The Youth Lab

THE DOMESTIC LIVES OF YOUNG MEN

The messy bedrooms of twenty and thirty something men in NYC may not seem like the richest material to build a dedicated online audience of fanatical young viewers around, but comedian Rachel Coster’s TikTok series Boy Room is fast turning into a cultural phenomenon. Each 90-second episode features the comedian poking her head around the often hilariously messy bedroom dwellings of her subjects. Coster also tries to help her guests with practical advice and tips on how to make their bedrooms more appealing. One part self-help guide, other part anthropological study, the series has built more than 120,000 followers after just five weeks while the most viewed video has over 2.7 million views on TikTok.

BEYONCÉ OR TAYLOR SWIFT?

The on-street vox pop is a well-established journalistic device, the Latin phrase Vox populi, vox dei [meaning ‘the voice of the people’] even translates to an old proverb which actually dates back to 798. But lately, the vox pop has come back into fashion with new and incredibly popular TikTok-friendly formats designed for bite-sized digital consumption. The TikTok channel ‘Viral Interviews’ asks spontaneous ‘this or that’ questions relating to music, celebrity and brands to random passer-bys on British and American streets, posting 2-3 times per day and going increasingly viral with millions of views across each video. The cut-throat ‘chop’ format of each rapid-fire question plays into the youth audience's need for instant gratification and entertainment, immediate micro-moments for young viewers to consume, react to, agree or disagree with and even chop up for their own commodification. This ‘erosion of context’ to quote the culture expert Curt Steinhorst, speaks to the restless, fast-paced energy of young audiences when it comes to digital content that can hold their attention.

UK drag queen Tiara Skye has also recently blossomed into an overnight internet celebrity with her unique charismatic take on vox-pop interviews along the night-time streets of London, turning a seemingly tired and overdone format into delightful bursts of infectious spontaneity with complete strangers.

ENTER THE SPLIT SCREEN GENERATION

Epitomising the effects of this generational attention span deficit, young viewers are increasingly glued to a new style of hyperkinetic split screen videos making waves across social platforms such as Reels and TikTok. Juxtaposing normal-paced storytelling or messaging on split screen above an unrelated hyperactive scene (usually taken from a video game or fast-paced video), the idea is to keep the attention of youth audiences with frenzied visual stimulation long enough for the message to deliver. Brands like Mooju have already adopted this trend in their TikTok content and expect to see more major brands jumping aboard this style of overstimulation very soon.

"At first it feels like a chaotic jumbled mess that has been hastily thrown together in the hopes that at least one element of it will grab your attention, but its disordered nature is not only intentional, it's essential. The intention is to not only hook you in, but to disassociate you entirely."
Polyester Zine

BRAND TAKEOUTS:

FOCUS ON PEOPLE NOT OBJECTS: Viewers are infinitely more interested in other people than anything else and when you create something that taps into the authentic quirks, peculiarities and behavioural nuances of people, interesting content will always be created. From mini documentaries focusing on the real humans at the centre of a horrific conflict to the personal habits of young people and where they live, put people at the forefront of your messaging.

MICRO-MOMENTS ARE KEY: From TikTok duet and stitch to chopping up content and publishing on other platforms, digital micro moments have never been so popular. Ask yourself, what is the key micro-moment in each brand content piece you make?

EXPERIMENT WITH COCKTAIL CONTENT: Meaning mix up unrelated ingredients in your content, whether it’s audio or video. Youth audiences have grown up with ‘second screening’, the act of simultaneously using their phone while watching a movie. We’re now moving into the next phase of this, where young people crave content that moves faster and faster.

OTHER THINKHOUSE NEWS

GOOD LIFE 2030 IRELAND: Listen or read our conversation with The Irish Times Inside Marketing Podcast, just published today!