Why Millennials Deserve Our Attention
By 2020, global millennial spending power will total $20 trillion plus. Not paying attention to the needs of this burgeoning demographic is business suicide.
The sooner supply chains can adapt to millennial attitudes, the better placed they are to thrive in the future. Agile logistics buyers who can secure providers offering millennial-focused services will reap the rewards.
Only 19 percent of millennials believe that others can be trusted, compared with 40 percent of boomers and 31 percent of generation Xers, finds a recent Pew study. This widespread mistrust in organizations and individuals has led to increased demand for transparency and traceability at every level. Millennials want to know exactly where their goods and services are coming from, how they will be transported, and the exact time they will arrive.
Transparent Tracking
Introducing Simplicity as a Service into the supply chain sector is a step in the right direction, with some consultancies already pre-empting the shift to millennial style services by suggesting faster response times to changing customer demands. To stay ahead of the competition, choose providers that offer reliable and transparent tracking services; it’s the smart, millennial-ready choice.
Despite claims that "snowflake" millennials are not tough enough, it’s my opinion that they have demonstrated much resilience. Many in the United States and UK have been hit hard by the effects of the financial crash, student debt, and astronomical property prices, but they have adapted and found ways to be successful.
This agile approach to life is reflected in the expectations millennials place on the goods and services they buy into. Innovation and resilience are a pairing that millennials know only too well. As such, their favored brands are ones that constantly bring them new and improved iterations of products and smart updates to services they have subscribed to.
If competitors spring up, millennials expect brands to innovate fast and come back stronger, with better services. To tap into this mindset, choose providers that pioneer innovation and are not afraid of some healthy competition.
Personalized Experience
Millennials are the "experience generation" and it’s important that the supply chain is considered essential to their customer experience, not just an invisible support function. This hands-on demographic demands bespoke goods and services, tailored to their needs from well before the point of sale until well after.
Personalized marketing has skyrocketed since millennials established themselves as the consumers to impress. However, it’s not easy to get the attention of a group that is constantly bombarded with information. A personalized approach is vital to cut through the noise of generic internet ads and spam emails.
To mitigate, businesses should aim to choose logistics providers that are committed to understanding the millennial psyche and have invested in technology and marketing to make millennials the world over feel personally catered to.