3 things Baby Boomers should know about working with millennials

During the past 14 months, I’ve had more millennial clients than I did members of the Baby Boomer and Silent generations. Very quickly, wealth, influence and power shifted to those between 18 and 34 years old.

The good news is that millennials demand the experience and expertise of top names in ghostwriting and speechwriting. They want those of us with a track record for producing books, articles, editorials, blog posts, online videos and speeches that have gotten noticed.

The bad news is that for most of us Baby Boomers, this is a new target market we have to struggle to understand. I’ve made my share of mistakes.

Because the millennials who are succeeding are doing it big, they are a group we want to write for. They are where the action, money and transferable knowledge are.

Here’s what I’ve learned:

Millennials aren’t homogeneous.

Some millennials are conservative in their style and thinking, and some are on the edge in everything. We have to ask explicitly about tone, organization, content and language, and then we have to run a small sample by them. During a project, it’s smart to keep running pieces by them to ensure you are on track.

Millennials are usually group oriented.