Millennials have gotten a considerable chunk of ink in recent years in the world of loyalty marketing as they comprise the most sought after marketing group.
But in a new Gallup report titled, “How Millennials Want to Work and Live,” when it comes to the concept of engagement, two interesting developments were revealed.
Only 29% of Millennials are engaged to their jobs, meaning they are emotionally and behaviorally connected, the report says. Another 16% of millennials are actively disengaged, meaning they are more or less out to do damage to their company. The majority of millennials (55%) are not engaged, leading all other generations in this category of workers. Not engaging millennial workers is a big miss for organizations, the report notes. The millennial workforce is predominantly “checked out”― not putting energy or passion into their jobs. They are indifferent about work and show up just to put in their hours.
What’s more, only one in four Millennials are fully engaged―meaning they are emotionally and psychologically attached to a brand, product, or company, the report says, and their engagement trails that of older generations: Gen Xers (28%); Baby Boomers (33%); and Traditionalists (38%).
Still, Millennials have low levels of customer engagement across most industries that Gallup tracks. In the banking industry, for example, 31% of Millennial customers are fully engaged. In hospitality, the figure is 20%.
Notably, Millennial customers are also much more likely to be actively disengaged than any other generation of consumers. In some industries, Millennials’ level of active disengagement is nearly on par with, or exceeds, their level of engagement. In the insurance industry, 31% of Millennial customers are fully engaged, and 27% are actively disengaged. In the airline industry, just 12% of Millennials are fully engaged, while almost four times as many (46%) are actively disengaged.
But here’s the thing for loyalty marketers: When Millennials are fully engaged as customers, they’re more profitable and loyal than are other customers. In the wireless service industry, Gallup discovered that 95% of fully engaged millennial customers say they plan to stay with their wireless provider, compared with 10% of actively disengaged millennial customers.
These fully engaged customers are substantially more likely than other customers to say they would recommend their provider to others and are substantially less likely to say they consider price as the most important factor in choosing a wireless provider.
According to the report, the greatest challenge for businesses seeking to engage Millennial customers is to deliver the convenience of multiple channels while maintaining a consistently positive experience across every channel.