Targeting the Teens

TheStar.com: When it comes to marketing to youth, it’s usually worse to aim at the demographic and miss, than it is not to advertise at all.
When McDonald’s launched the “I’d Hit It” online advertising campaign in the U.S. — without knowing the slang translated to having sex with a cheeseburger — the gaffe blew up in the company’s face.
Sites such as http://www.andrewteman.org/blog ruthlessly picked apart the fast-food giant, as visitors took the opportunity to chronicle other examples of just how lost advertisers are when marketing to youth.
Another offender listed on the site is Wal-Mart, for an ad featuring a young black actor uttering the line “Wal-Mart has everything I need. No diggity.”
One of the chain’s Canadian commercials features young people in Wal-Mart-purchased clothes — the same labels sold at many of the 4,000 Wal-Mart stores worldwide — claiming they aren’t “afraid to be different.” And a recent commercial for The Bay has actors in designer duds doing what most young people do after getting dressed up — riding skateboards.
All of these ads expose the companies to ridicule because it’s clear to the target market that these retailers know very little about young people — but want their attention and disposable income nonetheless. Essentially, then, these ads expose the companies as the posers they are.
Manufactured Cool [TheStar.com]