The Seven Youth Marketing Ministry Virtues

WonderGroup, a marketing company which targets tweens, teens, and parents, publishes a monthly e-mail newsletter, Youth University, for those in the marketing industry. As youth workers we are not marketers who market the message of Jesus. With the help of blogs like Church Marketing Sucks as well as blogs from real youth workers, the little tips we receive can help us as to better our task of sharing the message of Jesus. But that is not why I read such reports as Youth University.

Youth marketing firms also want to reach our youth--for not-so-righteous reasons. For the subscribers of Stuffnet and for my local ministry work, I want to know what their millions of dollars (I don't have it) can tell me about teens and tweens. That is how and why I have this WonderGroup report where I found this delightfully interesting article. The July 2006 issue listed their seven youth marketing virtues but they have also inadvertently listed how we do youth ministry. No real wisdom here. Just coincidences to encourage us in our work.

The seven youth marketing ministry virtues are:

1. Be clear. You are a Christian youth worker with a mandate to teach the message of Jesus. However you do that--whether it is through speech, music, drama, technology, art, silence--teach clearly. WonderGroup note: "In an attempt to be clever, we often forget to be clear and overt about the action we went to the audience to take." You've all seen that clever commercial but can't recall what was actually advertised. Be sure that your teachings, in whatever form you are using, are not so clever that the point is missed.

2. Be accepting. I realize this is "preaching to the choir." We all desire to have youth groups which are accepting of everyone. Isn't it interesting that marketers seek this too. The big difference is they are seeking acceptance in a disingenuous way to gain something from our teens. Hopefully our attempts at acceptance are genuine. Chap Clark wrote in his book, Hurt: "A student handed me a note after class (he was substitute teaching) one day that read, 'The thing we worry about the most is not disappointing others.' The cynic in me immediately recalled the exceptionally rowdy and flippant class, and I was tempted to dismiss the note as a sarcastic attempt to manipulate my research. Yet the next day I felt different about the tone of our conversation. It seemed to me that what I had read as callous indifference and even arrogant disregard was actually a test. Did I really care about what they thought or, more importantly, about them? Was I interested in each one as a unique and valuable person, or was I one more adult who was willing to use and exploit them for my career? When I recognized what was at the core of their response to me, I saw twenty-eight fragile midadolescents who wanted to know that they mattered to me." (p. 142)

3. Be attentive. WonderGroup note: "Young people desire to be heard." So do adults and so do children. But with teens, whom are speeding through cognitive and moral development, the desire to be heard has more to do with the teen gaining an understanding about who he/she is as a teen and soon-to-be adult. The underlying question that torments all adolescents is will they be okay as adults? Or will they continue to be inadequate, stupid (in how they make decisions), and awkward adults--the same as they feel as teens? Youth group provides a safe place for teens to flesh out decisions. Youth group allows teens close opportunities to mirror the adults who are involved in youth ministry. Hopefully youth group also offers a place for parents and teens to hear each other. Do your teens get a chance to work out their faith or do they get to sit and absorb the experience? Know this, others with not-so-good motives will give them attention.

4. Be contagious. What a fantastic word--contagious. The message of Jesus should be contagious. Your youth ministry should be contagious. However don't get contagious mixed up with cool. They are not the same. Cool comes and goes. Cool is very fickle. Ask the creators of YouTube. YouTube was just to be a video-sharing site between family and friends. Yet for unexplained reasons YouTube became cool. But YouTube won't be contagious. To be contagious means you are infected with something and being infected changes your life. Hopefully your youth group is infecting teens with the right stuff so their lives are never the same again. Even into adulthood.

5. Be new. WonderGroup note: "Kids love new things." The message of Jesus is not new but technology and creativity give us new ways. If you are not naturally creative or techy, the internet is full of ideas from people who are. That is my secret that makes me look brilliant to my church.

6. Be generous. I am one of those who do not like the practice of giving away prizes, candy, rewards for bringing Bible, friends, etc. Others do it and the fruit of those efforts cannot be disputed so this is not the space for that. I just personally fall on the side of no rewards. WonderGroup note: "Give away physical rewards but don't forget how important psychological rewards can be." This marketer's note brings a new point to this discussion. Psychological rewards are more important--with a generous spirit. What you can offer through your youth group in psychological rewards are learning real skills (especially with how to live a life of faith), accomplishment, achievement and found purpose. As we learned from Self Control, Not Self Esteem, these psychological rewards teach self control. Be generous with these.