think it would be nice to leave the kids alone. Or at the very least, not play dirty tricks with them by tapping into their insecurities and social quirks. It’s one thing to sell your product to an appropriate base, but it’s quite another to make the selling points things like making a girl feel ugly if she doesn’t use your make-up, or making boys feel like they couldn’t possibly be men if they didn’t play violent video games. There’s even more subtle innuendoes in a lot of advertising, that I think lead young girls to feel like the approval of men is their highest priority, and that boys should judge women almost exclusively on how “hot” they are.
I agree with andy. But we can’t deny the fact that not only are teen reading more on the net, but they are starting to produce content.