Notes

<a href="https://or8.ru/qst/34132">Marketing to students

The student market in the UK is estimated to be worth £13 billion of spending power in a year. It is a market no company should ignore. Marketers are desperate to get students’ attention before they turn into high-earning graduates. But students are hard to reach and cynical. How can brands target them?

Youth market trends analyst Sean Pillot de Chenecey advises companies who hope to market to students. Ha says there is no single strategy. Students organise their life on their mobile phones, respect brands that are ethical, but worry more about how they’re going to pay off their debt than world peace. To get students’ attention, marketers must offer them something that adds to their lives. It isn’t enough to simply sponsor a music tour: they have to make the event happen. For example, Carling (a beer manufacturer) introduced live music on the Tube.

Offering students help with their education and careers is an effective marketing method. The Guardian newspaper runs careers fairs and offers discounts on its products, such as Guardian Student, a 32-page newspaper.

Red Bull, a successful energy drinks brand, uses what it calls ‘energy teams’ on university campuses. The company recruits teams of students and gives them a Red Bull car, which has a fridge. The students offer samples and give information about the product benefits.

They do this on campus at sporting events and at times of the year when students might need an energy boost. It’s extremely important that it’s a student doing this and not a company sales rep’, says the company’s consumer manager who runs the scheme. ‘You need to have an approach that doesn’t look like a sales pitch’.

Having an insider on campus can help marketers understand student life. Youth marketing agency, Virgin D3, has a database of students who act as ‘field stuff’. They ask them for help when planning an event at their university. Perhaps, by getting ideas from the students themselves, companies can find ways to reach this difficult market.

Wilkinson Company involved 60 universities in research, using questionnaires distributed to students initially in Years 2 and 3 of a range of universities and then to 'freshers' (new students) through the University and Colleges Admission Service. This ensured the widest range of students was included to eliminate bias. It also gave a wide range of responses.

From this initial group, students were asked a second set of questions. Participants were rewarded with Amazon vouchers to encourage a good take-up. The research focused on two areas: student awareness of the Wilkinson brand; reasons why students were currently not using the stores regularly.

The market research enabled Wilkinson to put together its marketing strategy. The aim was to ensure the student population began shopping at Wilkinson stores early in their student experience. This would help to maintain their customer loyalty to Wilkinson throughout their student years and also to develop them as future customers after university. Repeat business is key to sustained growth.

Wilkinson wanted to create satisfied customers with their needs met by the Wilkinson range of products. A marketing campaign was launched which focused on a range of promotional tactics, specifically designed to appeal to university students:</a>