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The Foster Letter —

Religious Market Update

The FOSTER Letter is a bi-weekly e-mail religious market intelligence report targeted to Christian market channel and ministry leaders.  Each issue reports on news, trends, events and research that will directly or indirectly impact your audiences and businesses in a convenient summary format  Better informed leaders make better choices!

Researched, Edited & Published by Gary D. Foster

Excerpts from the

June 10, 2007 edition of

The FOSTER Letter—Religious Market Update

Changing Beliefs According to the 2007 Barna Group Tracking Survey, American’s spiritual activities and religious identity have changed little in recent years, but what Americans believe is changing. 5 out of 6 theological perspectives have shifted in recent years away from traditional biblical views. This includes perspectives about God, Jesus and Satan. 66% (vs. 71% in ’06) believe God is best described as the all-powerful, all-knowing perfect creator of the universe who rules the world today. 37% strongly disagree that Jesus sinned and 24% strongly reject the idea that Satan is not a real spiritual being. Each of these beliefs is lower than in ’06. Just 27% strongly endorse explaining their faith to others (down from 39%) and 27% reject good works as a means to personal salvation (down from 31%). The only religious belief unchanged from previous years was the belief that the Bible is accurate in all the principles it teaches (45%). Millions of Americans feel personally committed to God, but they are renegotiating the definition of that deity. Barna Research President David Kinnaman suggests the shift away from biblical perspectives is like moving the foundation of a building. “We are likely to see more significant alterations to the spiritual landscape, since what a person believes dictates a great deal about their behavior and allegiance. There are few tasks more important than helping Americans develop a biblical view of life.” (Barna Online 5/21/07) 

Built-In Moral Compass A National Institutes of Health study included scanning the brains of volunteers as they were asked to think about a scenario involving either donating a sum of money to charity or keeping it for themselves. The study found that when the volunteers placed the interests of others before their own, the generous response activated a part of the brain that usually lights up in response to food or sex. Neuroscientists concluded that since the brain responds to unselfishness with pleasure, possibly it has a built-in moral compass designed to help the species survive and propagate. A related study also discovered two systems in the brain that guide moral decision-making. One is a more conscious, rational system, and the other is a more emotional, intuitive system. How these two systems interact in making moral decisions may partially explain why many people who are willing to help someone in front of them will ignore requests to make a donation to help a faceless child overseas. (PWB 6/1/07) 

Recognize Them or Lose Them 79% of people who quit their jobs “cite a lack of appreciation as a key reason for leaving.” Another 65% of Americans “report they weren’t recognized the least bit in the previous year.” (The Carrot Principle by Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton)   

Fact Vs. Values Relentless repetition was once enough to drive your message home. Not anymore! Fact-based statements can be proven or disproven objectively. But the ‘truth’ of a values-based statement hinges on agreed-upon values. Modern advertising overflows with values-based statements, e.g. “Big selection,” “High quality,” “Low prices,” “Easy credit.” Even though they may be true in the mind of the advertiser, the public has heard them all before. The left hemispheres of our brains detect and prefer fact-based statements. Today we are hype-immune and hunger for statements of fact. To persuade today’s hype-resistant customer, you must learn to make fact-based statements in your ads. NOTE: I can help you make sure your ads are not just repeating clichés but clearly delivering meaningful facts that will deliver results. All you have to do is contact me at 419-238-4082, GFosterCns@rmi.net or www.GaryDFoster.com. (Monday Morning Memo 9/26/05, Foster Network) 

Can Crowds Predict whether a book will succeed? The founders of Media Predict (www.MediaPredict.com), a virtual market, hope so, and Simon & Schuster plans to select a book proposal based on bets placed by traders in the market. Media Predict is soliciting book proposals and posting them on the site. Traders are given $5,000 in fantasy cash to buy shares based on their guess about whether a particular proposal is likely to get a deal, or whether Touchstone Books will select it as a finalist in the Project Publish contest. If either happens within a 4-month period, the value of the shares goes to $100 apiece; if not, the share price falls to zero. (NY Times 5/21/07)  

