Building Youth Brands In A Youthful Country
by Dheeraj Sinha
The differences in cultural contexts and economic life-stage of the eastern economies have told us that the way the Asian or more specifically Indian consumers respond to brands, products and other consumption stimulus are many a time different from the well established models of the West. This has now been well recognized and as a result newer or rather more Asian frameworks and ways of thinking have been encouraged in the past decade or so. But are these differences true for youth marketing and youth brands as well? Are the youth in these cultures really so different? Do the time tested western experiences in building youth brands work in such contexts or do we need new frameworks?
The new emphasis in the world of business today is this idea of co-creation. What does youth marketing have to learn from this new way of business? What change in the viewing lenses does this ask for while analyzing consumers and conceiving brands, especially in the context of youth audiences? What about the nature of youth today makes it imminent for brands and businesses to be co-creative with them? How can this approach help us see the world of youth from their side up?
In today’s world of boundariless - ness all kinds of distinctions are blurring. The personal is merging with the professional; entertainment is merging with play and family with friends. More than anybody else, it’s the youth of today who is living their lives like a large interconnected web. How should brands find a place in the lives of the youth whose entire microcosm is web-like and non-linear? How does our traditional brand thinking which is designed for a linear, need gap relationship with its consumer need to re-orient itself?
This paper looks at the youth of India and what does it take to build meaningful youth brands in the country in the light of above mentioned changes. It comes from the belief that any youth brand framework which works in today’s India must factor in the essential Indian context, the consumer expectation of co-creation and the web-like life that the youth today are living. All this in an attempt to answer two fundamental questions - what does it take to understand youth from their point of view in a social setting such as today’s India and how should a youth brand framework look in such cases?
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