Trying to get business leads and snag more sales? Are millennials part of your target market? If so, you may need to relearn everything you were taught about advertising and growing your brand.

Eighty-four percent of millennials do not trust traditional advertising. This age group does not like to be sold to. They crave relationship and connection, even when making purchases. They want to buy from real people, not company facades, logos or branded advertisements. The way to get to a millennial is to go for the heart. 

The good news is that loyal millennial customers can become ambassadors for your company. They love sharing their purchases and the products they adore and getting more people to buy what they recommend. Here are some more tips on how to reach millennials:

Take it online

Fifty-eight percent of millennials expect brands to publish content online before they make a purchase. If your business is not online, your company may not appear legitimate to this age group. 

Also, when millennials love a product, they post about it on their social profiles. If you are not online, your brand will not be reachable, and you could miss out on potential business leads and sales.

Take it to Instagram 

Instagram is widely popular among the millennial age group with more than half of U.S. millennials using the platform. Instagram is valued by this age group because it is a visually stimulating platform that provides a medium for personal self-expression, a common theme for young people. 

Instagram users not only use the platform to post about themselves, but they also follow popular Instagrammers (influencers) and look to them for recommendations, education, and engagement. These influential mini-celebrities have large communities that trust their authenticity.

If you want to get more business leads and brand awareness from this group, partner with these influencers to help you spread the word about your brand. Your audience is listening, and influencers' voices matter to millennials who prefer to make purchase decisions based on recommendations rather than brand-generated content. 

User-generated content

In a social world driven by selfies, filters, and hashtags, millennials love to share their lives and have fun online, and they are not afraid to show it. Use this to your advantage and involve your audience in creating content that will help you engage a broader audience. For example, if you are running a contest, have people upload photos and video posts of themselves for contest entries and include a unique brand-focused hashtag. 

Be transparent and authentic

Don’t sell your products; sell an experience. Sell something they can post about to their friends and feel connected to. This age group thrives on connecting via social media, and they will feel connected to your brand when they can see beyond the typical corporate facade and capture the heart of your brand.

Authenticity is also vital when marketing to millennials. Is your sole purpose just to sell to them, or to establish a connection, engage with them and enrich their lives? Millennials will see right through the former. Authentic content is that which contains no pretense or in-your-face selling. You may ask, “How can I sell products without actually selling them?” Create content that allows them to see what it would be like to experience your brand. For example, instead of posting an image of your leggings for sale, post an image of someone laughing and enjoying life wearing your leggings. Or post content generated by other users who love your leggings. Millennials love experiences, and they will want to experience what they see in these images. 

Text marketing

According to a study, text is the preferred communication channel for millennials when receiving notifications from businesses. They like the convenience and speed texting offers. And since 31% cite they text more than 50 times a day, reaching this age range of consumers via text is a smart, lucrative marketing strategy.

Use texts to message your customers about notifications, special promotions, events, news and any other information they would want to know about your business. Sending text messages is easy and cost-effective with the CallFire platform. If you want to get started with an SMS texting program to get business leads, target, attract and engage your millennial consumers, sign up for a free account here.