Hank [BS/MSEE,
MSM $$$, Ph.D. Mgmt] teaches 
Unlike all previous generations, the Net Generation was born with the Internet already on. Don Tapscott , the writer of Growing Up Digital and Wikinomics, suggests the Net generation, that is, most readers of this blog, are multidimensional in their purchase decisions:
First of all, they want options. Thanks to the various TV channels, people have more options for their needs and can always make decisions in many options around, especially in the modern living environment. For the Net Generations, they are growing up in this environment which offers them options to choose what they want in the abundant resources.
Second, they like customization. All-size-fits-all standard is no longer suitable for the Net generations’ needs. They want to be cool, be unique, and extraordinary. If there is a customerized product existing, they are willing to save and pull out all their money to pursuit the uniqueness.
Third, they want to change their minds. If you think the Net generation will be loyal to a brand that they really love, maybe you guess wrong. Unlike the older generation’s loyalty to the specific kinds of brand, the Net generations will not adhere to just one kind. They like to compare things within different brands and not necessary buy all kinds of stuffs in one brand. They have the right to match around with the ideal products they love.
Fourth, they want to try it out. Before buying things, they like to test and manipulate with the products first and then decide if they want to buy them or not. They like to compare with goods before making their minds.
Last but not least, they focus on function and real value. Epstein (1998) states that “The Net generations are not impressed with technology—They care about what technology can do for them.”
This is the target market of many entrepreneurs, and more mature companies such as Microsoft. Facebook is the “face” (no pun intended) of this market, their communication channel of current choice. Some 69% of females and 56% of males 
in the Net Generation are avid Facebook users. This is why Microsoft was willing to pony up $240 million for a small stake, 1.6% of Facebook - to be able to reach this very important demographic for themselves and their customers. Recognizing the importance of their platform to a broad range of marketers and entrepreneurs, Facebook has opened their doors (API) to developers and entrepreneurs to produce third party applications for their product. Anything “Facebookish” is a potentially lucrative market for entrepreneurs, as social networks continue to become pervasive and mature. Where is all of this going? And where should entrepreneurs position themselves to take maximum advantage of the future? If this is the face of the Net Generation, what will be the characteristics of the yet unnamed generation being generated, so to speak? What say you? Hank
15 Responses to “Net Generation, Facebook & Microsoft”
- 1 Pingback on Oct 26th, 2007 at 5:31 am
It is difficult to say how one should position himself in the mareket as an entrepreneur. Of course thats what makes an entrepreneur successful. And if it were easy everyone would be doing it. I don’t think any more social networks are going to be the way to go for awhile. Facebook and myspace had both done a great job at targeting college students. Also hundreds of other sites exist for adults. Advertising is huge, everyone knows businesses make money by advertising on these sites. But how can a business really make a killing in this social network?… Right now it seems that personallizing is the way to go. Numersous times we’ve seen blogs that people are going crazy over the ability to personalize their stuff (myspace and crocs). So what we do is… we start selling backgrounds and cool designs and layouts like the girl did for myspace. The projected rate of growth next year is up to 70 million people! I know the idea is elementary but thats 70 million dollars if we sell each background at $.99. The numbers never lie.
The net generation is the main focus of many entrepreneurs and leads to product development and marketing directed towards generation Y (1980-2000). Marketers are starting to market younger and younger, if someone wants to make it big they need to already start thinking about generation Z (2000-present).
All I have to say is when i start my business i am going to advertise on facebook.
This seems very accurate, but I do not have a good solution in mind. Entrepreneurs would ideally want customers to only buy their version of a product, but that’s not going to happen so entrepreneurs have to think outside the box and find ways to keep attracting new customers.
I definitely think that social networks like Facebook are a big stepping stone for things to come in communication. Now employers are on Facebook with access Facebook profiles. to As far as positioning myself, I would agree with John’s statement, I would start thinking about generation Z. I used to cadet teach in a 3rd grade elementary class, and they were constantly working on their laptops that the school provided them. When I was in 3rd grade the only computer I was using was an old school Mac, and the only things I did on that computer was type stories and play Oregon Trail. It is obvious that technology is a rapidly changing market, so you have to be ahead of the game to play. As far as what is to come in the “Net generation,” it’s hard to say. If I knew the answers to that question I would be laughing my way to the bank as Hank would say. Hopefully I will be laughing my way to the bank some day, I’m working on it.
I do not know what kind of business I will run, but I know what to include. I would make it easy to use if a website. I would have widgets or things so people can personalize what I am selling. For advertising, social networks are good because of the hits they are recieving, and should advertise on search engines. Should do that because they also receive millions of hits a day, but other than that the websites might stop running pop ups because of technology people can buy or set the internet to block the pop ups.
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This is very similar to the targeting teen markets blog. More and more teens had money to
spend so it makes sense to have them be your target market. Now, more and more students are
being users on social networks so entreprenuers should not ignore this. Some how have these
people be your target market. As far as the face of the next generation.. who knows. It
could seriously be anything, my guess some sort of virtual world thing that you go into and
hang out with people in, I don’t know… It could be anything.
Social networks such as facebook are a good market for entrepreneurs. I still think that much more can be can to it. I was thinking someone could may be add video chat facebook for friends.
However a good idea this is now, it will eventually turn like all markets do into a saturated market. But the bright side is, once this market becomes saturated, then someone will come along and create a new market. I’m more looking forward to that then seeing what else facebook can become.
It seems to me like the net generation is a generation of very informed customers. Instead of buying a computer a a computer store from one company, we would rather look online at dozens of companies with hundreds of different computer choises. The we can customize the ‘perfect’ computer that we found to make it fit perfectly. In my opinion, these will bring competition between companies to a whole new level. In the past, competion was considered fierce if two competing stores were right next to each other. Now, every competing store in that industry is virtually right next to each other. A customer can shop the competitor’s store with little effort. This is a destructive model. It will weed out the companies that have worst or expensive products, but isn’t that just capitalism. These super informed customer will bring capitalism to a whole new level.
I think what could be very useful for entrepreneurs is the same thing as with youtube. There are so many people using youtube right now and it would be a golden opportunity to be able to analyze everything on youtube in order to better understand your target market and see what they’re interested in. And right now I think facebook has finally provided that opportunity, you can easily look at the most popular groups or applications or whatever and from that find out what your target market, ie facebook users, are interested in the most and use that to your advantage as an entrepreneur.
I think that many of these statements are very true and summarize the current generation quite accurately. I think it is a little ridiculous how much time some people spend on facebook and how big of a deal it is but it is what it is and if you can profit on it then run with it. People obviously like to play around and waste their time surfing online all day so if you can see a product or service that targets these people by all means develop that idea. I think it may have come a little later than it should have, but Microsoft is doing just that… investing in a very popular item that a lot of people use. I really don’t see people changing over to another social network or stopping their usage of facebook by any means in the near future. This is a HUGE and PROFITABLE market.
$240 million for less than 2% of Facebook is ridiculous. If I were at Facebook, I would just cash out now and sell it all. I can’t see it growing much more that it already has. Also, I read the deal also gives Microsoft an advantage over Google and other advertisers for the next few years, so that’s huge.