I remember my teenage years vividly. I was very impressed with the Winfield advertisements and commercials. It carried the essence of manlihood, rugby and satisfaction. I was too young to smoke back then, but I knew that Winfield epitomised the “Maxi-Man”. I wanted to be that guy when I grow up. Esteemed, in the know and well associated with the sport of men.

The youth market is something hot on the lips of marketers and businesses, but something rather reluctantly pursued. For we (I included) know just how menacing teenagers can be. How a seemingly simple approach could amplify their distrust, distaste and “so not cool dude” attitude to their peers.

Let’s face it, we’re scared. We have a brand to protect. Not to mention our ego. And even worse, they hang about these weird places like Facebook and Youtube these days. Things I’ve heard of, but not likely something I’d bother to invest in. I can’t even manage to have him sit still and listen to me for one minute.

And the last time I asked if I could drop him off somewhere, his “friend” with the tattoo and weird peircings ogled at me as if I’m from another planet.

Remember the days when we as teenagers watched 3.2 hours of TV a day, listened to 2.3 hours of radio a day, read 1.7 newspapers per day and 3.3 magazines each week?

Do they do that today? Unlikely. But I reckon we can just ignore them until they grow up and transcend back to normal human beings.

The chances of that happening are even less my fellow people. They grow up with more savvy, more knowledge and a stronger opinion than you have ever dreamed of having. Their voices carry more influential substance than your greatest public speech or television interview.

If you do not believe this, then I’m willing the venture a guess that you’re probably a very gullible and naïve person. Straight up.

This is all well documented and understood by most, but the real issue lies not in acknowledging fact. It lies in implementing fact into a strategy that could ensure actual returns, a reputation that’s intact and brand that is engaging the emerging market to great effect.

We know they won’t appreciate your authoritarian television commercial. They also don’t click on your banner ads or pay the slightest reaction to your grandiose testimonials, quarterly reports or inflated bottom line.

They’re willing to participate in a brand that provides them with an incentive. It is in their inner being to expect something back for their time and effort. And that trend will continue from hereon in.

There’s a couple of things that should be at the top of anyone’s mind willing to engage the youth market and looking to do it right:

1. Engage them using their medium of choice, not yours.
Mobile marketing is top of the list. Social networking sites such as Facebook, blogs, Mxit, Youtube et al are all platforms they frequent. Fortunately, these platforms also allow them to pay your message forward to your friends very easily.

2. Make it worth their while.
Like a kid willing to do you a favour if you give something back, so to will they be willing to experiment with your products or services if you are willing to incentivise it.

3. Make sure they think it is cool enough. Not your wife, not your product manager, but them.
The coolness factor is important. This will change over time, but best would be to research popular trends, hot topics and engaging matters to grab their attention. Once you have their attention, it is yours to mess up.

4. It has to make them feel part of your brand.
Gone are the days when your brand is forced down their throats. These days they’ll tell you straight up that you suck and they’ll make damn sure their friends know about it too. You need to plan your campaign that would interest them in associating with you.

As you can see from these 4 points is that everything is about them. It has always been about them and one of the biggest reasons we’re getting it wrong is because we continue to build our marketing campaigns around our brands.

Are you contemplating taking on the most difficult market of them all? Share your wisdom and fears here and let’s make sure these campaigns are successful the first time.