Oh yes.
Generation Z is the first generation to grow up digitally native. They were interacting with digital devices starting as early as age three and their first exposure was probably a cellphone.
By the time they had their first cellphone, typically at age ten, they quickly became immersed in the cellphone culture. Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Discord, Tik Tok… are multiple reasons why our newest generation spends an average of seven hours and eighteen minutes a day interacting with their phones.
There are a whole bunch of us older folks a little uncomfortable with that statistic. I will temper that stat with the fact that most of us older than forty probably spent up to four hours a day watching TV… which kind of freaked out our parents. Did your Mom every tell you that watching TV was bad for your eyes? I didn’t buy that either! Gen Z, shocking to me, don’t really watch TV, despite most likely having a giant flat screen television very conveniently located near them.
So, for better or worse, our Gen Z children are spending what is a working day playing with, communicating with and, occasionally learning with their cellphones.
And while they are busy with their cellphones, they are not busy with print material. They don’t read newspapers (neither did I at that age, and, really, who wants to wrestle with a full-size newspaper). They don’t read print magazines (most of which have migrated to digital… as have newspapers). Printed books? Not if they don’t have to. Printed text books? Google just told me that seventy seven percent of text books are now digitized. And most schools now hand out tablets to all the students on which they get assignments, do homework and learn on.
Gen Z students expect everything that can be on their cellphone to be on their cellphone… including their yearbook.
Last year I did fourteen focus groups (I was enjoying them so much I just kept doing them). They were informal, between 5 to 20 students/teachers. I addressed three issues: Do you want your yearbook on your phone, do you like YearBoxx (I showed them the demo) and what would you pay for it?
Universally, the answer to question one was… hell yes (excuse my rough language). Six times I got one student in the group who would wrap their arms around their chest as if hugging something, swivel just a little, close their eyes and say ‘I love my print yearbook’ (which was probably what they were pretend hugging). I would say, ‘Fantastic, I’ll get back to you in a few minutes.’
Then I’d whip out my tablet, which was easier to demonstrate the demo on, and showed them what YearBoxx is all about. Their reaction was phenomenal.
To the last question, what would you be willing to pay for YearBoxx, the answer was a range of twenty to sixty dollars. When I told them it was less than ten bucks, they freaked. You can maybe understand why I did fourteen focus groups… I was having so much fun.
To the six students who let me know at the beginning of the meeting how much they loved their print yearbook, I asked them if they could only have one yearbook, which would it be, print or digital. They all (what was so interesting to me about this was that all six of them did and said the exact same thing) lowered their eyes and said in a very low voice, digital. Why, asked I. They basically would mention their favorite features of YearBoxx.
I would then suggest to them that for the additional price of a piece of pizza and a Coke (I love this expression and use it often!), you can have BOTH your print book AND a digital yearbook. They all lit up and were genuinely excited. Sometimes, life can just work out perfectly.
So… is Gen Z ready for a digital yearbook, specifically for a YearBoxx digital yearbook?
Yeah, I think so!
