August 27, 2025 • 50 mins
As each generation ages, the way they see the world—and the way the world sees them—changes. In this episode, we explore the shifting mindsets of generations as they migrate into new age groups. From the Silent Generation to Gen Alpha, we break down their formative experiences, cultural touch points, and evolving relationship with technology and trust. This isn’t just a history lesson—it’s a look at how generational identity is never fixed, but constantly reshaped by time, culture, and circumstance. Whether you’re curious about how Boomers view digital life, why Gen X remains skeptical, or how Gen Z is redefining connection, this episode provides a clear chart and conversation that help decode the forces behind generational change.
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SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host,
SPEAKER_01 (00:08):
Ken Carroll.
Who are you really targeting inthis episode of Over the Bull?
Hi, I'm Ken.
If you hear some noises in thebackground, I've got several
bits of data that I'm going tobe referring to.
And I just thought it'd bereally interesting to let's talk
about the age of the people thatyou're trying to target for your
(00:30):
business.
Now, the reason I wanted to dothis was I was inspired because,
you know, there are certainthings that happen when you're
trying to explore doingmarketing and do marketing is a
fun term in itself, isn't it?
But the idea is that as you'reworking with a client to figure
out what you're doing, one ofthe topics that comes up is the
(00:52):
age group of the people you'retrying to target.
For example, if you were totarget, say, 35-year-old, you
know, 35, 40, you know, 44,whatever age group, you assume
certain things.
And when I say you, it's me too.
We assume that it's possibly thesame 35 year old that was the 35
(01:14):
year old 10 years ago.
Meaning that people naturallyevolved to have the same
attributes as the previousgeneration once they hit a
certain age.
However, this is false.
Every generation forms andchanges based upon their
(01:34):
influences and what they've beenthrough.
So targeting the 35 year oldtoday is a lot different than
targeting the 35-year-old of 10years ago because they've gone
through different things.
They've seen different things.
They've experienced differentthings.
And so collectively, what wecould say is that the
(01:58):
35-year-old changes, the45-year-old changes, et cetera,
et cetera.
So what I thought would be kindof fun is to kind of put this in
perspective.
And let's break down each one ofthe generations and what what
they were influenced by.
And then what you can see iskind of how that baton is being
passed from generation.
(02:18):
What I mean by that is notadopting the same thing, but how
previous generation and whatthey went through affects the
next generation.
And then, of course, there arehuge advents in recent history
where if we take the beginningof the cell phone, iPads,
(02:39):
tablets, It's the internettechnology, and now we have
artificial intelligence.
What you can see is that theripples that happen due to
different age groups and whatthey've been exposed to kind of
forms the way they perceive theworld around them, and it also
kind of solidifies in generalcertain qualities of different
(03:01):
age groups.
Now, this is not, by any stretchof the imagination, the totality
of the argument.
You know, it's like what we'refocusing on if we were baking a
cake is maybe we're focusing onthe icing today.
Or maybe we're focusing on adifferent part of the cake, you
know, the decorations.
But there's a lot more to thecake.
(03:22):
For example, if you were to takesomeone who is in an urban area
versus, say, you know, someonewho's more rural, what you could
see is that that influence couldalso influence how they see
things.
And so...
one thing that's reallyimportant is to make sure you're
working with someone whounderstands where you're at and
(03:45):
what you do, because thosenuances could be missed from a
person that maybe doesn't livein the area.
And there's a lot of nuances tothat, but I don't want to go too
far down that rabbit trail.
So anyway, let's talk a whatchanges with those people.
(04:12):
So if we start off with thefirst group, what I'm going to
do is talk to you about thesilent generation.
So the silent generation, 1928to 1945, and we're talking these
are 80-year-old to 97-year-oldpeople.
Now, their core identifiers,they're traditionalist, they're
(04:36):
civic-minded, they value loyaltyand duty.
And so you see that thisgeneration has a very locked-in
perception of the way they seethe world.
Now, what formed that mindsetwere things like the Great
Depression, World War II, radio,and early mass manufacturing.
(05:03):
Now, they're also skeptical ofrapid change.
They tend to trust institutionsAnd low digital exposure is part
of what they have.
So you could imagine that ifyou're coming from a background
where there's scarcity, like,for example, if you take the
Great Depression, the wholebanking collapse and all that,
(05:27):
and then you move into theunknown of World War II, and now
we have the beginning of theradio where that's a source of
information.
And then we had this earlymanufacturing.
So what you could see is howthey would value maybe jobs.
(05:47):
Like my dad, he was born in1936.
My dad, for example, one of thethings he really tried to
enforce on me when I was youngwas the idea to get a job, to
keep that job and retire.
Work that job your whole life.
Now, dad, because of where hewas, the world was a lot
(06:10):
different.
Back then, when you had peoplewho had loyalty to their
employees and employees' loyaltyto their employers, then to take
them through a lifetime ofstability was important to the
employer and to the employeebeing dedicated to working hard
(06:32):
for the employer was somethingthat they both valued.
And so it was symbiotic can itwork?
While if you look at some of themore modern advents of business,
you'll see that there's a lot ofinstability and that concept of
loyalty and that high value,that high ethical system is more
(06:54):
going out the window for a lotof people.
And what they simply look at is,you know, if I'm paying Bob X
number of dollars and I canreplace Bob with an AI system or
I can replace Bob with a youngerperson, then I'm I saved that
money.
So you see that the way thatit's evolved over the years
(07:16):
makes the idea of keeping thesame job for your entire life
less viable, and it changes theway that you see the world, you
see.
But the silent generation wouldhave been a lot different
experience, and that particularmodality would have been more
viable for that generation.
(07:38):
Now, if we move on to the babyboomers.
So we're talking 1946 to 1964.
So you're seeing this age groupis 61 to 79 years old.
So they're quickly replacing thesilent generation.
Now, they had post-war optimism,they were career focused, and
(07:59):
they value security and status.
So if we look at the previousgeneration, think about what
they went through.
The Great Depression and WorldWar II.
a lot of instability, a lot ofunknowns, a lot of question
marks.
And so then you take the nextgeneration who was influenced by
the previous generation.
(08:20):
They value this idea of beingimportant.
They value this concept of beingsecure because there was so much
insecurity from the previousgeneration.
So you see, it's not a siloedevent.
People are influenced by whatthey grew up with.
Now, if we move on, we can seethat the formation of their
(08:43):
group would have been post-WorldWar II boom.
Television, the Civil RightsMovement, and the Cold War.
Now, If we look at where theyare in the digital landscape,
they generally trust traditionalinstitutions.
They're cautious, but adapted tothe digital atmosphere later in
(09:06):
life.
So you're seeing that, you know,where they're coming from.
You know, they want to berelevant.
They want to have status, thisgroup.
And by having status, part ofthat is they don't want to feel
like that they're there.
mother or dad, they want to feellike that they're current
(09:26):
because that feeds this idea ofsecurity and status.
They don't want to look likethey're inept.
And so by doing that, you'reseeing the adaptation, but
you're also seeing what theyvalue.
So if you're targeting the babyboomer group, you want to build
a system that does instill ahigh sense of security and
status and trust.
(09:47):
And you want to give them thatsense of that optimism that they
desperately want that wereingrained in their formative
years.
So as you can see, targeting thesilent generation versus the
boomers would be significantlydifferent.
And then, of course, that'sbased upon what they've been
through.
We tend to think that people aresiloed and that somehow they
(10:11):
just developed a certain senseor a certain attitude toward
things just because they didwhat they did.
However, when you look at thebroader culture influence,
that's one thing that does it.
But then also within a subset ofthat, you have two different
groups, right?
Like if you were either canmigrate toward what your parents
(10:34):
did or you can migrate and dothe opposite of what your
parents did.
And some of that boils down topersonal, personal, whatever,
whatever does that to people.
But there is this thought thatat least when you look at it
from this big perspective ofwhat they've been through and
the expectation, then you couldstart start building things more
toward it.
(10:55):
Now, if you start looking atthis, then what you can also say
is that if I was building asystem for the silent generation
versus the boomers, and then theboomers are replacing the silent
generation, I've just becomeirrelevant.
You see, this is why your weband your marketing plan always
has to evolve because the agegroups change and the
(11:16):
expectations of those age groupschange too.
So let's move on to generationX.
So Generation X is between theyears 1965 and 1980, and now
it's 45 to 60-year-olds.
Independent, skeptical,hardworking, and they try to
(11:39):
balance life and pragmatism.
Now, the influence of thisgeneration are personal
computers.
MTV, believe it or not, is a bigone.
The end of the Cold War, and wehad this concept of dual income
households.
So let's move on and we'll kindof break this down a little bit.
(12:00):
Now, the thing about thisgeneration is they're skeptical
of authority, moderate digitaltrust, but wary of surveillance
and ads.
And so the idea is that as thisstuff started happening, so you
could imagine that peoplewanting to cling on to something
(12:21):
because once thing, like if youresearch things like the
Hegelian dialect and things likethat, you find that people, when
they're in a bad situation, theytend to go toward what they
think is safe.
