Attention Please!

If you are a 20-something media consumer, by the time you finish reading this article, you or your peers have already looked at your smart phone, your television, your tablet or another digital tool a minimum of four times according to a recent article by Advertising Age.

Maybe you went from this posting to a short video on the internet. Maybe your phone indicated a new text. Perhaps there was a tablet app that worked with the latest TV drama. Though an EXTREMELY generalized study (among 30 people!), this report suggests that  “digital natives”  who have grown up with this technology have no problem switching from one media resource to another, up to 27 TIMES AN HOUR.

For those who are of this age and group, this doesn’t seem so unusual. A.C. Nielsen, the guys who analyze media viewing, have already reported on the multi-channel interest of young audiences – those viewers who authored all the tweets and FaceBook postings while audiences watched a live event such as the Grammy Awards or NFL playoffs. 

But for those of us who want your attention for our advertising messages, unless there is the short, recognizable communication, we will have to have some new considerations as to how best to retain your interest and memory for our brand.

Step one? Be prepared for marketers who will continue to coordinate their messages to you as 1960s women coordinated their clothes. 

Step two? As a consumer you will see a lot of brand emphasis -- brand identity with communications that, either on line or on the air, will be unforgettable. This assumes that the big idea is remarkable to begin with – and then marketers will have to capture the audience’s attention on that smart phone or tablet LONG ENOUGH and OFTEN ENOUGH to make the idea stick.

(Try doing that when most consumers have already has been exposed to roughly 3,000 ads a day and nearly 2 years of television advertising in a lifetime.  It’s enough clutter to make only the most worthy words matter.)

Step three? As part of the “digital natives,” prepare for marketers to hire you and your buddies as business professionals that live and breathe the technology.  Get lucky and get to work with seasoned executives who understand the power of the brand story and its message. And live happily ever, talking with our nanosecond-shifting global market. Your future is now.