No TV Till You Do Your Responding : Nickelodeon Taps In to Children's Opinions Via Computer, and Not Everyone Is Happy

By BRUCE HOROVITZ

May 4, 1993 12 AM PT

When Nickelodeon, the cable TV network for children, asked 11-year-old Emily Frlekin to take part in a marketing research project, she thought it sounded terrific. So did her mom, Angela.

For Emily, who lives in North Hollywood, it was a chance to earn a $100 savings bond--and brag to friends that her opinions on everything from new TV shows to fashions were important to Nickelodeon. And to her mom, it was an opportunity to observe her daughter’s creativity while responding to questions posed by researchers--usually via her daughter’s home computer.

Most of the questions are about Nickelodeon’s projects--such as future TV shows or its upcoming Nickelodeon magazine. Some are simply questions about what children like--and dislike. But Emily’s mom was taken aback when her daughter was asked by Nickelodeon to confide to its researchers some examples of things that her parents told her not to talk about.

“I was incensed that they’d pry that deeply into her private life,” said Frlekin, who refused to let her daughter respond to the question. And while Frlekin--who has six children--still supports the detailed, on-line research that Nickelodeon is doing with her daughter and more than 100 other children nationwide, she now keeps a closer eye on the questions and answers.

Nickelodeon is among the first companies to amass marketing information by specifically observing the computer messages that groups of children send back and forth. But it isn’t the only firm testing advanced ways to find out what is on the minds of youngsters. Plenty of others are eager to tap into this lucrative market of preteens that annually accounts for an estimated $6 billion in direct purchases--and which influences another $132 billion that parents spend on them.

Nike recently hired a research firm to help it find children willing to invite their friends home--then allow researchers to listen to their discussions. And before Levi’s introduced Dockers for boys, its ad agency sent researchers into boys’ bedrooms to take pictures of their decorations, their favorite wardrobes--even their closets.

Marketers insist that this type of research is harmless--and only helps them better understand children and provide children with the things they truly want. But critics contend that marketers are prying too deeply into the lives of children in order to mold them into future consumers of their products.

“You have to consider that the information the marketers get isn’t being used for the sake of the kids, it’s being used for the sake of corporate profits,” said Sut Jhally, professor of communications at the University of Massachusetts. “The danger is that the kids’ culture will eventually be defined through very narrow marketing mechanisms.”

One consultant--who helped devise Teen Spirit deodorant--said marketers must be extremely careful when doing research with children. “Kids don’t really want someone to be interfering in their personal relationships with their friends,” said Michele Kaminski, a Pittsburgh-based youth marketing consultant. “They don’t want marketers invading that space.”

But marketers who want to be successful with children may have little choice but to get nosy, said James U. McNeal, professor of marketing at Texas A&M; University and author of “Kids as Customers.” After all, more than 90% of the toys brought to market are flops, he said.

Some youth-marketing experts believe that Nickelodeon, with its on-line research of 8- to 12-year-olds, is on to something big. “It’s a 21st-century form of pen pals,” said Rena Karl, editor of the Encinitas, Calif.-based Marketing to Kids Report newsletter.

“This may be the wave of the future in terms of researching anybody--not just kids,” said Dan S. Acuff, president of Glendale-based Youth Market Systems.

Well aware of the attraction that many kids have for computer forums, Karen Flischel, Nickelodeon’s vice president of research, wondered why Nickelodeon couldn’t set up its own forum--then use it as a way to “listen” to a mixture of children.

Nickelodeon plans to eventually enlist 175 children nationwide for its research project--50% of them minorities. Most children are asked to stay with the project for 18 months.

“Nickelodeon is very research-oriented. We say we know what kids want because we ask them,” Flischel said. “But our biggest concern is to not overuse these kids--to not exploit them.”

Indeed, Nickelodeon’s sales department has already asked the research department if it would be willing to test some advertisers’ new products with the on-line panel. But so far, the research department has resisted.

For the most part, Nickelodeon wants to know what children think of its shows. It recently sent children videocassettes of a new miniseries, “The Tomorrow People.” By observing the children’s computer conversations, the network discovered that many youngsters didn’t realize that the show’s action shifted between North America and Europe. As a result, producers inserted graphics that spelled out where the action was taking place.

“It may sound simple,” said Flischel, “but if you don’t get people aboard at the very beginning of a series, you’re doomed. They won’t watch any of it.”

Besides the $100 savings bond, Nickelodeon also pays children such as Emily $15 per project to do such things as videotaping family holiday gatherings. It recently asked Emily to take snapshots of family members--and to send a detailed essay on her 7-year-old sister.

Why does Nickelodeon do all this? “I suppose they want to see what we’re like,” said an astute Emily. “If they know what we’re like, they must know what we’d like to see on TV.”

Briefly . . .

At the Lucky Strike shareholders meeting today in Stamford, Conn., Janet Sackman, a former Lucky Strike cover girl who has since lost her voice to throat cancer, plans to ask the company to stop targeting children in its ads. . . . Los Angeles-based RM Marketing has launched a new Spanish-language magazine, Nuestra Gente, distributed free through the mail to homes in cities with large Latino populations. . . . A new upscale, weekly newspaper that will be home-delivered on Sundays for free, Sunday Beverly Hills/Westside, is scheduled to begin publication in early September. . . . The Los Angeles agency Poppe Tyson was awarded the $10-million Toshiba America Information Systems account formerly handled by the Venice agency Chiat/Day. . . . Torrance-based Saatchi & Saatchi DFS/Pacific has won the $5-million creative advertising account for PIP Printing. . . . Santa Monica-based Drew Advertising has won $2 million in new billings from new accounts Insignia Solutions and Portrait Display Labs. . . . A conference focusing on the African-American consumer, sponsored by the National Assn. of Market Developers, continues through Wednesday at the Doubletree Hotel in Marina del Rey. . . . The Los Angeles agency Davis, Ball & Colombatto has been tapped by McDonald’s for a national campaign promoting Big Mac’s 25th anniversary.

What Children Like

More than anything else, marketers to children want to know what children like. This survey by a youth marketing research firm of 300 children ages 6-12 was taken in October, 1992. Here are the TV shows and commercials that children said they liked best:

Which is the funniest TV show you ever watched?

Home Improvement: 30%

Funniest Home Videos: 23%

Family Matters: 9%

America’s Funniest People: 8%

Full House: 7%

Simpsons: 4%

Living Color: 2%

All Others: 17%

(2 or fewer mentions)

What is the funniest TV commercial you’ve seen?

Little Caesar’s Pizza: 37%