Marketing & Children

Résumé du document

For about 15 years we have observed that the strategies of advertisement companies have completely changed towards the population of children. In this presentation, we consider children as the people who are from 4 to 14 year old. Advertisers have started to develop new strategies in order to captivate this population. Nowadays, children are considered as highly important. People finally realised that the consumers of 'tomorrow' are currently young, dependant of their parents but also very attracted and aware of the media. This tendency can be illustrated by these figures: 'the population of younger than 14 spend each year 30$ billion. Moreover, 8 out of 10 kids have their own TV, and half of them also possess a DVD / video player. Finally a million children who are less than 9 years old, own a mobile phone, and five million have access to the internet.' These figures can partly explain why companies so suddenly decided to 'focus' their products on children.

Extraits

[...] Product There exist several marketing strategies in order to attract children. However the basic characteristics of a produc like: colors, design or packaging have a strong impact on children and on their purchasing behaviors. Design Product designing has been strongly developed since few years due to a bigger general demand of consumers. Design reveals a brand's image, and if a brand searches for the best feedback possible, it must give consumers what they are waiting for. The best way to attract children is to simplify the aspect of the product and its use. [...]

[...] The young people want the same pair of basketballs or the same jogging as star of moment. For example, in 2006, with the World Cup, brands used players like Zidane or Cissé. These celebrities also appear in the sector of the music, with the participants of the Star Academy for example. Or still in advertisements for the washing as the brand Skip, which, in 2006, establishes a partnership with 15 clubs of French rugby. Influence of these characters or the other stars, companies must respect some ethnic obligations as: - Refrain to use characters on products recognized as harmful for the children (alcohol, tobacco) - Do not associate the character with the violence, or the racism. [...]

[...] At every age, a child thinks different things about a product. He doesn't adopt the same behavior. He becomes identified every time with the character, with the celebrity or with the hero who represents the brand or the product. Marketing professionals have to use icons according to these parameters to be effective. In the food-processing industry, the examples of brand the most known which use characters, is Nestlé, with the rabbit Quicky who drinks chocolate Nesquik; or the dog Pico of the cereals Chocapic. [...]

[...] Radio stations target rather the older (teenagers). It's easier for them to make the distngtion between announcements, programs and advertising than for the younger. They're more aware to the aim of marketing as well. Although there's a listening attention, memorisation is less important with the radio than with television. It's a media of atmosphere, a very short communication; that's why this sort of media needs lot of efforts to be successfull because there's a low memorisation and has an undefined impact. [...]

[...] In this presentation we consider as children the people who are from 4 to 14 year old. Advertisers have started to develop an important amount of new strategies in order to captivate this population of when its value has seriously under-estimated until then. Nowadays, the children are considered as highly important. People finally realised that the consumers of “tomorrow” are currently young, dependant of their parents but also very attracted and aware of the media. This tendency can be illustrated by these figures: population of younger under 14 spend each year 30$ billion billion for toys and 6 billion on clothes). [...]