And so if you were to take, say,the silent generation, and then
you see the ramifications thatwould have on the boomers, and
(12:45):
then you take the boomers, andyou put that into Generation X,
you can see how that evolvesfrom wanting to clamor to radio
or things that make me feel likethat I'm safe to where then
there becomes this idea that,well, maybe I can't trust the
people that my mom and my dadtrusted.
(13:08):
And so then what happens is, isyou start to realize things like
you start to realize that if yousee an ad for detergent and
they're making a call or a pleadthat they're they're somehow
tied into some moral calls,which I'm not saying they are or
they're not, but more thanlikely they're not, what they're
(13:29):
doing is find a weakness andthen trying to target that
audience either through makingit look like they're empathetic
toward that audience orwhatever.
But what they're doingessentially is they're trying to
manipulate you.
And so when they try tomanipulate you, what happened
was is that the generation priorto Gen X, they would be more
(13:51):
susceptible to possiblyfollowing that if it's an
authoritative or a trustedbrand.
While as Generation X evolvesinto it, that's my generation,
we become more skeptical ofthose things.
And we go, well, of coursethey're saying that they do
that, but we understand theyhave board members and we
understand that their valuesystem is not the value system
(14:17):
of the silent generation.
And so the way that we look atthem is that they're trying to
manipulate us.
And again, generalities, right?
But just think about that alittle bit.
And so how do you do that?
Well, what you'll see is a trendhere from trust and thinking
that everyone thinks like, youknow, an ethical, honest person
(14:40):
to where now we realize that noteverybody thinks the same way
and not everybody does the samething in the same fashion.
All right, so let's move on herereal quick.
So then after Generation X, wehave what we call the millennial
generation, Gen Y, so to speak.
(15:03):
This is 1981 to 1996.
So think about this.
These are the 30s.
These are the group.
This is that spot that mostbusinesses think about, 29 to
44-year-old.
Now, we tend to think thisgeneration has more disposable
income.
And so if you were targeting the35-year-old just 10 years ago,
(15:26):
you were targeting Gen X, right?
But now you're targeting Gen Y,the millennials.
Now, let's talk about some oftheir core identifiers.
This group is tech adopted.
They value experiences,diversity, and flexibility.
So you could imagine justreading that, what they would
(15:50):
want as an offering versusversus what the Gen X would want
as an offering if they want thatmore flexibility and diversity.
And you're seeing that this ideaof status is kind of waning and
people are changing the way thatthey value things.
So what influenced the Gen Ygroup?
(16:13):
So the internet boom, right?
I mean, if you look at 1981 to1996, just think of the
evolution of the internet duringthat time.
And then we have, of course,9-11.
You know, 9-11 is one of thosethings that really impacted a
lot of people in how theyperceived the safety of their
(16:36):
existence and also probably gavethem a sense of– maybe a little
bit of Americana, you know,coming back to people, you know,
wanting to defend the homelandof their parents and
grandparents.
Then we have social media rise.
I mean, social media was poppingup about that time.
You know, we had, what was theone, MySpace, you know, and we
(17:00):
had certain one of those andMinespring and, you know, all
these crazy things that were upat the time.
And some fell and some rose.
And then people were starting toget used to this.
And then also, if you thinkabout it, the people that made
it were learning how to getpeople to spend more time on
their social media platforms.
(17:22):
And of course, that's evolvedover time to where now you can
almost look at thisdopamine-style approach that
social media companies take,which is why there's a
scrolling, where you're alwayslooking for that next video,
that next dopamine hit.
Yeah.
you know, that kind ofsatisfies, kind of scratches
(17:44):
that itch and it makes you wantto find that other video and
then keep going and going, whichkind of like bottles you in to
social media today.
This is not an accident, in myopinion.
This is absolutely deliberate.
And, you know, so anyway, let'smove on.
And then global recession, ifyou remember, we were impacted
(18:08):
by that.
Now, where are they as far asthe digital landscape.
So they're digitally adaptive.
They trust social media forconnection, but are aware of
misinformation.
Now, I'm not a big fan of thesewords, misinformation and
disinformation, because I'm GenX.
I like to call things as theyare.
(18:28):
I think those are fancy words tobasically subset the word lie
and make people feel thatthere's some kind of variation
of the word lie.
So it needs multiple definitionsSo I'm not real big into that
terminology, but it did bring upa mode of skepticism.
(18:50):
And so as you look at that, thenyou start to go, okay, well,
what does that mean for thatgeneration?
Because remember, these are35-year-olds.
And so as they're starting tolook at this more conspiracy
style, and I don't mean that ina negative term, because if you
(19:10):
look at the word conspiracy,that's a legitimate term.
This term was actuallymilitarized.
It's not subjective.
It was actually known that thisterm was used to marginalize
certain thought that kind of gotoutside the box.
And if you go back and look, youcan see that it's objectively
true that terms like conspiracytheory were used to make people
(19:36):
not trust certain people who hadcertain views.
Now, I don't mean that theconspiracy is Theories are true
or false or anything like that.
It just means that the actualterminology was used as a
manipulative tactic.
Now, does that mean that, youknow, we take something that
(19:57):
they've been through and then wego, well, they're aware of this?
Well, yeah, they're aware of it.
And probably because theprevious generations, you know,
they go, oh, hold on a minute.
Maybe this is how this is.
And, you know, we become thisidea of being skeptical of
authority anyway.
And then we take that and thenthat influences the next
generation.
So you can kind of see how thatwaterfall just kind of trickles
(20:20):
down further the more that yougo.
Now, let's move on here.
Let's talk about Gen Z.
Okay, so now we have Gen Z andwe're looking at 1997 to 2012.
So these are your 13-year-oldsto 28-year-olds.
Now, we're moving now to theworld of digital natives.
(20:44):
And then you're seeing thatthey're more aware of social
awareness, obviously, andentrepreneur and pragmatic.
Now, if we look at some of theircore identities, let's look at
some of their formativeinfluences, smartphones, social
media dominance, climatedebates.
(21:05):
And there's one more here, gigeconomy.
I don't know why I put that downthere.
We'll just kind of let that sit.
because I just want to keepmoving.
And so they're also digitalnatives, high usage, but strong
skepticism toward institutionsand ads.
So what you're seeing is that atsome point between the silent
(21:30):
generation and Gen Z, whatyou're seeing is that people are
now looking because, and I thinkpart of it's because you're so
inundated with advertising thatyou can't help but to see the
idea that you're beingmanipulated one way or another.
You're manipulated into thinkingif you get the latest smartphone
that somehow you're going to bea cooler person or whatever the
(21:52):
case may be.
But you're seeing more and moreof that.
And so the more that you becomeaware of the manipulation, the
more that you're resistant to itbecause people don't want to be
manipulated.
So if you were to take, forexample, Edward Bernays, there
was a famous story about EdwardBernays and how he got females
(22:17):
to start smoking.
And the reason that he did itwas because, one, he was
contracted to get women to startsmoking, but he didn't say start
smoking.
What he did was he said, theseare torches of freedom because
equality for women was huge backin the days of Edward Bernays.
(22:38):
It was like one of those turningpoints.
And so what he did was heactually used that as a
manipulative tactic and thencoerced women to start smoking
cigarettes because they saw itas an act of being conformed or
being on the same level or asmales.
(22:58):
And so when you look at thingslike that, you go like in their
day, they didn't think that.
They thought, you know, this isme kind of rebelling at the
system that they felt was notgiving them an equal shake.
And so then what they did wasthey started smoking.
Now, if we look at that today,we go, wow, that was really
(23:18):
manipulative and probablydangerous.
And it kind of messed up a lotof stuff.
Well, then you fast forward andthen we see by Gen X, you're
starting to see this idea of thehusband and the wife going to
work.
So you can see that the familystructure breaks down.
The mother's influence on herchildren has changed
(23:39):
dramatically.
And then we know that, you know,having two people work means
more income, more taxes, allthose things.
And so then we start to thinkabout, okay, well, is that part
of what was going on here aspeople were being manipulated
into other things?
And then, of course, when peoplein authority abuse their power,
(24:01):
then we start to see that,especially the more that it
happens and the more it'sreported.
And then you see that there'smultiple perspectives.
So you start to see And then, ofcourse, then you're also having
the rise of alternative media.
Like, for example, it's verycommon for someone to say that
(24:21):
CNN or Fox or MSNBC is legacymedia.
And then there are influencesthat push them versus
alternative people, you know,alternative groups that have
popped up across the Internet.
And so then they're seeing asbeing more legitimate and
honest.
And we see the legacy media istoting the line.
(24:44):
And so you can see, if I justkind of dive into the mindset of
the world and the soup ofhumanity that's happened since
the 1900s, you can see that eachone of these generations
impacted the next generation.
But then the next generation,due to the digital landscape and
everything that's happened,they've changed how they see the
(25:06):
world too.
And so to dissect that isextremely important, especially
if you're trying to reach acertain audience.
And we're seeing that being whoyou are is more important.
