Marketing to millennials can be a difficult and confusing process, but if you’re successfully prepared to do so, your company can soar.

Millennials are the largest population group in the United States, with over 76 million Americans falling within the category. In addition, millenials are forecasted to outpace the spending of Baby Boomers by the end of 2015.

Millennials are often thought of as one big group connected through social media. Members of this group love to hear the opinions of others, argues Oliver Nieburg – with 66% of people researching a company recommended by a friend and 72% believing it’s their duty to share a negative brand experience. What does this all mean? Marketers must find ways to create shareable moments with their millennial-aged clientele. When millennials are given shareable moments, they’ll discuss them with their friends and therefore create word-of-mouth marketing.

One company I strongly commend on marketing to millennials is Apple. With their sleek interface, user-friendly designs and catchy slogans, Apple is a premier company to monitor. This company is even more dear to me because I recently purchased my first Apple MacBook, which completely lives up to the hype. Apple has a way of enticing millennial shoppers in a way that other companies don’t. Apple’s “Silhouette” ad campaign was used to push sales of iPods, with characters on screen extravagantly dancing. While this campaign originally began in 2006, people today still purchase iPods because of these ads.

Understanding millenials and acknowledging that not all of them have a sense of entitlement with short attention spans is the first thing to asses when marketing to millenials. Almost half of millennials are married, and the same number have children. While I, personally, do not fit this demographic, I have countless friends who are my age that are either married or engaged. Your company must know these people are not easily grouped into a one-size-fits-all category.

Millenials are an extremely large group, with an estimated population of almost 100 million in the US, which is more than Baby Boomers. So, companies must find ways to adapt to better market to them. The three best ways to market to Millenials:

1. Millenials value happiness, diversity and discovery more than anything else. Find ways to speak and connect these crucial feelings to your product.
2. Understand that millenials have fast-pace lifestyles and market your product in a way that helps their lives become more centered. In other words, how will your product accommodate such busy lives?
3. Lastly, ensure millenials feel involved. Entice action. Millenials do not want to be purely “marketed” to.

Some brands do a stellar job of marketing to millenials, and your company should take notice. Tide Pods, which are single-use detergent packets, is an extremely effective product. They are easy to use, quick and don’t require additional steps like other detergents. Implementing these values into your marketing mix is a great way to capture attention of millenials.

Knowing key concepts and strategies that capture millennials’ attention is absolutely crucial for your company. Below are some ideals to better understand this generation.

1. With an estimated purchasing power of $1.78 trillion, it is simply unintelligent to not emphasize efforts of marketing to them.
2. Perhaps one of the most valuable characteristics according to millenials is not missing out on something – or being the first to experience it. These are both great values to build marketing efforts around.

What does this all mean for your business? It is absolutely imperative to begin emphasizing efforts to capture this generation. Get your business out on social mediato give millenials and easy, convenient way to connect. Also, start monitoring companies that market well to millenials already. Companies like Uber and Yelp, in addition to Apple and Tide Pods perform marketing to millenials extremely well. Clearly, millenials are a vast group and not taking advantage of this demographic will prove costly for your business.