10 key insights for brands targeting Ethnic Youth in the UK
Proprietary research carried out by media agency Manning Gottlieb OMD has revealed new insight into the media consumption and connectivity of Gen Y's ethnic youth, a previously overlooked audience in Britain that is continually growing.
The research, led by Alison Tsang, head of insight at the agency, was conducted in three stages: the first involved speaking to 1,700 respondents between the age of 18-29 across 10 ethnicities, 40 filmed street interviews and 20 blog diaries, as well as a quantative survey of White British and Ethnic Youth.
Here are 10 key pieces of insight that's stemmed from the research:
70 per cent of British Ethnic Youth regularly read a newspaper, while 60 per cent of British White Youth was found to do the same.
27 per cent of British Ethnic Youth communicate with five or more friends each day, in comparison to 16 per cent of White British Youth.
"Having the right designer labels is important for a persons image" was a statement that 34 per cent of British Ethnic Youth agreed with, as opposed to 18 per cent of White British Youth.
Importance of looking good was important to 78 per cent of British Ethnic Youth, with the same true of 64 per cent of White British Youth.
71 per cent of British Ethnic Youth regularly listen to radio, as does 65 per cent of White British Youth.
"Having the latest technology and gadgets are important for a person's image" was agreed with by 47 per cent of British Ethnic Youth, but only by 32 per cent of White British Youth.
46 per cent of British Ethnic Youth regularly read mainstream magazine titles, as does less than a third (32 per cent) of White British Youth.
On social media, only Facebook was stronger in use among the White British Youth, Snapchat (54 per cent), Instagram (20 per cent), Google+ (21 per cent)' Tumblr (14 per cent), Snapchat (13 per cent), Vine (9 per cent), FourSquare (8 per cent) and Flickr (8 per cent) were all more widely used by British the Ethnic Youth community.
Cinema was found to be the most popular method of consuming ethnic media, according to 55 per cent of British Ethnic Youth respondents.
During a typical day 22 per cent of British Ethnic Youth was found to communicate with five or more people within their family network, as opposed to only seven per cent of White British Youth.
Discussing the research, CEO of Manning Gottlieb OMD, Robert Ffitch, told The Drum that he had found that the ethnic youth section was not regularly discussed within agency planning meetings unless raised by the company itself.
Ffitch also discussed the insight that within Ethnic Youth in Britain, 44 per cent of the Asian Youth and 40 per cent of Black youth felt a new car was a priority to them, in comparison with 33 per cent of British Youth, and how important that insight could be for clients: "We've work with Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi and we want to go to them and say 'we know everyone researches car buying online and then they go to a dealer once they have made up their mind. This audience is using online for everything, social networks and communications and always talking about it before they go into the research.' So we need to look at what we're doing on Twitter and Facebook that is different in order to engage with this audience during that journey. We do a little bit with are adult but we could be doing a lot more.thats what we are excited about," he explained.
Ffitch also added his concern about the growing gap in between actively engaged young people across ethnicities, with the White British Youth clearly falling behind across most elements of the survey
"The worry would be how passive and disengaged the white British Youth is becoming and watching friends from ethnic backgrounds outpace them and be much more active and interested and seek opportunities and be British while also being proud of their ethnicity at the same time. The White British Youth is in danger of being left behind from a commercial point of view, status point of view, and an opinion point of view. If we do this research again in three or four years time, I bet their participation has gone backwards which should be a worry for White British Youth."
The survey also discovered that 64 per cent of British Ethnic Youth believed that's there was opportunity within the UK, which was higher than the 52 per cent of White British Youth that agreed with that sentiment.