You know, it's almost likepeople want to hear someone
cough or someone with a normalvoice or someone who's just kind
(25:29):
of saying what they think,because there's an authenticness
when someone just says what theythink, rather than trying to be
very careful and manipulatewords and manipulate a
situation.
which, by the way, we're in themiddle of some huge updates.
We're actually moving from onepartner to the next for that
(25:53):
very situation.
What we found is thatbusinesses, a lot of businesses,
not all businesses, because Iknow a lot of really ethical,
honest people, but a lot ofthese big corporate businesses,
what they've done was they takethis legal word salad mentality,
and what they do is they Theytry to, rather than fix the
(26:13):
problem, they try to fix theperception of the problem.
And they try to manipulate youinto thinking that it's not
them, but it's some othersituation.
Like our hosting situation, inmy opinion, is absolutely one of
those where we're dramaticallychanging and we're going to have
100%, not 99% uptime.
(26:36):
Yeah, you heard me right, 100%,which that SLA is a lot
different than 99%, becausethat's another example.
You take where they say, hostingcompany says, well, we'll give
you 99% uptime guarantee.
We've run those tests.
And what we find is that thatguarantee is month to month.
(26:59):
And so all that means is, isthey take you down for five
hours in one month, theirguarantee just says, we'll pay
you for the month.
But you could imagine how badthat would be to be down for
five hours in a given month Andthen they'll give you back a few
bucks, uh, to compensate you forall that time.
You could imagine that's verymanipulative in my opinion.
(27:20):
And so I don't like playingthose kinds of games, but when
you see those things going onand then, then as generations
are coming up into it andthey're like, Hey, hold on a
minute.
These aren't the good guys justbecause they have this big
polished brand don't mean thatthey're this, they could be
that.
(27:40):
And so then the idea idea ofbigger does not necessarily mean
more trusted.
Now, you can imagine as a smallbusiness the opportunity that
you could have here by justsimply being honest and ethical.
You know, we have clients comein.
One of the things I love to dois talk about what Google posts
(28:01):
in terms of the effectiveness ofGoogle ads because people have a
perception that I run ads onGoogle that somehow it's just
going to reign in business.
Well, that's not true.
I mean, in the last podcast, wetalked about one example where
we had, where Ryan was, what, 12weeks, 12 weeks running Google
(28:21):
Ads, and then he started to seesome really nice success from
it.
Well, that doesn't mean thatthat success will continue, but
it also means that if he pulledthe plug on week 11, that he may
not have experienced the samething.
So, as you can see, thisdiscussion is more of, well, how
(28:41):
does the mind work and how doesour generations influenced?
And so you look at the 13 to 28year old, you know, in just
seven years, we're talking to 35year olds.
So you can imagine howdramatically different you need
to approach people.
Now, if we look at the digitallandscape, this is kind of cool,
(29:04):
actually, because it's almostlike ethical and honesty and
candid and being who you are isbecoming in fashion again.
You know, at some point we'retrying to mask all that stuff,
right?
And make ourselves seem likesomething that we're not.
But with the advent of theinternet and AI specifically,
(29:27):
not the internet, but the adventof artificial intelligence,
while it can be promising, itcould also be an absolute
backfire in this situation.
Like, I'll give you a couple ofexamples.
AI have values morediscussionary conversations and
they value EEAT concepts.
(29:49):
You can Google that.
We've done some podcasts on it.
So they value these things.
However, so it's a greatopportunity to be yourself and
to be authentic and to, youknow, shed this concept of I'm
something that I'm not or I'mtrying to present something that
I'm not.
One of the best things you coulddo is be honest with people
(30:10):
today.
That's where everything's movingtoo.
And I think that's brilliantbecause we've been trying to do
that for 20 years and we stillbattle all these companies that
are over promising junk and justtrying to sell something and
then manipulate situations andall those things.
But as we're moving into it,there's also a potential extreme
(30:32):
backlash with AI because AI isnot a sentient human being.
I mean, it does not think foritself.
It filters and us things basedon what the programmers tell it
to do.
They could be influenced by alot of different factors, both
philosophically from theircreators, but also from the
(30:53):
demands of maybe legalconstraints.
Now, with that being said, I cantell you that I have had
conversations with different AImodels, and I intentionally talk
about something that'scontroversial.
Not so much that I'm trying toget it out of the system, but I
want to go does it give me bothsides of the equation?
(31:14):
Especially if I attack somethinglike, say, for example, the
pharmaceutical industry, likeI'm going skeptical of that.
And then what I found was theseAI models, what they do is
they'll actually tote the lineof the mainstream narrative.
So it'd be the equivalent ofasking about cigarette smoking,
(31:34):
and all they do is give youPhilip Morris quotes.
You're not going to trust thatAI model when you see that.
And And so unless there's achange in AI being able to give
both sides of the equation andgive them a fair handshake, I
really don't know how it's goingto be adopted.
Because what's interesting is ifyou take a guy like Christopher
(31:59):
Hitchens, he was a prominentatheist.
One thing he talked about was hesays we're pattern-seeking
mammals.
And I remember that.
I remember that in one of hisdebates, and I thought that was
really brilliant.
You know, like we see puppy dogsand clouds and elephants and
clouds and things like that.
It's because we arepattern-seeking mammals.
(32:20):
Now, of course, I think thathuman beings are more than just
the byproduct of meaninglessevolution.
I can't see that.
I can't turn the corner on that.
But his point was noted.
Okay, so what we are seeing,too, is that the generations
now, especially the youngergenerations, is becoming
(32:43):
hypersensitive to the idea of AIcontent.
So there's a whole other aspectto this because AI content
equals untrue, unauthentic,un-E-E-A-T.
So if AI doesn't get its acttogether and starts giving the
full perspective, one of twothings is going to happen.
(33:04):
People are going to become morebrainwashed to one view, which
would give unimaginable powerthe people who are you're seeing
(33:42):
that the desire of man and theflawed aspect of man always
comes full circle into this.
It's not like we can createsomething that's beyond what we
perceive.
And if you also look at thesegenerations, if you really want
to dig back into it, look at thevalue system of the 1900s and
(34:04):
1920s and 1930s, 40s, et cetera,et cetera.
And what you're going to see isthat that value system changes
as well.
Okay.
So let's keep moving here.
So now we've got 2013 to 2025.
And let me roll back over herefor one second.
And this is what we're callingthe generation alpha.
(34:26):
Okay.
So let's talk about this alphageneration.
Fully digital.
They're AI native.
Global perspective.
Inclusivity expected.
Now, I want to talk to you aboutsome of this stuff in a minute.
So So we have the formativestuff, AIs obviously,
automation's important, climateand globalization narratives,
(34:49):
and they have been heavilyinfluenced by the pandemic.
Now, there is a lot to unpackthere, but let's keep moving
here for a second.
Now, they're AI native, heavyresilience on tech.
They trust convenience, butskepticism is still forming.
So what I find interesting aboutthe Generation Z and the Alpha
(35:14):
is that it's almost like you'reseeing that the silent
generation, they cravedstability and security, and they
were clamoring to whatever wouldgive them that sense, which you
could imagine the hownewscasters and people like that
could really become these voicesof trust and whatever they would
(35:37):
say would be the gospel, totransforming it to where kind of
like now we're in the Wizard ofOz, that generation looks behind
the curtain and goes, oh, wait,hold on a minute.
That's a human too.
And so maybe they're influencedby things just like we're
influenced by things.
And so maybe I can't trust thatperson.
And so then we have AI whereit's manipulative in certain
(35:59):
ways and it's using certainthings as disingenuous.
And so now you're having thisgeneration that's starting to
see those patterns and they'rebecoming aware of it.
Like, for example, if I'mdriving down the road with my
son, he quickly identifies AIimages.
I mean, he's like, no, that's AIgenerated.
He can also quickly identify ifsomething was made by Canva.
(36:22):
And he goes, that's just Canvastuff.
He marginalizes it because heknows that very little effort
was put into it.
He knows that somebody justpicked a template and dropped
something in.
And so you can imagine that ifyou're falling prey to that and
you're becoming moredisingenuous, but you think
you're creating something reallyeat, you see that quickly that's
(36:45):
becoming a problem becauseyou've lost your identity and
you're trying to play by therules that two generations ago
were playing by their rules withmarketing.
And the idea now is to go, youknow what?
When I eat, sometimes I get foodon my shirt.
And you just say it.
You don't try to hide the factthat you eat like a normal human
(37:08):
being and you make mistakes.
And And to embrace thatauthenticness, I think
personally is refreshing.
And I am glad that I'm seeingthe generations after my
generation become more aware ofit, because what it says is that
human beings are something wellbeyond something that can just
simply be manipulated over time.
(37:30):
Now, we go into, you can takeanything, like you go research
Germany before World War II, andthen you look at their
situations.
you know, they had a certainsituation that was really primed
for a man like Adolf Hitler totake power.
And when you look at somethinglike that, you go, okay, now if
(37:52):
that happens, what has impactedthese generations that aren't as
extreme as that?
