‘Gen Zers’, born in the mid to late 1990s and early 2000s, have grown up with the Internet at their fingertips and technology as a given. They’re a generation uninterested in buying newspapers and prefer to get their information from their smartphone, which is never further than an arm’s length away. So how do marketers attract these new consumers to their business?
Forget avocado toast (
that’s so millennial) and check out these tips to getting Gen Z hooked on your brand:
1. Influencers are worth their weight in gold
Gen Z has completely redefined the meaning of the word ‘celebrity’. According to this generation, anyone with a few thousand (or hundred thousand) followers and some model-esque photographs can be influential.
Influencer marketing involves a partnership between a brand and a social media user with a large following (aka, an influencer). The brand leverages the influencer's audience to make sales and then the influencer receives free or discounted products from the brand — or they can be paid directly by the brand.
Gen Z is influenced less by traditional celebrities, like singers and actors, and more influenced by ‘relatable’ Internet celebs closer to their own age. These social media influencers have become hyper-popular, making influencer marketing a highly effective strategy in terms of reaching this audience.
Before you say that an influencer is way out of your budget,
that’s where nano-influencers come in. They generally have only a few thousand followers on a particular social media channel but within a well-defined sector. This makes them influential in a smaller market, meaning they cost less.
2. YouTube content all the way
According to a
2017 survey by AdWeek, a staggering 50% of Gen Z “can’t live without YouTube”. Shocking, right? So if you want to reach Gen Z, you’d best add YouTube to your ad budget.
Thousands of young people are constantly browsing online for entertaining and useful videos. So if your brand can be there to offer them
valuable content, you’ll have an opportunity to get Gen Zers to develop a genuine interest in your business.
Building a YouTube channel isn’t as hard as you think and it’ll get you more mileage out of your marketing. The videos you create for the channel can easily be repurposed and used on your company’s website, shared on social media or even incorporated into your email marketing campaigns.
3. Stories on Instagram and Snapchat are key
Gen Z has a short attention span, which means that telling bite-sized stories can often be the best option for your marketing strategy.
Instagram and Snapchat stories offer brands the opportunity to upload snackable posts that last for 24 hours. If you ensure that your stories contain interesting and entertaining content, you’ll win over Gen Zers on the platforms, where they spend most of their time.
Stories also provide brands with another place to utilise social media influencers. If you’re unsure how to make the most out of your brand’s social media stories, why not turn it over to your influencers? Your social media influencer will know exactly the type of content Gen Zers want to see – and they’ll know how to create it.
4. Tell the truth
While ‘authenticity' may have been a marketing buzzword years ago, Gen Z requires more than that. They demand that brands be honest about their business practices and are more ethically aware and politically astute than ever before.
Gen Zers are socially conscious and only want to do business with brands that share the same values as them. As the most digital-savvy generation, they can easily tell if a brand really means what they say. Marketing speak that is ‘all talk’ just doesn’t cut it anymore.
If your brand claims to be focussed on promoting equality opportunities but does not have diverse employees, Gen Zers will not be impressed. Brands wanting to reach the youth need to ‘walk the walk’ and not just ‘talk the talk’.
5. Give them what they want — instant gratification
Everyone likes to obtain things quickly, but thanks to the Internet, Gen Z has only ever existed in a world where everything was at their fingertips. With attention spans shrinking, your brand needs to make an impression —
and fast.
Brands that do not focus on giving young consumers instant gratification will be ignored — and Gen Zers will find an alternative. Having grown up with everything available at the touch of a button (or rather, a swipe on a smartphone screen) Gen Z expects everything to be available with ease.
If your brand aims to target Gen Z, you’ll need to have an active social media presence, a website that is easy to navigate and good customer service. Once you understand what is important to this generation, you’ll be able to better tailor your services to them.
Are there any other ways that marketers can attract Gen Z? Let us know in the comments section below.
Now that you’re armed with the knowledge of how to win over Gen Z customers, why not brush up on your marketing buzzwords? Check out these 20 Buzzwords every marketer should know.
*Image courtesy of Vecteezy