Anastasia Goodstein Talks to PSFK

Anastasia is an award-winning blogger and often-quoted expert on American tweens, teens and early twentysomethings. Her blog, Ypulse.com informs ad agencies, media outlets and brands trying to reach youth. Her first book about teens and technology called “Totally Wired” was published by St. Martin’s Press this past March. We thought she’d be a good person to ask what’s happening with the kids these days.

Ypulse seems to be many things these days – how could you describe it? Any new projects?

Ypulse has grown from a blog about youth culture for media and marketing professionals into a media platform for this community that now includes events or Ypulse Mashups and video podcasts of those events (Ypulsecasts.com). Modern Media Partners, a small company that helps media entrepreneurs to build, produce, market and sell business conferences and media brands, became a minority owner of Ypulse a few months ago, and are helping me to further expand. Right now we’re redesigning the site (for the first time in over three years!) and working on expanding opportunities for sponsors as well as planning our next Ypulse Mashup focusing on reaching college students with technology, which will happen in early February in Los Angeles.

What one critical shift in youth culture should we be aware of today? Why?

The biggest shift is that they are totally wired meaning they have grown up with the internet and cellphones and have fully integrated these technologies into their lives doing all the things teens have always done — just digitally…and publicly. What marketers need to understand is that for teens, it’s all about how technology is meeting their needs — to stay connected, express themselves, buy one song at a time, etc. Teens are quick to adopt technology for these reasons, which are different than the reasons “early adopters” embrace new technology. For teens it’s less about the bells and whistles or even great design (look at their adoption of MySpace a year ago) and more about tech that’s easy, intuitive and meets a core need.

What/who are a few of the companies that are embracing the changes in youth trends and promoting innovation and creativity?

In the social space I like what BuzzNet is doing by integrating social media with pop culture content young people are interested in from the get go vs. trying to add that on to an existing profile-oriented social networking site. Vimeo is an interesting take on video marketing itself as the anti-YouTube for young people that may not be as interested in the whole fame aspect of posting videos. Brands I love are Jones Soda (user-generated labels, embracing the skater community, integrate youth as advisors), Threadless (user generated design and just their whole ethos) and kajeet in the tween wireless space (they really listen to what kids and parents want in a phone/plan and I love their mascots “the dudes.”).

Thanks, Anastasia!

Ypulse
Totally Wired