Obviously, that's a huge extremesituation.
But then when you look at whatall's going on, then you go,
okay, well, how do I addressthat as a business owner and
survive during the time.
(38:13):
So if you don't move more towardconversational language, you're
going to alienate artificialintelligence from using you as a
point of reference.
And if you don't use authenticlanguage, then the next thing
you're going to do is alienatethe individual because they know
that you're blowing smoke.
And right now you're seeing thishuge, huge broadcast of people
(38:35):
that are claiming that they cando things in marketing they can
not do.
This is why I'll often tell you,hey, be careful about answering
those emails, those cold emailswhere these people are telling
you that they can do, they can'tdo them.
Okay, they can't.
The reason they're emailing youcold emails is because it's
(38:55):
cheap, it's easy, and they can'tmarket to you in an authentic,
realistic way.
And so they have to intrude onyour day by sending stuff to
your email box and putting yourname on it when they don't know
you to manipulate you intoclicking.
Now, If we were to takesomething like that, for
example, what they're doing ispreying upon certain statistics
(39:17):
that we know.
So if you take something likethat and they go, okay, it's
statistically known, like if youlook at different data from
email marketing tools, it'sknown that if someone
legitimately subscribes and youaddress them by name and you
give them a personalizedexperience, it's known that that
does better.
(39:37):
And so what did the bad guys do?
Well, of course, course, whatthey do is they go harvest a
bunch of email addresses,harvest the names, dynamically
insert your names into theseclumsy, dumb emails, and then
they send them out, and thenthey go, okay, that cost us very
minimal money to do that.
(39:59):
And so if it gets us a certainnumber of leads, it's worth it.
And so by you playing into thatgame, what you're doing is
feeding that machine.
But let's think about what elsehappens.
What happens to the nextgeneration when they see that.
Oh, it's got my name on it, andI don't know this person.
They're trying to manipulate me.
And so by you playing the game,then what you're doing is
(40:24):
contributing to that, but it'salso having the exact opposite
effect on the next generation.
So you can imagine what thatwould do to the trust if you
hired a company to send cold,unsolicited emails to a group of
people, what that does for yourreputation.
You see, and there's companiesthat just do that.
And so the idea is, where areyour boundaries?
(40:47):
And then are you preparing forthe 35-year-olds that are
quickly becoming the nextgeneration?
When you look at 13 to 28, it'llbe a blink of an eye before Gen
Z is your target audience, thesedigital natives who have a lot
of usage.
(41:08):
And then there's strongskepticism.
How are you going to bridge thegap with that?
What are you going to do that'sdifferent than what marketing
was just a few years ago?
Now, if we tie this into the AI,the reason I have been talking
so much about artificialintelligence is if you look from
(41:28):
a marketing perspective, this isexactly what's going on out
there.
All these companies have been, alot of these companies, not all
of them, a lot of thesecompanies have built models that
are completely unprepared forwhat's going on with artificial
intelligence.
I mean, especially if you're inthe, like you're renting
(41:49):
properties, things like that.
I mean, these guys are, a lot ofthem are completely unprepared
and there's a lot of goodcompanies out there that are
going to eat their lunch.
And the sales pitch of theseguys is just absolutely, it's
insane that they're eventhinking that their sales
pitches would still work.
But they're unprepared.
And so part of what we need todo is be prepared for that AI
(42:14):
mechanism, that AI influencethat's going on in the world.
And part of that is changingexactly how you do things and
how you reach people and then dothat authentically, you see.
So this is also why yourmarketing plans go up and down.
And so I just think it's very,very interesting when you start
(42:35):
to break all this down.
And so if you're targeting the35-year-old of today, then
remember that 35-year-old todayis not the same as a 35-year-old
of tomorrow.
And you need to do a little bitof homework on this.
Okay, so let me button this upwith one more thought.
Now, the last thought I wantedto kind of make full circle with
(42:56):
is this also does not live in asilo by itself.
The interesting thing about, oh,and by the way, this is also why
you never farm your work out toother countries.
You need to work in your nativecountry and hire locals, no
matter what the cost is.
Because only people thatunderstand your culture and your
environment can design within itlike legitimately.
(43:18):
The other ones will look likethey're faking.
So just two cents.
If you're farming out andthinking you're doing something
great by doing that, you'rewrong by that.
I mean, we are becoming a globalcommunity, but it's still the
culture and everything is stilllocalized.
And if you're neglecting that,you're making some huge
mistakes.
(43:38):
Anyway.
way.
A lot of people think they candecide that as an owner of a
business without looking at itthrough a marketing lens, which
is also absolutely not true.
Okay.
So what I wanted to do is talkabout some of these other
concepts.
So one of them is theenvironment.
(43:59):
Okay.
Now, when we started this, Italked about that someone who
lives in a city versus outsidethe city may have dramatically
different experiences.
And so if you could imagine Andas a whole, you know, if you
were shielded from the GreatDepression and World War II, it
would also maybe shield you asan individual from following
(44:21):
what most people did in thepreceding generation.
And so when you look at yourenvironment, if you're living in
a certain segment of society ora certain area, and there are
certain things that are adoptedby that group, meaning like, for
example, if you take NortheastOhio, I have some clients over
(44:43):
in Ohio right now, and theseclients are really salt of the
earth, incredible, awesome, kindpeople.
And the way that the internethas influenced them has been
marginal compared to how itinfluences some other people.
So if you're marketing to thatkind of audience, the way you
(45:05):
would take this data we talkedabout today would have to be
also filtered through what thatservice area looks like.
And then you have to make somereally big decisions about,
okay, can I be authentic withinthat community?
And how do I be authentic tothat community?
Because if I were to take thepractices of an agency in New
(45:28):
York that has no clue of what'sgoing on in Northeast Ohio,
believe it or not, a good, solidagency, now not a freelancer,
not a college kid, not thesepeople, but if you can find a
good, solid agency and that areathat understands that market,
they're going to speak more toyour audience than that group in
New York.
Now, it's not to say that thegroup in New York is not smart.
(45:50):
There are things called focusgroups, and there are different
things that can help makedecisions.
But I'm like, if you're swimmingin the water, you're going to
know the temperature, right?
So I really think this ispowerful.
And I really think that if youdigest this and you think about
where you're at and what you areand the audience you're trying
(46:10):
to target and how they'vechanged, then I think what it's
going to do is change the waythat you're approaching
business.
And I think sooner than later ismore important.
The more you can get authentic,the more you can adopt
conversational language, I thinkthe better you're going to be
giving the trend and the shiftin the world.
(46:34):
Just like no one is using phonebooks anymore, the same thing is
happening with the way peoplelook at their world today too.
And so all that needs to be putinto its proper context.
Okay, so I think I want to wrapup the podcast today with this.
I don't really have a lot of, Idid pull a lot of data from
(46:55):
third-party resources for thisinformation today.
I don't think necessarily I'mgoing to include it because this
is just kind of generalinformation.
You can do your own homework andalso do your own homework.
That's one of the most importantthings you could do is to make
Make sure that what I'm tellingyou is true.
And if it's true, then you needto stick with it.
(47:16):
And if you see some variancethat you need to consider within
your area, within what I'msaying, well, consider that too.
Put that into the mix.
And then the great thing aboutmarketing is, first of all, I
always found that telling thetruth is so much easier than
trying to manipulate somebody.
So it's just easier just to bewho you are and do what you do,
which reminds me of a prettyaffluent guy I met a year And I
(47:41):
remember him saying at onepoint, he's like, you know, if
we can't be in business, if wecan't compete in business with
what we are, then we don't needto be in business.
And I thought there wasn't a lotthat I'll quote from that guy,
but that was one of the stories.
But the idea is what you want todo is you do want to get to a
point to where you're shifting.
And if your marketing agency isnot addressing these problems or
(48:05):
not discussing these issues,then you need to find somebody
else.
You know, there are so manythings that go into this plan.
Like I'm doing some researchright now.
I'll ramble here for just twoseconds.
And part of what I wasresearching was a new company
starting up in an area and wewere looking at their
competition and theircompetition has been around
(48:27):
there since like 1979.
Okay, now what we also found wasthose companies in 1979, think
about their influences and howthey perceive advertising.
Skeptical, right?
So they're not really embracingdigital marketing.
So if we were to embrace digitalmarketing more and then approach
that newer generation, you cansee the strategic advantage we
(48:48):
have because they're setting onwhat they've already built and
they think it's going tocontinue.
That's a great opportunity.
But then also we have to earnthat business because they're
also trusted, you see.
Okay, well, that's enoughrambling for this week.
Thank you so much for joining mewith Over the Bull.
I do hope this helps you out.
Honestly, you have no idea howmuch I realize that that
(49:11):
businesses, they're being somanipulated and promise so many
things that just simply aren'ttrue.
And I just hope that thisreaches you in a way to where
you can pierce through the veilof anything that people are
selling you or offering you orcurrently doing for you, and you
(49:33):
can change it.
And you can change it, and youcan be a better, stronger
company.
