What it Takes to Sell to a Teenager Online

Editor’s note: I would like to introduce a new author to 10e20 – Kayla. Kayla is a highschool junior in New York working for 10e20 part-time on projects with a teen target market. She will be contributing from time to time here at 10e20.com to give you a teen’s perspective on things online. I got so much out of my friend Dean’s guest blogger Jessica that I wanted to continue the conversation…

Many teens today are very particular about the websites that they use. From what the website is selling, to the cursors that are being used on them. It is all very important. Usually when I am searching the web for either research papers or just on my free time checking out new stuff, I look at the site as a whole first instead of reading the first sentence or looking at the first thing I see. If there is not a lot of colors and everything is pretty much letters and a blank/boring background, I won’t stay on that page even if it is informative. For example:

This page is just links, no pics, and a white background. All of the links could lead to something that a person has been looking for, but no one wants to click on all of those boring links until they find what they want. By the time someone got to what he/she was looking for they probably wouldn’t want it anymore or they would forget what it was that they were looking for in the first place.

A good website that I have gone on many times to buy or look for shoes is:

If you look at Zappo’s site as a whole its not the prettiest or most interesting page, but it is easy to follow and you know whats going on and what will happen when you click on one of the buttons. So in the end its all worth it.

Some of the most awesome websites that teens enjoy are Official band websites. For example:

For Guster’s site the first thing you see is a cool animated picture that shows the band is really original and cool. Seeing this gets me interested in the page and makes me want to learn more about the band. I like how when you scroll down everything you need to know about the band is right there waiting for you to read or look at.

For The Killers site, I like how the first thing you see is a bright colored page that is sort of mysterious that links you to the official page. So its exciting to see what comes next. And once you get on the actual page there is background noises, and a cool background picture. Another fun thing about this page is that the links move around and don’t just sit there like normal pages. The uniqueness of these pages gets the teens hooked and helps the bands become more popular in the world.

Other sites like www.Burton.com and www.iFrogz.com are easy to explore and their home pages are very cool. You can tell that they really know how to sell their products.

To me and many of my friends, its not so much of “what” you sell, it’s really about “how” you sell it to grab the attention of us.

Editor’s Note: This post came from a simple question I posed to Kayla (via a text message) – Forget social networks for a minute and tell me what do you and your friends like & dislike online? Some of her choices made me shudder (complete Flash websites) but also reinforced my belief of: give your target audience what they want. If you have specific questions for Kayla that you would like to learn more about – please feel free to ask.