Until not so long ago, friendships were simple: to follow the most common universal definition, friendship is a relationship between two humans that is based upon mutual empathy, understanding, trust and have the other person best interests at heart.

As a closer-to-40-than-30 father of a baby girl, I'm well out of my league to talk about the life of a teenager from a first-hand or parental perspective. But as a marketer and technophile, my daydreams are often filled with golden rays and Andy Rooney's voice saying "when I was a kid ... we didn't even have email. We didn't have instant messenger. We didn't text each other in class; no, we passed notes."

It's February, the month of love. I was listening to teenage girls talk about the "perfect" date and I thought, What a teen wants from a perfect date is what she wants from the perfect company.

When you're engaging teenagers, little nuances that are often overlooked become the noose around your neck. You think "hip-hop" is hip-hop, and that teens love hip-hop. Not so fast. There are a lot of different niches inside a genre. One kid hates a certain kind of hip-hop, but loves another. A different kid could be the opposite. You have to understand the subtle - but significant - differences, the same way every color that could be called "green" is not the same. So if you think that teens love green, you better know every different shade and what it signifies. …

It probably comes as no surprise, but teens are so deeply entrenched in their emotions that the slightest pull to connect them to a greater cause, or a hidden feeling or belief that they can relate to, can easily cause them to act, engage, and purchase. As teens yearn to connect and be heard, advertisements that can alleviate the separateness that comes with growing into adulthood and unite teens to a greater good will have a powerful effect.

Most marketers agree that we are in a period of radical change in the way we connect to each other and in the way we consume content. But no demographic group is more rapidly adopting innovation than teenagers. And not only are they the pioneers in the development of new channels, they also seem to speak in a language that's completely foreign to most of us who were born before 1990.

This is the time of the girl - we've seen it coming, and it's here. Global organizations focusing on girl "upliftment," serving future family "upliftment" is working. There are now more girls in U.S. universities than boys.

How the use of technology in the educational experience will change marketing expectations.

It's no surprise that engaging teens in general is difficult- their attention spans are among the lowest of all age groups. And when you add to the mix a highly controversial, sometimes confusing subject such as politics, your likelihood of engagement becomes even lower.

The idea of group occupation has been around for a long time, dating back to protests in the form of takeovers and sit-ins throughout modern history, all in the name of social progress. Invigorated recently by Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and all of its offshoots, the idea of "occupy" is a word that has new relevance to teens and those who want to connect with them.