And this is one piece of thatpuzzle that may help Until next
week, this is Ken Kerr with Overthe Bull, and this podcast is
brought to you by IntegrisDesign out of Asheville, North
Carolina.
SPEAKER_00 (49:51):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, afull-service design and
marketing agency out ofAsheville, North Carolina.
Until next time.
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host,
SPEAKER_01 (00:08):
Ken Carroll.
Who are you really targeting inthis episode of Over the Bull?
Hi, I'm Ken.
If you hear some noises in thebackground, I've got several
bits of data that I'm going tobe referring to.
And I just thought it'd bereally interesting to let's talk
about the age of the people thatyou're trying to target for your
(00:30):
business.
Now, the reason I wanted to dothis was I was inspired because,
you know, there are certainthings that happen when you're
trying to explore doingmarketing and do marketing is a
fun term in itself, isn't it?
But the idea is that as you'reworking with a client to figure
out what you're doing, one ofthe topics that comes up is the
(00:52):
age group of the people you'retrying to target.
For example, if you were totarget, say, 35-year-old, you
know, 35, 40, you know, 44,whatever age group, you assume
certain things.
And when I say you, it's me too.
We assume that it's possibly thesame 35 year old that was the 35
(01:14):
year old 10 years ago.
Meaning that people naturallyevolved to have the same
attributes as the previousgeneration once they hit a
certain age.
However, this is false.
Every generation forms andchanges based upon their
(01:34):
influences and what they've beenthrough.
So targeting the 35 year oldtoday is a lot different than
targeting the 35-year-old of 10years ago because they've gone
through different things.
They've seen different things.
They've experienced differentthings.
And so collectively, what wecould say is that the
(01:58):
35-year-old changes, the45-year-old changes, et cetera,
et cetera.
So what I thought would be kindof fun is to kind of put this in
perspective.
And let's break down each one ofthe generations and what what
they were influenced by.
And then what you can see iskind of how that baton is being
passed from generation.
(02:18):
What I mean by that is notadopting the same thing, but how
previous generation and whatthey went through affects the
next generation.
And then, of course, there arehuge advents in recent history
where if we take the beginningof the cell phone, iPads,
(02:39):
tablets, It's the internettechnology, and now we have
artificial intelligence.
What you can see is that theripples that happen due to
different age groups and whatthey've been exposed to kind of
forms the way they perceive theworld around them, and it also
kind of solidifies in generalcertain qualities of different
(03:01):
age groups.
Now, this is not, by any stretchof the imagination, the totality
of the argument.
You know, it's like what we'refocusing on if we were baking a
cake is maybe we're focusing onthe icing today.
Or maybe we're focusing on adifferent part of the cake, you
know, the decorations.
But there's a lot more to thecake.
(03:22):
For example, if you were to takesomeone who is in an urban area
versus, say, you know, someonewho's more rural, what you could
see is that that influence couldalso influence how they see
things.
And so...
one thing that's reallyimportant is to make sure you're
working with someone whounderstands where you're at and
(03:45):
what you do, because thosenuances could be missed from a
person that maybe doesn't livein the area.
And there's a lot of nuances tothat, but I don't want to go too
far down that rabbit trail.
So anyway, let's talk a whatchanges with those people.
(04:12):
So if we start off with thefirst group, what I'm going to
do is talk to you about thesilent generation.
So the silent generation, 1928to 1945, and we're talking these
are 80-year-old to 97-year-oldpeople.
Now, their core identifiers,they're traditionalist, they're
(04:36):
civic-minded, they value loyaltyand duty.
And so you see that thisgeneration has a very locked-in
perception of the way they seethe world.
Now, what formed that mindsetwere things like the Great
Depression, World War II, radio,and early mass manufacturing.
(05:03):
Now, they're also skeptical ofrapid change.
They tend to trust institutionsAnd low digital exposure is part
of what they have.
So you could imagine that ifyou're coming from a background
where there's scarcity, like,for example, if you take the
Great Depression, the wholebanking collapse and all that,
(05:27):
and then you move into theunknown of World War II, and now
we have the beginning of theradio where that's a source of
information.
And then we had this earlymanufacturing.
So what you could see is howthey would value maybe jobs.
(05:47):
Like my dad, he was born in1936.
My dad, for example, one of thethings he really tried to
enforce on me when I was youngwas the idea to get a job, to
keep that job and retire.
Work that job your whole life.
Now, dad, because of where hewas, the world was a lot
(06:10):
different.
Back then, when you had peoplewho had loyalty to their
employees and employees' loyaltyto their employers, then to take
them through a lifetime ofstability was important to the
employer and to the employeebeing dedicated to working hard
(06:32):
for the employer was somethingthat they both valued.
And so it was symbiotic can itwork?
While if you look at some of themore modern advents of business,
you'll see that there's a lot ofinstability and that concept of
loyalty and that high value,that high ethical system is more
(06:54):
going out the window for a lotof people.
And what they simply look at is,you know, if I'm paying Bob X
number of dollars and I canreplace Bob with an AI system or
I can replace Bob with a youngerperson, then I'm I saved that
money.
So you see that the way thatit's evolved over the years
(07:16):
makes the idea of keeping thesame job for your entire life
less viable, and it changes theway that you see the world, you
see.
But the silent generation wouldhave been a lot different
experience, and that particularmodality would have been more
viable for that generation.
(07:38):
Now, if we move on to the babyboomers.
So we're talking 1946 to 1964.
So you're seeing this age groupis 61 to 79 years old.
So they're quickly replacing thesilent generation.
Now, they had post-war optimism,they were career focused, and
(07:59):
they value security and status.
So if we look at the previousgeneration, think about what
they went through.
The Great Depression and WorldWar II.
a lot of instability, a lot ofunknowns, a lot of question
marks.
And so then you take the nextgeneration who was influenced by
the previous generation.
(08:20):
They value this idea of beingimportant.
They value this concept of beingsecure because there was so much
insecurity from the previousgeneration.
So you see, it's not a siloedevent.
People are influenced by whatthey grew up with.
Now, if we move on, we can seethat the formation of their
(08:43):
group would have been post-WorldWar II boom.
Television, the Civil RightsMovement, and the Cold War.
Now, If we look at where theyare in the digital landscape,
they generally trust traditionalinstitutions.
They're cautious, but adapted tothe digital atmosphere later in
(09:06):
life.
So you're seeing that, you know,where they're coming from.
You know, they want to berelevant.
They want to have status, thisgroup.
And by having status, part ofthat is they don't want to feel
like that they're there.
mother or dad, they want to feellike that they're current
(09:26):
because that feeds this idea ofsecurity and status.
They don't want to look likethey're inept.
And so by doing that, you'reseeing the adaptation, but
you're also seeing what theyvalue.
So if you're targeting the babyboomer group, you want to build
a system that does instill ahigh sense of security and
status and trust.
(09:47):
And you want to give them thatsense of that optimism that they
desperately want that wereingrained in their formative
years.
So as you can see, targeting thesilent generation versus the
boomers would be significantlydifferent.
And then, of course, that'sbased upon what they've been
through.
We tend to think that people aresiloed and that somehow they
(10:11):
just developed a certain senseor a certain attitude toward
things just because they didwhat they did.
However, when you look at thebroader culture influence,
that's one thing that does it.
But then also within a subset ofthat, you have two different
groups, right?
Like if you were either canmigrate toward what your parents
(10:34):
did or you can migrate and dothe opposite of what your
parents did.
And some of that boils down topersonal, personal, whatever,
whatever does that to people.
But there is this thought thatat least when you look at it
from this big perspective ofwhat they've been through and
the expectation, then you couldstart start building things more
toward it.
(10:55):
Now, if you start looking atthis, then what you can also say
is that if I was building asystem for the silent generation
versus the boomers, and then theboomers are replacing the silent
generation, I've just becomeirrelevant.
You see, this is why your weband your marketing plan always
has to evolve because the agegroups change and the
(11:16):
expectations of those age groupschange too.
So let's move on to generationX.
So Generation X is between theyears 1965 and 1980, and now
it's 45 to 60-year-olds.
Independent, skeptical,hardworking, and they try to
(11:39):
balance life and pragmatism.
Now, the influence of thisgeneration are personal
computers.
MTV, believe it or not, is a bigone.
The end of the Cold War, and wehad this concept of dual income
households.
So let's move on and we'll kindof break this down a little bit.
(12:00):
Now, the thing about thisgeneration is they're skeptical
of authority, moderate digitaltrust, but wary of surveillance
and ads.
And so the idea is that as thisstuff started happening, so you
could imagine that peoplewanting to cling on to something
(12:21):
because once thing, like if youresearch things like the
Hegelian dialect and things likethat, you find that people, when
they're in a bad situation, theytend to go toward what they
think is safe.
And so if you were to take, say,the silent generation, and then
you see the ramifications thatwould have on the boomers, and
(12:45):
then you take the boomers, andyou put that into Generation X,
you can see how that evolvesfrom wanting to clamor to radio
or things that make me feel likethat I'm safe to where then
there becomes this idea that,well, maybe I can't trust the
people that my mom and my dadtrusted.
