The next subject is MXit and how popular it is and the increase of its impact on our daily lives. He reinforces this by using a case study as an example to show the impact of MXit and other such tools similar to MXit on our lifestyles.

Tyler next chats about how advertising is migrating from push advertising to pull advertising and how viewing a small screen ( phones, mobile game player etc) is ‘normal’ for people who have grown up with a small screen.

The youth market segment also live their lives differently by doing multiple tasks at the same time, this in Tyler’s opinions is killing Advertising alongside traditional education.

Time and attention is the new currency according to Tyler. We can learn and understand more about people through all the information gathered by online sources Google, Facebook etc. Marketing needs to become more relevant to “ME” who in this self-obsessed world is the pinnacle of one’s thoughts. The advertising also needs to be “on my terms”. The marketing must add value to our lives, it must be “Useful”.  Lastly the marketing must not be “intrusive”.

1 018 610 active facebook users is South Africa and 9 502 581 page served by the SA blogosphere in the past month were two interesting stats from Tyler.

Trends for the future

• Big companies will increase spending phenomenally. For example Coca Cola is looking to spend $11 Billion on mobile ad campaigns
• Phones will have a much longer battery life i.e. 9 days and owing to this instant messaging will increase its popularity while sms’s and mms’s will have their popularity decreased.
• Location based advertising will become more effective and popular as its useful and relevant
• Mobile Video usage is increasing with the cheaper price of data plans.
• User generated content from mobile phones will become the mainstay of news content.

Tips for Engaging the youth

• Quick cheap and easy
• Market through multiple channels
• Be a friend, make us belong
• Don’t try be cool
• Be entertaining and interactive
• Don’t push, let me pull

Please start preparing. You dont advertise in social media, you get involved in social media- this was the crux of Tyler’s presentation

Online strategist John Kotsaftis from Naspers was supposed to discuss how the advertising industry can encourage and attract more qualified digital specialists in South Africa.

However, in his place, Tyler Reed, MD of Younique, a youth marketing company, will replace him. Tyler will continue on the subject of Social Media.