How to market to Gen Z as they quit social media
Young consumers are growing uneasy about their relationship with the algorithm, and many are switching off. Joel Moran, Afterpay’s international vice-president of marketing, explores how brands should adapt.
Look at the marketing mix of any brand, big or small, and it’s likely that paid digital ads play a large role. But the success of targeted advertising over the past decade has created an unexpected problem, according to leading futurists.
Younger customers – caught in a never-ending hype cycle of new trends – are increasingly exhausted by ‘new’ stuff. Others are growing suspicious of algorithms designed to encourage them to spend, spend, spend. As a result, many are switching off.
For brands, who pour billions of dollars into digital advertising every year, this presents a dilemma. Gen Z and Millennials account for 36% of the total retail spend in Australia. If they’re rejecting the algorithm, how else can brands reach them?
The challenge is not to ‘reach’ Gen Z, they have no money. Marketers should be talking to Gen X, who, in a few short years, will be the beneficiaries of the most significant wealth transfer in history
Leave Gen Z alone. They don’t want your “stuff”.
Gen Z is irrelevant for atleast another decade they have no spending power.
Smart companies should focus their future on Gen X as they will have the largest amount of money due to the impending generational wealth transfer.