This is what you need to know in one, single article.
Millennials are a hot topic. While I consider “millennials” but one topic in the file of “pressing issues necessitating the evolution of visitor-serving organizations,” it turns out that there is a lot of information to point out and underscore. No doubt, I’ll be adding to this list with future posts and there’s more where these came from, but these nine Know Your Own Bone Posts make up a helpful set list for engaging this new and important audience. I’ve been on a millennial-related post roll recently. Let’s keep it going for one more week. Here is a compilation of nine data-informed take-aways for cultural centers aiming to reach millennial audiences.
Some of these posts are videos and some are data-informed articles. Each of these points links to a post with more in-depth information. But before we dive in, I must share this (though it is mentioned in several posts): “Millennial talk” is increasingly code for “everybody talk.” The trends that are most effective in engaging this generation are trends that are increasingly required for reaching other generations as well. So if you’re not completely sick of “millennial talk” and are able to take a step back, you may find yourself nodding and thinking, “Hey! This is increasingly true for ALL visitors to cultural organizations.” Because it is.
1) MILLENNIAL TALK is not about ignoring other generations
This is the best place to start. If you’re experiencing “millennial talk” overload, here are four important things to keep in mind. Remember: When we talk about the need to reach millennials, we are NOT talking about ignoring other generations. Instead, we are adding a new, important generation to our discussion list of existing important generations. In order to carry out effective “millennial talk,” we need to remove defensiveness and realize that we’re talking about the future of cultural organizations for all visitors and generations – not only millennials.
2) We have a big problem with engaging millennials (DATA)
And we need to fix this in order to survive long-term. Data suggest that the issue is particularly pressing. Millennials currently represent the largest segment of visitors to cultural organizations. (Nope. Not Baby Boomers). However, millennials are also the only age demographic not visiting cultural organizations at representative rates. This means that millennials are both our most frequent current visitors AND the visitors that we need to do a better job attracting in order to survive and thrive. As sick as we all may be of talking about millennials (I am, too, and I’m a millennial!), these facts make effectively engaging this audience a VERY big deal. This is a reality that organizations ignore at their own risk and it is my experience that showing this data and underscoring this situation helps explain why this generation is getting so much attention right now.
3) There are two (most important!) things to keep in mind for engaging millennials
Okay – so reaching millennials is important and other generations should not take this need to mean that their own generations are less important. So how can organizations best reach millennials? There are a lot of tips and tricks out there, but I’ve boiled it all down to two. Here are the two, most important mindset shifts for engaging millennials. They sound simple, but they are actually large-scale culture changes for many visitor-serving organizations to carry out. They require a shift in how we think. Again, however, making these shifts does not only help position organizations to better reach millennials. It positions organizations to better reach all visitors in today’s connected world. Really, these two shifts are necessary for engaging nearly everyone.
4) Millennial audiences may be our best audiences (DATA)
Engaging millennials has a huge payoff! This post highlights three, data-informed reasons why it’s absolutely worth the energy to reach these folks. Namely, they are super-connected to many people and have terrific potential to share positive experiences and spread valuable word of mouth and third-party endorsements of your organization. They are also most likely to share those positive experiences with their circles! Moreover, millennials have the greatest intent to revisit a cultural organization among the three, primary generations today. It all adds up to an understanding that targeting millennials is a good thing for everybody – and this generation does a lot of important messaging for organizations!
5) Millennials spend the most on food and retail (DATA)
It’s a smaller point, but it’s also an added bonus: Millennials spend more than any other generation on food and retail at visitor-serving organizations. Check out the data. For those folks who are less “believing” of the incredible value of third party endorsements in securing visitation and the importance of millennial audiences on that front (discussed above), here’s a more cut-and-dry financial incentive. Are we all happy now? Yes? Excellent.
6) Attracting millennials is key to engaging people of different racial and ethnic backgrounds (DATA)
Organizations often aim to engage folks of different racial and ethnic backgrounds. In doing this, many organizations overlook information regarding how people of different racial and ethnic backgrounds actually view themselves. The United States population is growing increasingly diverse with folks that are different than the historic visitor to cultural organizations – and much of that change is driven by millennials. We are the most diverse generation in the workforce. But we don’t primarily identify ourselves as our ethnic backgrounds. We identify ourselves as being young. This data is critical because it means that an important key to engaging audiences of more diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds is – in fact – engaging millennials.
7) Millennials are changing membership programs (DATA)
Millennials are necessitating change. If your organization doesn’t have as many millennial members as it should, it may be because your organization is not yet offering the type of membership that millennials want! (In fact, many aren’t.) The data about what millennials want in a membership program is particularly cool (in my humble opinion) because it underscores a trend that we are seeing for members on the whole. Mission-based members are more valuable members than transaction-based members and, really, what many organizations consider to be one “membership program” may actually be two, separate programs. There’s important thought-fuel here.
8) Millennials are not naturally caring more about arts and culture as they age (DATA)
And now for some not-great news: We cannot sit around and wait for millennials to “grow into” caring about cultural organizations. It’s not happening. At IMPACTS, we call this “cause durability” and millennials have it. The thought that millennials will “age into” historic visitor profiles is not proving true. Simply because the historic visitor profile is an older, white person doesn’t mean that millennials will have the same values when they become older, white people themselves (…particularly because this generation is incredibly diverse so that’s not even a thing for almost half of our generation). “But,” you say, “this isn’t about ethnicity – it’s about growing wisdom and appreciating the finer things in life as one ages!” Okay. We can hope for that, but data isn’t supporting it and is it worth the risk to your organization’s future to simply sit around without effectively engaging these audiences?
9) It is time to add millennials to your board of directors
Millennials represent the largest generation in human history. Still, many boards of directors for cultural organizations do not include a single millennial. Here are five important reasons to add millennials to your board of directors. They aren’t rocket science. They may simply be inconvenient truths… but truths they are, nonetheless. It’s difficult to attract millennials without listening to them and getting their input where it counts: in the board room and in leadership meetings.
There’s more to come on Know Your Own Bone in regard to engaging millennials, to be sure – and there are more posts than these in my archives. That said, I’ve tried to select the hardest-hitting, what-you-need-to-know round up. We’ll take a break from millennials for a while and get back to other myth-busts and trends in the weeks ahead- but there’s a lot here and it’s important. I hope that these posts are useful to you and please remember to dive into the individual points to get the full information and dig into the data. We’re on our way to integrating new mindsets into our organizations!
