Featured YFS Tool: "Attractive Media" Focus Group Tool

Youth-Friendly Market Research

Over the past months, YFS-Link has featured a number of youth-friendly market research tools designed specifically to provide financial services providers and youth serving organizations with the type of information that is most useful in developing youth-inclusive financial services. For example, the tools can help practitioners determine segments in the market, identify delivery channels, and select the type of information that is most appealing to young people. This allows financial institutions to decipher the intricacies of different youth markets and understand how small tweaks to the product, marketing or delivery can affect whether or not a service will be attractive to young clients. Moreover, these tools ensure that the market research process is empowering to young people, so that they too find value in the process.

Attractive Media

The "Attractive Media" tool is a youth-friendly focus group tool that is used to help identify the types of promotion or marketing that are accessible, informative and attractive to young people. The tool is designed to be completed in only 30 minutes and can be easily paired with other youth market research tools, such as the "Use of Time and Mobility Tool."

CHF-Ryada, West Bank / Gaza

Under the USAID Expanded and Sustained Access to Financial Services (ESAF) program in Palestine, Making Cents International is working with CHF's local microfinance institution, Ryada, to develop and launch its first start-up business loan targeted especially at youth clients. As part of its comprehensive technical assistance package to support the entire product development cycle, Making Cents used the "Attractive Media Tool" to help Ryada understand how to promote the new product to its target market.

After conducting numerous focus group discussions with youth clients and potential youth clients, Ryada learned that young people did not find their existing marketing materials or techniques to be particularly compelling. Using data from these focus groups, Ryada revamped its marketing brochures and advertisements, using language, images, and colors that were more appealing to the younger demographic.

When the MFI asked what might make a financial institution more attractive for a young person, participants revealed that they would like to see some types of information featured on marketing materials, while other types of information did not matter to them as much. For example, they shared that graphics to help them better understand the loan re-payment and required steps would make them more inclined to become a client. On the other hand, the MFI's mission statement, which was a common feature in marketing materials, was not useful or interesting information to the youth. Through the implementation of the "Attractive Media Tool," Ryada also learned that young people were avid users of the internet and social networks. In response, Ryada redesigned its website to be more youth-oriented, again focusing on using straightforward language, more graphics, and colors that appealed to the young people. The MFI also created a Facebook account that is featured on the website and on all other Ryada marketing materials, and that is monitored daily by bank staff.

Click here to download the "Attractive Media" tool.

Questions? Do you have a youth-friendly market research tool to share? Contact us at yfslink@makingcents.com to share your organization's latest techniques for effectively reaching out to young people.