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College Students Love Their Brands »
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College Students Love Their Brands

College students, albeit a relatively small demographic, are among the most sought-after by marketers - and they have some definite ideas about some brands, writes AdAge, citing data from the annual “GenX2Z College Brand Study,” released earlier this month by Anderson Analytics.

“They have huge impact on what their parents buy, and then they have their own money, more than any other generation before them, and of course they are the consumers of tomorrow,” Tom Anderson, managing partner Anderson Analytics, is quoted as saying.

College students have an insatiable craving for Apple:

• The company was ranked No. 2 overall best brand by 17% of students surveyed.
• It ranked No. 1 and No. 2 for the most-anticipated products (the iPhone and new iPod versions).
• It also ranked No. 1 and No. 2 in product recommendations (iPod, followed by Apple products.
• And it ranked No. 6 in most-popular commercials.

As for college students’ favorite brands among various product categories: The iPod is cited by 65% as their favorite MP3 player; their favorite book, Harry Potter (20%); soft drink, Coke (17%); Cellphone service, Verizon (17%); fast-food joint, Taco Bell (13%); website, Facebook (12%).

Other findings from the report:

• Commercials polarize college students:
  • Geico was ranked No. 1 as both the best and the worst commercials; 25% ranked it good, 26% ranked it bad.
  • Axe Bodyspray, iPhone, Burger King and Apple also made both lists.
• Students like accessing, but not necessarily creating, consumer-generated media:
  • 75% visit social-networking sites.
  • Only 14% write blogs.
  • Only 8% uploaded videos to YouTube.
  • 64% don’t make videos at all.
  • The 14% who do make videos don’t share them.
• There are disparities between the sexes:
  • More than 71% of women recently read a book for pleasure vs. 55% of men.
  • More than 55% of men played videogames alone, vs. 21% of women.
  • Just 17% of women said they had recently played a game with others, vs. more than 40% of the men had.

About the study: The GenX2Z study findings came from a sample of 1,000 college students on BrandPort.com representing students from over 375 US colleges and universities.