What is this “Millennial” thing anyways?!

GREAT QUESTION!

Did you know? In Q1 of 2015 Millenials (although the exact years are debated, think current 20 to 36-year-olds)  surpassed all other generation and now holds the largest share of the American workforce.  So this Millennial thing, is a pretty big deal!

What does Millennial generation really mean?

Here are the major demographic points: 

• 77 Million individuals in the US
• Median income for younger Millenials is $25K, while older Millennials average $45k
• Only 21% of millennials were married in 2014 compared to 45% of baby boomers at their age.
• 1 in 4 have a Bachelor’s degree or higher, making them the most formally educated generation
• 38% of Millennials are bi-lingual

Here’s a great chart: 

How does this affect the workplace?

This article “5 ways Micro Markets Serve the Millennial-driven Workplace” lays them out for us.  We highlighted the takeaways for you!

Strong Company Culture

Millennials are not easily “impressed by the sheer scale of a business, its age, or the general buzz that surrounds it (Deloitte, 2016).” Therefore, companies striving to attract and retain Millennials should invest in tools that will foster a strong culture, including organization transparency, technology, and food. MicroMarkets offer quality products, open layouts, multiple payment options (including fingerprint and payroll deduct), and employee discounts.

Work-Life Balance

Having a MicroMarket is a great way to show millennial employees that their employer is not only interested in work output, but their nutritional input. According to Forbes, for Millennials, “a job is no longer just a job ― it’s their life as well.” To attract and retain this type of worker, companies need to demonstrate mutual investment in their lives by offering ways to maintain the lifestyle they envision for themselves while working hard for the organization. That includes diverse product offerings, dietary foods, and the ability to make choices based on nutritional information.

Open, Collaborative Space

MicroMarkets lend themselves well to modern spaces. The open flow of the market combined with comfortable seating, such as couches or booths, gives the millennial worker a place other than the boardroom to interact and collaborate with coworkers. MicroMarkets are the new water cooler.

Healthy Food Options

Nearly 80% of Millennials say that they are using healthy foods as a preventative measure for illness and disease (USA Today, 2015). MicroMarkets can help employers capitalize on this growing trend towards healthier lifestyles by stocking nutritional foods, including gluten-free and protein-rich options. Items such as Jack Link’s beef jerky and Wonderful pistachios are simple offerings to start with.  Believe it or not, many common vending products serve this purpose if you know what to look for. KIND Bars, Sargento cheese sticks, and Orville Redenbacher popcorn are some healthier gluten-free snacks. (But be careful, as gluten-free products can vary by brand!) MicroMarkets also enable the availability of fresh fruits, vegetables, yogurt, salads, and other prepared foods. These products can be leveraged to tie the breakroom experience into a company’s overall wellness initiatives.

Local, Sustainable Products

MicroMarkets enable stocking of locally-sourced products, thus protecting the environment and supporting the local economy. According to a 2015 Nielsen study, 66% of Millennials say they’re willing to pay more for products and services that come from companies that are committed to positive social and environmental impact. Millennials want to feel good about the products they’re purchasing and their impact on the world. Providing local products enhances positive experiences and loyalty with MicroMarkets.

Creating Your Micro Market Planogram

Here’s an article that is really beneficial to micro market operators everywhere! Although this article is from the Summer of 2014 it’s still relevant to your process.  Take a look!

How to Create Your Micro Market Planogram

By Brad Bachtelle

Here Are Some Great Take Aways:

Operator questions continually arise as to how to merchandise and planogram micro markets. What are the difficulties in creating a planogram for a micro market? How do I assign shelf space to new products when I still have older products that haven’t sold? How often should I change my market planogram? Should I have visible prices?