Broadband Boom According to Leichtman Research Group, Inc., the 19 largest U.S. cable and telephone providers, representing 94% of the market, acquired over 2.9 million net additional high-speed Internet subscribers in the first quarter of ’07. The top broadband providers now account for 56.2 million subscribers, with cable companies having over 30.7 million broadband subscribers, and telephone companies having over 25.4 million subscribers. (Center for Media Research 5/18/07) 

New Generation Latinos Immigration is no longer the main driver of growth in the U.S. Hispanic market. It has been surpassed by natural growth of the in-country population, according to a Mercanti Group report. This trend will have big implications for advertisers trying to reach Hispanics with tailored marketing programs, including choice of language and media. From ’00 - ’05, growth was split between immigration and natural increase of the resident. Now, natural growth has the upper hand, with a substantial base population tending to produce families larger than the national average (3.87 vs. 3.19). While 73% of Hispanic immigrants prefer Spanish to English, the number falls to 25% of their children and just 1% of their grandchildren. With a larger proportion of Hispanics being born in the U.S., English will increasingly supplant Spanish as the most effective language for marketing messages. 3^rd-generation U.S. born Hispanics retain a sense of Hispanic identity and heritage. For example, one popular new magazine, Urban Latino, is an English-language publication catering to the New Generation Latino (18 to 34s). The same phenomenon is powering the emergence of a new, mostly English-language radio genre, “hurban” (Hispanic Urban). (MediaPost Publications 5/22/07) 

Extreme Work A study in the Harvard Business Review (12/06) reports 48% of workaholics are working an average of 16.6 more hours per week than they did 5 years ago. About 60% of high-earning individuals work more than 50 hours a week; 35%, more than 60; and 10%, more than 80. Add a typical 1-hour commute, and a 60-hour week means leaving home at 7 a.m. and returning at 9 p.m. 5 days a week. Extreme workers are defined in part as working 60 hours or more a week and have characteristics such as fast-paced work under a tight deadline, unpredictable workflow, responsibility for profit and loss, a large number of subordinates and a lot of travel. Extreme work undermines a worker’s health and relationships. (USA Today 5.22.07) 

Target Women More than 1,000 new foods and drinks targeting women have hit the global market in the past 4 years. (USA Today 5/16/07) 

M.B.A. 24% of U.S. executives believe an M.B.A. provides an excellent and adequate preparation for a leadership position. (Egon Zehnder International 5/07) 

God’s Whiz Kids Asian Americans make up 4.4% of the U.S. population. At Ivy League colleges like Yale, Harvard, and Columbia they constitute more than 15% of student enrollment and over 40% at UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC Irvine, according to Rebecca Kim, author of God's New Whiz Kids?. Many campus Christian fellowships are now predominantly Asian-American. There are 50 evangelical Christian groups at UC Berkeley and UCLA alone, and 80% of their members are Asian-American. In New York City, 1 in 4 evangelical college students are Asian-American and at Yale 90% are Asian. (The Christian Post 5/24/07) 

Mega-Relationship Marketing “We want solid relationships with 40 to 60 million households. Right now, we have a decent relationship with 10 million,” proclaims Elva Lewis, the executive charged with ushering P&G into a post-mass world. There are roughly 107 million U.S. households, and P&G is attempting to forge relationships with more than half of them. It has identified 9 or 10 cohorts, segments such as new moms or baby boomers that cover 90% of the top prospects for P&G’s 50 biggest brands. She contends, marketers can form these relationships as long as, on a continual basis, they understand what their consumers want. “We can use targeted scale and let the fixed costs of direct marketing -- list buys, acquisition, response modeling, mail and fulfillment -- be spread across 10 brands.” The effort will be deemed successful when more than half of their marketing outlay comes from non-advertising spending vs. today’s 60% advertising and 40% everything else. (Advertising Age 5/7/07) 

No Real Down Time 1 in 5 people toted laptop computers (me included) on their most recent vacations, finds an AP-Ipsos poll. 80% brought along their cellphones. 1 in 5 did some work while vacationing, and about the same number checked office messages or called in to see how things were going. Twice as many checked their e-mail, while 50% kept up with other personal messages and voice mail. Reasons vacationers performed work-related tasks include an expectation that they be available; a worry about missing important information; or in some cases the enjoyment of staying involved. 19% worked on their vacation even though they were technically off. Another 15% called work to check in. (USA Today 6/1/07) 

