This is Part III of a five-part series:
Part I – When Their Childhood Exists on Virtual Platforms
Part II – Popularity, Child Development, and Social Media
In Part One of this series on teens and social media, we examined how middle and high school students are using social media, particularly Snapchat. In Part Two, we looked at the psychological and social development of teens and their motives behind striving for popularity. Now we will turn our attention the other player in the social media game: Silicon Valley.
Even though the Snapchat app is available as a free download to users, profits from the platform are far from nonexistent. The company behind the popular app, Snap Inc., is valued at over 3 billion dollars (USD) and has, at many times, neared a valuation of 4 billion dollars (USD.) To put that monetary amount into perspective, the value of Snap Inc. is greater than the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of over 45 unique countries, including Cambodia, Namibia and Haiti.
Snapchat receives over 300 million users each month. That is equal to the entire population of the United States of America! And over 70 percent of those users are under the age of 34, with a third of all users under the age of 18. That means that over 30% of all Snapchat users are minors. So how do Snapchat and other social media platforms attract so many young users? They market to the desires and needs of the teenage demographic, tailoring their content to meet teens where they are developmentally. (Snapchat Statistics Source)
Eager to please their peers, teens and children reaching adolescence are among the most impressionable, and the tech giants in Silicon Valley know this. Aware that acceptance within the peer group is important to teens, tech companies have found a way to capitalize on what matters most to their adolescent users. With visible counts of one’s number of followers, upvotes, and likes, the companies behind social media platforms are providing teens with quantifiable assessments of their purported popularity, which both they and their peers are able to view 24/7.
In the case of Snapchat, popularity and rank are determined by the number of ongoing streaks maintained by a user (see Part One of this series for an in-depth look at Snapchat streaks.) Each day, there are over a million unique snaps sent, many of which are sent through streaks. Imagine the time and effort that go into creating those more than 1 million messages, each of which contributes to users’ ranks on the platform.
But it isn’t just a reach for popularity and acceptance that is causing teens to flock to social media. Multiple scientific studies have found that the thrill of receiving likes and validation from one’s followers activates the brain’s social reward pathway. Users can actually experience a rush of dopamine when they log onto their social media accounts and see that they have received likes on their latest picture or upvotes on their most recent Reddit post. Tech companies have invested in curating user interfaces that cater to positive responses within the brain by employing tactics ranging from carefully constructed algorithms to select color palettes and the specific placement of icons on a webpage.
Of course, all social media users regardless of age are eligible to experience neurological responses and increases in dopamine when using social networking platforms; However, when these responses are coupled with the need for peer acceptance and the desire to acquire popularity, an intense attraction is created for the internet’s adolescent users. And if teens being an easy demographic to hook isn’t enough of a motive for tech companies to target them, there are additional perks that this young demographic brings with it to social media.
Teenagers have always held significant influence over trends and popular culture. If a tech company can attract teens to its platform, the likelihood of success increases. Teens also possess hefty buying power, both because they are beginning to earn their own incomes and because they are influential within their families, particularly when it comes to on-trend purchases. If the companies behind social media platforms can secure teenagers as customers, they are in turn securing their bottom line.
Since adolescents hold so much influence over the success of social media outlets and are able to strengthen profitability, what deterrent does Silicon Valley have from marketing to middle and high school students? The drawback is one of ethics and morals. Is it ethical to intentionally influence children who are still developing and learning how to discern what is in their best interests? Is it moral to persuade them with the aim of turning them into consumers so that they can assist a bottom line?
The hard truth is that, from a business standpoint, targeting teenagers is much more beneficial than it is detrimental. Companies are faced with very few, if any, deterrents when it comes to marketing to teenagers and their pre-teen counterparts. Assuming that the companies in Silicon Valley won’t soon have ethical awakenings about the morality of manipulating minors in order to achieve profits, it is on parents and adult authority figures to become educated on how tech giants target teens and to, in turn, share that knowledge with their children.
Have open discussions with your child(ren) about the tactics that companies use to market social media platforms.
Help your child(ren) understand that social media platforms ultimately exist to earn profits.
Establish an ongoing dialogue in which any questions about the intricacies of for-profit companies and social media can be asked, and make a habit of learning about the behind-the-scenes happenings of each virtual outlet that both you and your child(ren) use.
Become versed in the valuation of each platform, the leaders of each company, and how revenue is earned.
By understanding the structures and systems that support social media platforms, you can become informed about how and why users are influenced. Facing companies worth billions of dollars is no easy feat, but being informed will give you a podium on which you can discern marketing tactics from your individual voice.
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This post is republished on Medium.
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