(13:08):
And so then what happens is, isyou start to realize things like
you start to realize that if yousee an ad for detergent and
they're making a call or a pleadthat they're they're somehow
tied into some moral calls,which I'm not saying they are or
they're not, but more thanlikely they're not, what they're
(13:29):
doing is find a weakness andthen trying to target that
audience either through makingit look like they're empathetic
toward that audience orwhatever.
But what they're doingessentially is they're trying to
manipulate you.
And so when they try tomanipulate you, what happened
was is that the generation priorto Gen X, they would be more
(13:51):
susceptible to possiblyfollowing that if it's an
authoritative or a trustedbrand.
While as Generation X evolvesinto it, that's my generation,
we become more skeptical ofthose things.
And we go, well, of coursethey're saying that they do
that, but we understand theyhave board members and we
understand that their valuesystem is not the value system
(14:17):
of the silent generation.
And so the way that we look atthem is that they're trying to
manipulate us.
And again, generalities, right?
But just think about that alittle bit.
And so how do you do that?
Well, what you'll see is a trendhere from trust and thinking
that everyone thinks like, youknow, an ethical, honest person
(14:40):
to where now we realize that noteverybody thinks the same way
and not everybody does the samething in the same fashion.
All right, so let's move on herereal quick.
So then after Generation X, wehave what we call the millennial
generation, Gen Y, so to speak.
(15:03):
This is 1981 to 1996.
So think about this.
These are the 30s.
These are the group.
This is that spot that mostbusinesses think about, 29 to
44-year-old.
Now, we tend to think thisgeneration has more disposable
income.
And so if you were targeting the35-year-old just 10 years ago,
(15:26):
you were targeting Gen X, right?
But now you're targeting Gen Y,the millennials.
Now, let's talk about some oftheir core identifiers.
This group is tech adopted.
They value experiences,diversity, and flexibility.
So you could imagine justreading that, what they would
(15:50):
want as an offering versusversus what the Gen X would want
as an offering if they want thatmore flexibility and diversity.
And you're seeing that this ideaof status is kind of waning and
people are changing the way thatthey value things.
So what influenced the Gen Ygroup?
(16:13):
So the internet boom, right?
I mean, if you look at 1981 to1996, just think of the
evolution of the internet duringthat time.
And then we have, of course,9-11.
You know, 9-11 is one of thosethings that really impacted a
lot of people in how theyperceived the safety of their
(16:36):
existence and also probably gavethem a sense of– maybe a little
bit of Americana, you know,coming back to people, you know,
wanting to defend the homelandof their parents and
grandparents.
Then we have social media rise.
I mean, social media was poppingup about that time.
You know, we had, what was theone, MySpace, you know, and we
(17:00):
had certain one of those andMinespring and, you know, all
these crazy things that were upat the time.
And some fell and some rose.
And then people were starting toget used to this.
And then also, if you thinkabout it, the people that made
it were learning how to getpeople to spend more time on
their social media platforms.
(17:22):
And of course, that's evolvedover time to where now you can
almost look at thisdopamine-style approach that
social media companies take,which is why there's a
scrolling, where you're alwayslooking for that next video,
that next dopamine hit.
Yeah.
you know, that kind ofsatisfies, kind of scratches
(17:44):
that itch and it makes you wantto find that other video and
then keep going and going, whichkind of like bottles you in to
social media today.
This is not an accident, in myopinion.
This is absolutely deliberate.
And, you know, so anyway, let'smove on.
And then global recession, ifyou remember, we were impacted
(18:08):
by that.
Now, where are they as far asthe digital landscape.
So they're digitally adaptive.
They trust social media forconnection, but are aware of
misinformation.
Now, I'm not a big fan of thesewords, misinformation and
disinformation, because I'm GenX.
I like to call things as theyare.
(18:28):
I think those are fancy words tobasically subset the word lie
and make people feel thatthere's some kind of variation
of the word lie.
So it needs multiple definitionsSo I'm not real big into that
terminology, but it did bring upa mode of skepticism.
(18:50):
And so as you look at that, thenyou start to go, okay, well,
what does that mean for thatgeneration?
Because remember, these are35-year-olds.
And so as they're starting tolook at this more conspiracy
style, and I don't mean that ina negative term, because if you
(19:10):
look at the word conspiracy,that's a legitimate term.
This term was actuallymilitarized.
It's not subjective.
It was actually known that thisterm was used to marginalize
certain thought that kind of gotoutside the box.
And if you go back and look, youcan see that it's objectively
true that terms like conspiracytheory were used to make people
(19:36):
not trust certain people who hadcertain views.
Now, I don't mean that theconspiracy is Theories are true
or false or anything like that.
It just means that the actualterminology was used as a
manipulative tactic.
Now, does that mean that, youknow, we take something that
(19:57):
they've been through and then wego, well, they're aware of this?
Well, yeah, they're aware of it.
And probably because theprevious generations, you know,
they go, oh, hold on a minute.
Maybe this is how this is.
And, you know, we become thisidea of being skeptical of
authority anyway.
And then we take that and thenthat influences the next
generation.
So you can kind of see how thatwaterfall just kind of trickles
(20:20):
down further the more that yougo.
Now, let's move on here.
Let's talk about Gen Z.
Okay, so now we have Gen Z andwe're looking at 1997 to 2012.
So these are your 13-year-oldsto 28-year-olds.
Now, we're moving now to theworld of digital natives.
(20:44):
And then you're seeing thatthey're more aware of social
awareness, obviously, andentrepreneur and pragmatic.
Now, if we look at some of theircore identities, let's look at
some of their formativeinfluences, smartphones, social
media dominance, climatedebates.
(21:05):
And there's one more here, gigeconomy.
I don't know why I put that downthere.
We'll just kind of let that sit.
because I just want to keepmoving.
And so they're also digitalnatives, high usage, but strong
skepticism toward institutionsand ads.
So what you're seeing is that atsome point between the silent
(21:30):
generation and Gen Z, whatyou're seeing is that people are
now looking because, and I thinkpart of it's because you're so
inundated with advertising thatyou can't help but to see the
idea that you're beingmanipulated one way or another.
You're manipulated into thinkingif you get the latest smartphone
that somehow you're going to bea cooler person or whatever the
(21:52):
case may be.
But you're seeing more and moreof that.
And so the more that you becomeaware of the manipulation, the
more that you're resistant to itbecause people don't want to be
manipulated.
So if you were to take, forexample, Edward Bernays, there
was a famous story about EdwardBernays and how he got females
(22:17):
to start smoking.
And the reason that he did itwas because, one, he was
contracted to get women to startsmoking, but he didn't say start
smoking.
What he did was he said, theseare torches of freedom because
equality for women was huge backin the days of Edward Bernays.
(22:38):
It was like one of those turningpoints.
And so what he did was heactually used that as a
manipulative tactic and thencoerced women to start smoking
cigarettes because they saw itas an act of being conformed or
being on the same level or asmales.
(22:58):
And so when you look at thingslike that, you go like in their
day, they didn't think that.
They thought, you know, this isme kind of rebelling at the
system that they felt was notgiving them an equal shake.
And so then what they did wasthey started smoking.
Now, if we look at that today,we go, wow, that was really
(23:18):
manipulative and probablydangerous.
And it kind of messed up a lotof stuff.
Well, then you fast forward andthen we see by Gen X, you're
starting to see this idea of thehusband and the wife going to
work.
So you can see that the familystructure breaks down.
The mother's influence on herchildren has changed
(23:39):
dramatically.
And then we know that, you know,having two people work means
more income, more taxes, allthose things.
And so then we start to thinkabout, okay, well, is that part
of what was going on here aspeople were being manipulated
into other things?
And then, of course, when peoplein authority abuse their power,
(24:01):
then we start to see that,especially the more that it
happens and the more it'sreported.
And then you see that there'smultiple perspectives.
So you start to see And then, ofcourse, then you're also having
the rise of alternative media.
Like, for example, it's verycommon for someone to say that
(24:21):
CNN or Fox or MSNBC is legacymedia.
And then there are influencesthat push them versus
alternative people, you know,alternative groups that have
popped up across the Internet.
And so then they're seeing asbeing more legitimate and
honest.
And we see the legacy media istoting the line.
(24:44):
And so you can see, if I justkind of dive into the mindset of
the world and the soup ofhumanity that's happened since
the 1900s, you can see that eachone of these generations
impacted the next generation.
But then the next generation,due to the digital landscape and
everything that's happened,they've changed how they see the
(25:06):
world too.
And so to dissect that isextremely important, especially
if you're trying to reach acertain audience.
And we're seeing that being whoyou are is more important.
You know, it's almost likepeople want to hear someone
cough or someone with a normalvoice or someone who's just kind
(25:29):
of saying what they think,because there's an authenticness
when someone just says what theythink, rather than trying to be
very careful and manipulatewords and manipulate a
situation.
which, by the way, we're in themiddle of some huge updates.