Teen Religious Activities 54% of American teens have attended a church or religious service in the last 30 days, 20% attended a Catholic service, 8% a Southern Baptist service, 28% some other type of Christian service and 4% a non-Christian service. In contrast, just 23% attended a church youth group social activity in the last 30 days. 20% attended Sunday School, 14% a small-group Bible study while 8% have a youth group leadership role. In the last 30 days, 39% prayed regularly and 14% read the Bible. Compared to ’05, fewer teens are attending Sunday School (20% vs. 24%) and small-group Bible studies (14% vs. 18%). As for outreach, 24% told a friend about their religious beliefs vs. 30% in ’05. 15% invited someone to a church activity vs. 19% in ’05. (Baptist Press 5/23/07) 

Echo Boomers are the nation’s second-largest generation and by 2015 will account for approximately $2.45 trillion in annual spending. This generation may be misunderstood. 48% of Echo Boomers describe themselves as savers. 69% consider themselves wait-and-see shoppers, and 83% say they are bargain shoppers. 80% stick to a strict budget, and 81% are trying to cut back on spending. 88% like to buy things for others more often than just for themselves. 81% are giving what they can to charities. (Marketing Daily 5/25/07) 

Who Was Noah’s Wife Nearly half of Americans go to church regularly, according to a Univ. of Michigan study, and at least 85% believe in God, finds a Baylor Univ. study. But when it comes to knowing what’s in the Bible, Americans wash out. According to a ’04 Gallup poll, American teens barely know the 10 Commandments from the 12 disciples, or Paul from Peter. Only a third could pick out a quotation from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, and 25% didn’t think King David was king of the Jews. Harper’s magazine reports 12% of Americans say Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife. Many high school teachers and college professors say we’re raising a bunch of biblical nimrods, and that it’s time to teach — but not preach — the Old and New Testaments in public schools. Time magazine (4/2/07) published a cover story on the issue, and, according to the Gallup study, high school and college English teachers are nearly unanimous in calling for more biblical education. The works of William Shakespeare alone contain more than 1,300 biblical references, and they want their students to get them. About 8% of high schools offer an elective secular Bible class. (Colorado Springs Gazette 5/23/07) 

Religious Book Sales continued to grow strongly in ’06, according to the Book Industry Trends 2007. With an increase of 5.6% in net revenue, the religion segment was the highest growth category in dollar sales. It also led unit sales in all categories, with a rise of 3.1%. (Christian E-Tailing 5/4/07) 

Book Numbers Way Up Bowker has implemented a new methodology resulting in a huge increase in their estimate of new book titles published annually. The ’07 count is 291,920 vs. 171,920 a year ago. (Publishers Lunch 5/31/07) 

Senior Boom The Census Bureau projects the population of people 65 and older in 2050 will be 86.7 million, 21% of the total population. That is a 147% increase between 2000 and 2050. By comparison, the overall population will increase by only 49% over that period. (Facts for Features 3/1/07) 

Moral Values Poor Gallup’ annual Values and Beliefs poll finds Americans very pessimistic about the current state of moral values in the U.S. Only about 1 in 6 describe the state of moral values in the country in positive terms, and perceptions that moral values are “poor” are at their highest point, edging closer to the 50% mark. More than 8 in 10 Americans think morality is getting worse, representing a slight increase in the past 3 years. The groups of Americans most negative about moral values in this country include senior citizens, blacks, women, conservative Republicans, Protestants and weekly churchgoers. Americans have consistently rated morality in non-positive terms since ’02. The percentage describing the nation’s values as poor is at its highest point (albeit by 2 percentage points), and is edging closer to the 50% mark. (Gallup Alert 6/04/07) 

Worldview Only 2% of U.S. teens possess a biblical worldview acknowledging the existence of God, Satan and sin, the availability of forgiveness and grace through Christ, and the existence of absolute biblical moral principles. (Barna Update 4/23/07)

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