Successfully Connecting with Millennial Tweeple

There is a generational transfer of power and influence underway. As the Boomers begin their ride off into the sunset, a new day is dawning for their children and grandchildren - the Millennials (also referred to as Echo Boomers and Gen Y - those born roughly between 1980-1994).

We Millennials do not interact with one another or the world around us in the same way that our parents and grandparents have. We have come of age in an era of technology and information overload. It is a world on demand - with the world *wide web* at our fingertips. If it can't be accessed via the web in one or two Google searches it may as well not exist. . .

We are also a generation in which we were all told we were unique, special, talented, smart, fantastic and worthy of every praise - the world revolved around us. Our parents cuddled and coddled as our egos expanded and overloaded.

MySpace was a success because it was the first web outlet where we Echo Boomers with our explosive egos and tech talents could create a universe with ourselves as center.

Our Boomer parents puzzle over our innate need to broadcast ourselves - our every movement, wish, passion, desire, interest - while we remain confounded with their outdated perception of the world as revolving within two separate distinct spheres - inner (personal) and outer (professional/public).

The lines in our lives have become blurred. In an era where technology helps broadcast every move of a celebrity icon - from who's heart is broken to whose breaking the box office - is it any wonder we have internalized and absorbed this breakdown between the traditional spheres? As social networking surges ahead and various apps encourage us to open up more and more (Zkout/Brighkite - mapping, Twitter - status) our "open" lives are often regarded as intrusive and inappropriate by the generations that have gone before.

Connecting with people in a world where Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Digg, de.licio.us, Google Reader, Friend Feed and other social networking tools allow us to track who and what the friends we follow are doing, reading, eating, seeing, wanting, loving allows us to learn about people from the safe zone behind our computer screen. As in the video games we grew up with - we control the experience. We can determine when and if to reach out to people and how to do so. We read and learn about them and their lives in the same way we learn about celebrities - in a cyberzone where technology and information intersect. We get to know one another gradually, safely. We don't like high-pressure and we don't like strangers. We shop online so we control the experience and aren't hounded by salespeople. We meet people online so we can learn about them before we have to meet them (if we even make it that far).

Is it really any surprise that a generation of egoists has come to demand such power of direction in their social interactions?

This is where it becomes entirely necessary to understand us in order to most effectively do business with us.

"Don't trust strangers" - words any Millennial has heard so many times it instantly conjures up pictures of parents with pointed index fingers, furrowed brows and pursed lips.

So the message is - you're a stranger until we know you. How can you get to know us? Find us on Facebook, read about our interests and ask us a question about something we're interested in. Subscribe to our Twitter and learn about how we spend our days - what we think about. Then do an @reply here and there. As we see your activities and your interests - your tweets and status messages we'll get to know you and we can connect as *friends* when and if we extend the connection to the real world.

But don't just blanket add us. . . we know that tactic too. Most Millennials I know (with the exception of those using sites for business) won't add everyone that requests them as a friend on MySpace or Facebook. It's the "don't trust strangers" thing. We don't know you and we don't trust you. You probably just want our business or even something more sinister. We're bombarded with advertising every day in popups, packaging, neon signs, painted murals, margins and sidebars - and we don't trust salespeople and corporations. You have to send a message of interest first - "Hey - I met you with Ryan the other night at the Lux - how are you?" or "Hey - I see you enjoy Ayn Rand - I love Atlas Shrugged - have you read it?"

Either give us something of value or reach out to us because you really appreciate us as individuals. . . we resent people seeing $ signs on our forehead and we resent inauthenticity. We'll see right through you if you do either. Remember - for all our tech savvy, we are afterall just Tweeple on the other side of the screen. . . .

Some interesting facts:

In their recent book, Connecting to the Net.Generation: What Higher Education Professionals Need to Know About Today's Students, Reynol Junco and Jeanna Mastrodicasa[15] found that in a survey of 7,705 college students in the US:

* 97% own a computer
* 97% have downloaded music and other media using peer-to-peer file sharing
* 94% own a cell phone
* 76% use instant messaging and social networking sites
* 75% of college students have a Facebook account[16]
* 60% own some type of portable music and/or video device such as an iPod
* 49% regularly download music and other media using peer-to-peer file sharing
* 34% use websites as their primary source of news
* 28% author a blog and 44% read blogs
* 15% of IM users are logged on 24 hours a day/7 days a week


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