We're actually moving from onepartner to the next for that
(25:53):
very situation.
What we found is thatbusinesses, a lot of businesses,
not all businesses, because Iknow a lot of really ethical,
honest people, but a lot ofthese big corporate businesses,
what they've done was they takethis legal word salad mentality,
and what they do is they Theytry to, rather than fix the
(26:13):
problem, they try to fix theperception of the problem.
And they try to manipulate youinto thinking that it's not
them, but it's some othersituation.
Like our hosting situation, inmy opinion, is absolutely one of
those where we're dramaticallychanging and we're going to have
100%, not 99% uptime.
(26:36):
Yeah, you heard me right, 100%,which that SLA is a lot
different than 99%, becausethat's another example.
You take where they say, hostingcompany says, well, we'll give
you 99% uptime guarantee.
We've run those tests.
And what we find is that thatguarantee is month to month.
(26:59):
And so all that means is, isthey take you down for five
hours in one month, theirguarantee just says, we'll pay
you for the month.
But you could imagine how badthat would be to be down for
five hours in a given month Andthen they'll give you back a few
bucks, uh, to compensate you forall that time.
You could imagine that's verymanipulative in my opinion.
(27:20):
And so I don't like playingthose kinds of games, but when
you see those things going onand then, then as generations
are coming up into it andthey're like, Hey, hold on a
minute.
These aren't the good guys justbecause they have this big
polished brand don't mean thatthey're this, they could be
that.
(27:40):
And so then the idea idea ofbigger does not necessarily mean
more trusted.
Now, you can imagine as a smallbusiness the opportunity that
you could have here by justsimply being honest and ethical.
You know, we have clients comein.
One of the things I love to dois talk about what Google posts
(28:01):
in terms of the effectiveness ofGoogle ads because people have a
perception that I run ads onGoogle that somehow it's just
going to reign in business.
Well, that's not true.
I mean, in the last podcast, wetalked about one example where
we had, where Ryan was, what, 12weeks, 12 weeks running Google
(28:21):
Ads, and then he started to seesome really nice success from
it.
Well, that doesn't mean thatthat success will continue, but
it also means that if he pulledthe plug on week 11, that he may
not have experienced the samething.
So, as you can see, thisdiscussion is more of, well, how
(28:41):
does the mind work and how doesour generations influenced?
And so you look at the 13 to 28year old, you know, in just
seven years, we're talking to 35year olds.
So you can imagine howdramatically different you need
to approach people.
Now, if we look at the digitallandscape, this is kind of cool,
(29:04):
actually, because it's almostlike ethical and honesty and
candid and being who you are isbecoming in fashion again.
You know, at some point we'retrying to mask all that stuff,
right?
And make ourselves seem likesomething that we're not.
But with the advent of theinternet and AI specifically,
(29:27):
not the internet, but the adventof artificial intelligence,
while it can be promising, itcould also be an absolute
backfire in this situation.
Like, I'll give you a couple ofexamples.
AI have values morediscussionary conversations and
they value EEAT concepts.
(29:49):
You can Google that.
We've done some podcasts on it.
So they value these things.
However, so it's a greatopportunity to be yourself and
to be authentic and to, youknow, shed this concept of I'm
something that I'm not or I'mtrying to present something that
I'm not.
One of the best things you coulddo is be honest with people
(30:10):
today.
That's where everything's movingtoo.
And I think that's brilliantbecause we've been trying to do
that for 20 years and we stillbattle all these companies that
are over promising junk and justtrying to sell something and
then manipulate situations andall those things.
But as we're moving into it,there's also a potential extreme
(30:32):
backlash with AI because AI isnot a sentient human being.
I mean, it does not think foritself.
It filters and us things basedon what the programmers tell it
to do.
They could be influenced by alot of different factors, both
philosophically from theircreators, but also from the
(30:53):
demands of maybe legalconstraints.
Now, with that being said, I cantell you that I have had
conversations with different AImodels, and I intentionally talk
about something that'scontroversial.
Not so much that I'm trying toget it out of the system, but I
want to go does it give me bothsides of the equation?
(31:14):
Especially if I attack somethinglike, say, for example, the
pharmaceutical industry, likeI'm going skeptical of that.
And then what I found was theseAI models, what they do is
they'll actually tote the lineof the mainstream narrative.
So it'd be the equivalent ofasking about cigarette smoking,
(31:34):
and all they do is give youPhilip Morris quotes.
You're not going to trust thatAI model when you see that.
And And so unless there's achange in AI being able to give
both sides of the equation andgive them a fair handshake, I
really don't know how it's goingto be adopted.
Because what's interesting is ifyou take a guy like Christopher
(31:59):
Hitchens, he was a prominentatheist.
One thing he talked about was hesays we're pattern-seeking
mammals.
And I remember that.
I remember that in one of hisdebates, and I thought that was
really brilliant.
You know, like we see puppy dogsand clouds and elephants and
clouds and things like that.
It's because we arepattern-seeking mammals.
(32:20):
Now, of course, I think thathuman beings are more than just
the byproduct of meaninglessevolution.
I can't see that.
I can't turn the corner on that.
But his point was noted.
Okay, so what we are seeing,too, is that the generations
now, especially the youngergenerations, is becoming
(32:43):
hypersensitive to the idea of AIcontent.
So there's a whole other aspectto this because AI content
equals untrue, unauthentic,un-E-E-A-T.
So if AI doesn't get its acttogether and starts giving the
full perspective, one of twothings is going to happen.
(33:04):
People are going to become morebrainwashed to one view, which
would give unimaginable powerthe people who are you're seeing
(33:42):
that the desire of man and theflawed aspect of man always
comes full circle into this.
It's not like we can createsomething that's beyond what we
perceive.
And if you also look at thesegenerations, if you really want
to dig back into it, look at thevalue system of the 1900s and
(34:04):
1920s and 1930s, 40s, et cetera,et cetera.
And what you're going to see isthat that value system changes
as well.
Okay.
So let's keep moving here.
So now we've got 2013 to 2025.
And let me roll back over herefor one second.
And this is what we're callingthe generation alpha.
(34:26):
Okay.
So let's talk about this alphageneration.
Fully digital.
They're AI native.
Global perspective.
Inclusivity expected.
Now, I want to talk to you aboutsome of this stuff in a minute.
So So we have the formativestuff, AIs obviously,
automation's important, climateand globalization narratives,
(34:49):
and they have been heavilyinfluenced by the pandemic.
Now, there is a lot to unpackthere, but let's keep moving
here for a second.
Now, they're AI native, heavyresilience on tech.
They trust convenience, butskepticism is still forming.
So what I find interesting aboutthe Generation Z and the Alpha
(35:14):
is that it's almost like you'reseeing that the silent
generation, they cravedstability and security, and they
were clamoring to whatever wouldgive them that sense, which you
could imagine the hownewscasters and people like that
could really become these voicesof trust and whatever they would
(35:37):
say would be the gospel, totransforming it to where kind of
like now we're in the Wizard ofOz, that generation looks behind
the curtain and goes, oh, wait,hold on a minute.
That's a human too.
And so maybe they're influencedby things just like we're
influenced by things.
And so maybe I can't trust thatperson.
And so then we have AI whereit's manipulative in certain
(35:59):
ways and it's using certainthings as disingenuous.
And so now you're having thisgeneration that's starting to
see those patterns and they'rebecoming aware of it.
Like, for example, if I'mdriving down the road with my
son, he quickly identifies AIimages.
I mean, he's like, no, that's AIgenerated.
He can also quickly identify ifsomething was made by Canva.
(36:22):
And he goes, that's just Canvastuff.
He marginalizes it because heknows that very little effort
was put into it.
He knows that somebody justpicked a template and dropped
something in.
And so you can imagine that ifyou're falling prey to that and
you're becoming moredisingenuous, but you think
you're creating something reallyeat, you see that quickly that's
(36:45):
becoming a problem becauseyou've lost your identity and
you're trying to play by therules that two generations ago
were playing by their rules withmarketing.
And the idea now is to go, youknow what?
When I eat, sometimes I get foodon my shirt.
And you just say it.
You don't try to hide the factthat you eat like a normal human
(37:08):
being and you make mistakes.
And And to embrace thatauthenticness, I think
personally is refreshing.
And I am glad that I'm seeingthe generations after my
generation become more aware ofit, because what it says is that
human beings are something wellbeyond something that can just
simply be manipulated over time.
(37:30):
Now, we go into, you can takeanything, like you go research
Germany before World War II, andthen you look at their
situations.
you know, they had a certainsituation that was really primed
for a man like Adolf Hitler totake power.
And when you look at somethinglike that, you go, okay, now if
(37:52):
that happens, what has impactedthese generations that aren't as
extreme as that?
Obviously, that's a huge extremesituation.
But then when you look at whatall's going on, then you go,
okay, well, how do I addressthat as a business owner and
survive during the time.
(38:13):
So if you don't move more towardconversational language, you're
going to alienate artificialintelligence from using you as a
point of reference.
