Opinion
Unesda guidelines mustn’t be restricted by age
The Union of European Beverages Association’s move to introduce digital marketing guidelines is a positive step for the industry. However, they need to extend focus beyond the minimum age of 12 years old and make allowance for even younger children.
Children are embracing digital technologies and communications from an early age, increasing and changing the way they interact with brands
As Unesda acknowledges, it has been difficult to self-regulate and monitor restricted forms of marketing to children in the digital sphere. Although growing marketing experience and new technologies will help to make this more achievable, it will still prove difficult to completely govern. This is because children are embracing digital technologies and communications from an early age, increasing and changing the way they interact with brands.
A recent study showed that children aged between eight and 18 years old now spend an average of seven hours a day glued to smartphones, iPods, TVs and video games. It’s perhaps no surprise that there have been numerous reports of children under 13 flouting minimum age limits on social networks such as Facebook and Bebo.
The new guidelines will apply to a communications environment that’s more heavily influenced and determined by target audiences than what brands have been historically used to. Users have more power to control how they receive and source information. This power can be more easily exploited by younger users to bypass censorship and enable them access to content targeted at older age groups.
While industry support for the guidelines, which initially looks very positive, will be crucial to their effectiveness, Unesda should examine how children of all ages are interacting with communications technologies to help develop practical, applicable and relevant recommendations and guidance.
By looking beyond a minimum age limit of 12 years old and taking time to listen to the conversations young people have online, the content they’re searching for and consuming, and the online destinations they visit, guidelines can be developed that offer greater benefit to the brands they’re trying to serve and the audiences they’re trying to protect.
About the author
Andy Poole is digital strategist regions at Weber Shandwick North
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