“Mommy, I want it.” Marketers and the Powerful Influence of Children

September 9, 2010 at 3:38 am Leave a comment

Today, kids are targeted by many marketers, spending billions, compared to $100 million in the 1990’s. With dual incomes, smaller families, and postponing later to have children, parents have more disposable income, it’s no wonder parents are spending so much more on their children.

How do marketers get away with this? Several things play a role in targeting children:

Pestering & Nagging
Kids have the ability to nag at their parents about purchasing items that the parent wouldn’t otherwise buy. In fact, Barbara Martino, and advertising executive says “We’re relying on the kid to pester the mom to buy the product, rather than going straight to the mom.” In fact, there are two types of nagging, according to the book Kidfluence, it states that there is “persistence nagging” and “importance nagging”. Persistance nagging is repeating nagging which is not as effective as importance nagging, which plays on the guilt that parents might have for not spending enough time with their kids.

Psychology
Marketers are also tuned in to what makes kids tick. Utiliing reports, researches and psychologist, marketers are able to craft together cleaver marketing strategies.

Brand Name Loyalty
Marketers goal is to create brand name loyalty with children from the very beginning in hopes that they will create a lifelong relationships. According to the Center for a New American Dream, infants at the age of 6 months are able to create mental images of corporate logos and mascots. In fact, brand loyalty can develop by age two, which by 5, a child can recognize hundreds of brand logos

Buzz Marketing
This savy marketing is used by marketers to target young kids, especially teenagers. The idea around this is to create a buzz around the product, allowing the “word of mouth” to do the work. The idea is to have cool kids where the product or to allow a “cool” status with the product. Using the internet, social networks, blogs, chartrooms and other similar internet communications to help spread the word.