And if you don't use authenticlanguage, then the next thing
you're going to do is alienatethe individual because they know
that you're blowing smoke.
And right now you're seeing thishuge, huge broadcast of people
(38:35):
that are claiming that they cando things in marketing they can
not do.
This is why I'll often tell you,hey, be careful about answering
those emails, those cold emailswhere these people are telling
you that they can do, they can'tdo them.
Okay, they can't.
The reason they're emailing youcold emails is because it's
(38:55):
cheap, it's easy, and they can'tmarket to you in an authentic,
realistic way.
And so they have to intrude onyour day by sending stuff to
your email box and putting yourname on it when they don't know
you to manipulate you intoclicking.
Now, If we were to takesomething like that, for
example, what they're doing ispreying upon certain statistics
(39:17):
that we know.
So if you take something likethat and they go, okay, it's
statistically known, like if youlook at different data from
email marketing tools, it'sknown that if someone
legitimately subscribes and youaddress them by name and you
give them a personalizedexperience, it's known that that
does better.
(39:37):
And so what did the bad guys do?
Well, of course, course, whatthey do is they go harvest a
bunch of email addresses,harvest the names, dynamically
insert your names into theseclumsy, dumb emails, and then
they send them out, and thenthey go, okay, that cost us very
minimal money to do that.
(39:59):
And so if it gets us a certainnumber of leads, it's worth it.
And so by you playing into thatgame, what you're doing is
feeding that machine.
But let's think about what elsehappens.
What happens to the nextgeneration when they see that.
Oh, it's got my name on it, andI don't know this person.
They're trying to manipulate me.
And so by you playing the game,then what you're doing is
(40:24):
contributing to that, but it'salso having the exact opposite
effect on the next generation.
So you can imagine what thatwould do to the trust if you
hired a company to send cold,unsolicited emails to a group of
people, what that does for yourreputation.
You see, and there's companiesthat just do that.
And so the idea is, where areyour boundaries?
(40:47):
And then are you preparing forthe 35-year-olds that are
quickly becoming the nextgeneration?
When you look at 13 to 28, it'llbe a blink of an eye before Gen
Z is your target audience, thesedigital natives who have a lot
of usage.
(41:08):
And then there's strongskepticism.
How are you going to bridge thegap with that?
What are you going to do that'sdifferent than what marketing
was just a few years ago?
Now, if we tie this into the AI,the reason I have been talking
so much about artificialintelligence is if you look from
(41:28):
a marketing perspective, this isexactly what's going on out
there.
All these companies have been, alot of these companies, not all
of them, a lot of thesecompanies have built models that
are completely unprepared forwhat's going on with artificial
intelligence.
I mean, especially if you're inthe, like you're renting
(41:49):
properties, things like that.
I mean, these guys are, a lot ofthem are completely unprepared
and there's a lot of goodcompanies out there that are
going to eat their lunch.
And the sales pitch of theseguys is just absolutely, it's
insane that they're eventhinking that their sales
pitches would still work.
But they're unprepared.
And so part of what we need todo is be prepared for that AI
(42:14):
mechanism, that AI influencethat's going on in the world.
And part of that is changingexactly how you do things and
how you reach people and then dothat authentically, you see.
So this is also why yourmarketing plans go up and down.
And so I just think it's very,very interesting when you start
(42:35):
to break all this down.
And so if you're targeting the35-year-old of today, then
remember that 35-year-old todayis not the same as a 35-year-old
of tomorrow.
And you need to do a little bitof homework on this.
Okay, so let me button this upwith one more thought.
Now, the last thought I wantedto kind of make full circle with
(42:56):
is this also does not live in asilo by itself.
The interesting thing about, oh,and by the way, this is also why
you never farm your work out toother countries.
You need to work in your nativecountry and hire locals, no
matter what the cost is.
Because only people thatunderstand your culture and your
environment can design within itlike legitimately.
(43:18):
The other ones will look likethey're faking.
So just two cents.
If you're farming out andthinking you're doing something
great by doing that, you'rewrong by that.
I mean, we are becoming a globalcommunity, but it's still the
culture and everything is stilllocalized.
And if you're neglecting that,you're making some huge
mistakes.
(43:38):
Anyway.
way.
A lot of people think they candecide that as an owner of a
business without looking at itthrough a marketing lens, which
is also absolutely not true.
Okay.
So what I wanted to do is talkabout some of these other
concepts.
So one of them is theenvironment.
(43:59):
Okay.
Now, when we started this, Italked about that someone who
lives in a city versus outsidethe city may have dramatically
different experiences.
And so if you could imagine Andas a whole, you know, if you
were shielded from the GreatDepression and World War II, it
would also maybe shield you asan individual from following
(44:21):
what most people did in thepreceding generation.
And so when you look at yourenvironment, if you're living in
a certain segment of society ora certain area, and there are
certain things that are adoptedby that group, meaning like, for
example, if you take NortheastOhio, I have some clients over
(44:43):
in Ohio right now, and theseclients are really salt of the
earth, incredible, awesome, kindpeople.
And the way that the internethas influenced them has been
marginal compared to how itinfluences some other people.
So if you're marketing to thatkind of audience, the way you
(45:05):
would take this data we talkedabout today would have to be
also filtered through what thatservice area looks like.
And then you have to make somereally big decisions about,
okay, can I be authentic withinthat community?
And how do I be authentic tothat community?
Because if I were to take thepractices of an agency in New
(45:28):
York that has no clue of what'sgoing on in Northeast Ohio,
believe it or not, a good, solidagency, now not a freelancer,
not a college kid, not thesepeople, but if you can find a
good, solid agency and that areathat understands that market,
they're going to speak more toyour audience than that group in
New York.
Now, it's not to say that thegroup in New York is not smart.
(45:50):
There are things called focusgroups, and there are different
things that can help makedecisions.
But I'm like, if you're swimmingin the water, you're going to
know the temperature, right?
So I really think this ispowerful.
And I really think that if youdigest this and you think about
where you're at and what you areand the audience you're trying
(46:10):
to target and how they'vechanged, then I think what it's
going to do is change the waythat you're approaching
business.
And I think sooner than later ismore important.
The more you can get authentic,the more you can adopt
conversational language, I thinkthe better you're going to be
giving the trend and the shiftin the world.
(46:34):
Just like no one is using phonebooks anymore, the same thing is
happening with the way peoplelook at their world today too.
And so all that needs to be putinto its proper context.
Okay, so I think I want to wrapup the podcast today with this.
I don't really have a lot of, Idid pull a lot of data from
(46:55):
third-party resources for thisinformation today.
I don't think necessarily I'mgoing to include it because this
is just kind of generalinformation.
You can do your own homework andalso do your own homework.
That's one of the most importantthings you could do is to make
Make sure that what I'm tellingyou is true.
And if it's true, then you needto stick with it.
(47:16):
And if you see some variancethat you need to consider within
your area, within what I'msaying, well, consider that too.
Put that into the mix.
And then the great thing aboutmarketing is, first of all, I
always found that telling thetruth is so much easier than
trying to manipulate somebody.
So it's just easier just to bewho you are and do what you do,
which reminds me of a prettyaffluent guy I met a year And I
(47:41):
remember him saying at onepoint, he's like, you know, if
we can't be in business, if wecan't compete in business with
what we are, then we don't needto be in business.
And I thought there wasn't a lotthat I'll quote from that guy,
but that was one of the stories.
But the idea is what you want todo is you do want to get to a
point to where you're shifting.
And if your marketing agency isnot addressing these problems or
(48:05):
not discussing these issues,then you need to find somebody
else.
You know, there are so manythings that go into this plan.
Like I'm doing some researchright now.
I'll ramble here for just twoseconds.
And part of what I wasresearching was a new company
starting up in an area and wewere looking at their
competition and theircompetition has been around
(48:27):
there since like 1979.
Okay, now what we also found wasthose companies in 1979, think
about their influences and howthey perceive advertising.
Skeptical, right?
So they're not really embracingdigital marketing.
So if we were to embrace digitalmarketing more and then approach
that newer generation, you cansee the strategic advantage we
(48:48):
have because they're setting onwhat they've already built and
they think it's going tocontinue.
That's a great opportunity.
But then also we have to earnthat business because they're
also trusted, you see.
Okay, well, that's enoughrambling for this week.
Thank you so much for joining mewith Over the Bull.
I do hope this helps you out.
Honestly, you have no idea howmuch I realize that that
(49:11):
businesses, they're being somanipulated and promise so many
things that just simply aren'ttrue.
And I just hope that thisreaches you in a way to where
you can pierce through the veilof anything that people are
selling you or offering you orcurrently doing for you, and you
(49:33):
can change it.
And you can change it, and youcan be a better, stronger
company.
And this is one piece of thatpuzzle that may help Until next
week, this is Ken Kerr with Overthe Bull, and this podcast is
brought to you by IntegrisDesign out of Asheville, North
Carolina.
SPEAKER_00 (49:51):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, afull-service design and
marketing agency out ofAsheville, North Carolina.
Until next time.
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