Last night’s “How Gen Y Will Affect the Future of Marketing, or Why You’re Screwed if You Don’t Get with the Program” event in Boston’s Fanueil Hall included a packed panel of marketers and brand leads.

Whether they were marketing to GenY, consulting about GenY, writing about GenY, or using GenY behaviors and preferences to market more effectively to a broader segment, the title of this event was definitely fitting.

Panelists included Chief Creative Officer and Chief Social Media Officer at Mullen, Ed Boches (he moderated and Mullen hosted the event), founder and CEO of Mr. Youth, Matt Britton, Editor in Chief of TheNextGreatGeneration.com, Alex Pearlman (TNGG hosted the event), founder and President of Gemvara, Matt Lauzon, and Chief Brand Alchemist of SCVNGR, Chris Mahl. Lauzon broke the ice, beer in hand, saying the best way to get GenY to listen to you is to be drinking a beer – a comment quickly followed by a round brought to all the panelists.

GenY’s Relationship with Media

Boches anchored and kicked off the panel discussion by asking each panelist to define GenY and their use of various media.

Britton, who’s agency focuses on word of mouth, social interactive and experiential marketing, characterized GenY’s relationship with media as being “integrated everywhere” instead of primarily through television in generation before. He offered his firm’s research that the majority of college freshmen do not have TV sets in their dorm rooms. He rounded the question off by discussing the shift from print to digital, stating that “great content is not going to go away but the form is going to rapidly evolve into a digital world.”

Pearlman of TheNextGreatGeneration.com discussed GenY’s obsession with community driven content creation, citing her experience in building TNGG’ staff of GenY writers. “This generation wants to be heard. They want their opinions heard, and they want to talk to each other,” she stated. She went on to explain the extent to which the Millenial generation wants to be heard, pointing to how on any given week she receives 5-15 requests to write, with seven new writers joining TNGG this week already.

Lauzon of Gemvara offered a retailers perspective and experience on GenY’s relationship with media. He explained that GenY is driving a revolution in retail he’s branded as ‘meCommerce’ – the idea of truly integrating the customer into the shopping experience, be it through customization of products to the crowd-sourcing of inventory. Lauzon believes that executive culture that is “thinking about the company first and not the customer first” will get left behind with GenY in the long run, citing the importance of transparency with this generation.

Mahl from SCVNGR discussed gaming as an emerging form of media, touching on how gaming is a form of media that our generation has grown up engaging with and is now taking with them into a new life stage. Mahl believes GenY’s drive for information, individuality, and participation is the fuel behind the successful intersection of mobile, social, and gaming. As for SCVNGR, who’s hard work expanding this summer has begun to garner them national media attention this fall, he offered, “the dynamics of points and badges are certainly interesting, but once you put it together with information… it’s about influencing.”

Panelists Point to the Future: Gaming & Customization

Gaming and a focus on the individual – two GenY-driven phenomenons – were the two themes that rang strong when panelists pointed to the future of marketing.

A significant portion of the discussion was dedicated to gaming, and the enthusiasm around it ran throughout the night  (including a FutureM social check-in on SCVNGR). This enthusiasm coupled with some blank looks when asked “what’s the next big thing in marketing” suggests that the gaming phenomenon is still in its infancy with brands. Mahl described gaming as a media form which provides a fun, interactive, and experiential way for brands to engage with customers – extending their message through information and by facilitating social connections around that information.

As for customization, Gemvara’s niche, Lauzon drove the conversation stating, “This is the path we are on … everything from media to commerce is going to be tailored down to the person.” He went on to describe how consumers are starting to get very personalized experiences no matter where they go or what they are looking to purchase or interact with. He added that consumers are absolutely getting this customization across a number of media and platforms. Britton chimed in, offering Flipboard as an example and pegging it to the shift that has occurred in the music industry that is now occurring in television broadcasting: “I want to know what Edward thinks I should watch. I want my friends to curate my content. That’s the future of media.”

Examples Kept the Discussion Real

The panel offered examples of connecting with GenY and successful GenY marketing campaigns throughout the night that kept the discussion grounded. The thread that held the examples together: GenYs desire for participation and their use of technology is facilitating bringing people together, and allowing brands to have meaningful conversations.

Lauzon noted Rent the Runway (consumers decide what inventory is purchased), Britton offered Neutrogena (ran a contest with high schools across the US to win a free concert that started with 100 but soon reached 25% of all high schools over Facebook), Boches offered OKCupid (speaking to their realization that content is their most valuable product), and Pearlman pointed to the Wheat Thins campaign (sourced tweets about the product and then had an employee deliver boxes to man). Other examples touched on throughout the night included the successful Old Spice campaigns, Pepsi Refresh, and Splenda.

Audience Questions Kept the Conversation Going

Questions from the audience at this event were incredible, pushing the panelists on specific issues and sparking some very lively discussions. Questions varied from ways brand managers can separate the “lunatic fringe” from a representative sample, “slacktivism” in GenY and whether or not they will come out to elections this November, to the lack of diversity in the advertising world.

A final question was about what hasn’t changed in marketing, despite changed media and mediums. Panelists all seemed to agree with Boches who offered that, “Everything begins with something you haven’t seen or heard before … something that is remarkable and unexpected and makes us go ‘oh my God.’ The second part is something that touches us emotionally.”

Thanks to Mullen (Boches did an amazing job moderating – using the audience’s tweet stream behind him to help guide the discussion and ask questions on their beahalf), TheNextGreatGeneration.com (Pearlman was a phenomenal host, and judging by the tweets, the audience favorite), MITX, and the FutureM organizers for a fantastic panel last night.