1. Don’t apply “heritage merchandising” from vending to micro markets. Micro market open shelving allows for a much greater set of product options. A major operator miss-step in micro market merchandising and product selection is to rely upon vending experience as the primary basis.
2. Planogram development is a two-step process: 1) shelf space allocation based on a space-to-sales calculation and 2) selection of category products, including core and variety/rotational products.
3. Allocation by shelving type:
   Shelf space allocation is straightforward and begins by analyzing and totaling micro market sales by both major product categories (food, beverages, snacks, etc.) and sub-categories (soft drinks, energy drinks, juices, etc. within beverages; cookies, salty snacks, candy, etc. within snacks). As most product sub-categories have common temperature requirements for all sub-category products (juices are always refrigerated; chips are always at ambient temperature), the second step is to group sub-category sales by the type of shelves (ambient, refrigerated, etc.) on which they are presented to consumers. We now have a total dollar sales level for each shelf type.
4. For Example, Salty snacks represented 33 percent of total snack sales and candy 28 percent. Accordingly, an appropriate planogram for these markets should initially allocate one-third of the snack shelf space to salty snacks and, similarly, a 28 percent portion of candy. 
5. It is very important to ease consumer shopping by grouping same-category products together.  Examples: The smaller footprint and space between shelves for bar goods will enable better consumer access by moving their category positions onto higher shelves. Larger graphic items can be easily identified by consumers regardless of their shelf positions, so lower shelf placement makes sense without losing consumer visibility. Gum and mint items are generally impulse purchases, so placement high on shelving units or near the checkout kiosk makes sense to gain that incremental purchase.
6. Products should always include a combination of core products that are leading, proven items, plus new or variety products that present consumers with options within a category. The general rule of thumb is that core products should represent 70 to 80 percent of category SKUs to ensure strong consistent sales.
7. It is also important to understand that every top selling product at some point was “new” and that every retailer has at some time added products that have underperformed versus expectations. “New” is okay!
8. Rotating second-tier brands within a micro market product set will often deliver a sales spike and also make the micro market look “fresh” to consumers.
9. Draw attention to new products with signage: As operators add new products to their micro markets, there are two options for their location – a separate “new item” shelf area just for such items, or the placement of the new products within their general category shelf space. Whichever approach is taken, new products need to be clearly identified as such to draw attention.
10. It is important that the slow sellers are identified and “moved out” to allow that shelf space to be used for better selling items. The worst thing is to leave poor sellers in a market to just “sell through.” Once a decision has been made to discontinue an item, do something to eliminate the item from the micro-market within a short time period.
11. Micro-market planograms need to be adjusted or “refreshed” for two reasons: 1) to keep market product sets looking new and interesting to consumers and 2) to tweak individual location shelf space allocations according to the specific sales and consumer demand at the account.
12. After about six weeks following a micro market installation, it is important to do an initial planogram review. A category sales analysis on the new market will show the specific consumption pattern for that location. Category shelf space adjustments and elimination of slow moving products can then occur to better offer the location a product set that best matches demand.
13. It is best to routinely and relatively frequently change the micro market product set to keep the overall micro market and its appearance from getting “old” or “stale” from the consumer’s perspective.
14.  Market planograms should be refreshed at least every four months to let consumers know their micro market operator is on top of product selection and merchandising.

An SEO Overview and How You Can Improve Your Google Ranking!

SEO aka Search Engine Optimization is typically divided into two main groups:

•  On page SEO: Everything on the page. This includes everything from the words in the content you use to all the technical stuff (i.e. the code) like the HTML tags that tell the search engines about your content.  This is all within your control.
• Off-page SEO: Everything off of the page. This is primarily made of links to your website from other websites. This is not in your control, but you have some ability to influence it.

Why is on page SEO so important? On-page content is what you have complete control over. If you use the right HTML tags and structured data to markup your content, Google will know what you do and where you are.  For example, by using words like “markets,” “vending,” and “break room” you will list higher in the search results for those keywords. Thus, when customers in your area are searching keywords that make sense with your site … they’ll find your business!  To be most effective, think like your customer!

Don’t get too stressed out about the details if you aren’t a website guru! With the advancements in search engines and how websites are rated … your actual content (what you say on your website) is the most important factor in your on-page content.  Make your content clear, concise, and up-to-date and you’re already miles ahead of most websites!

Your SEO will also in some ways be affected by the links that your website is associated with.  For example as an operator or distributor, by providing a link to 32Market.com or BreakRoomRehab.com your association with these websites will increase your visibility when individuals search for Three Square Market in your area.  Help us – help you by placing our partnership badge on your website!

Off-page SEO can be tricky, but is also one of the most important sources of your ranking power.  Links are about quality, not just quantity. Links to your business from poor websites can actually penalize your search results.  Think of adding links to your website as earning links instead of just collecting as many as possible. You can earn links by creating valuable content that others want to link to.  Social sharing is just one of the ways that you can start increasing your “link-ability.”

A Quick Overview:

• Thorough, thoughtful and correct content on your website will take you a long way
• Updating your content regularly will keep you relevant
• Associations with quality websites can take your website to the top
• Earn links! Create content people care about. For an easy way to start, begin growing your social circle and sharing what you have to say!