[I took the test and here’s what came out for me. Indie Scenesters is one of the 3 largest tribes with 12%]
I'm always interested in research, especially brand- and media-related so when Crowd DNA reached out to me, I took the time to take a look at their UK Tribes project for Channel 4. To uncover the youth tribal profiles of brands and media usage, Channel 4 commissioned a sequel to the qualitative and quantitative research study conducted by Crowd DNA in the UK.
Find your Tribe, was a call answered by more than 38,000 young people since August 2008. They followed in the steps of the 80,000 of the first study.
Here's how it works. When completing an interactive, highly visual quiz, with questions about their music, fashion, lifestyle, brand and media preferences each participant finds out which youth tribe they belong to.
The studies were conducted through -
Qualitative techniques:
Desk research, online forums, Depth Interviews Expert interviews with marketers, media, event promoters, DJs, fanzine editors etc., Video and picture diaries, SMS-derived insight, a UK network of young people providing regular trend reports.
Quantitative techniques:
The online survey called Find Your Tribe was disseminated through relevant blogs and online media. The pay off for young people was in the fun and talk value of having their tribal identity defined; the benefit for Channel 4 was in gathering data on youth preferences across over 250 brands and media, plus on lifestyle attitudes and habits.
Some sample brand maps I pulled from behind the password on the site:
Check out Sony Ericsson.
Are they in the music business or are they in the platform for you to enjoy time with your favorite bands live business?
The findings in the study are tied culturally to the brand habits and preferences of UK young people. But it sort of gave me ideas on how I would frame questions for US results, or Italian as it may be.
I cannot help but think that something more could have been done to connect those who participated in the study with each other and the brands involved. Look at what happened here with extreme sleep [hat tip Mark Earls].
Educate, entertain, engage - there are plenty of ways for brands to be part of the conversation.