Gen Z is the generation guilty of bringing back loose-fitting jeans to fashion and the driving force behind TikTok’s crazy entrance to the social media sphere. But who can blame them? They’re the new trendsetters! For fashion brands to be top-of-mind and reach this ever-changing consumer called Gen Z, they need to learn where they spend time and what they want in terms of marketing and communications.
Who is Gen Z?
Gen Z refers to those born between 1997 and 2015 and in 2021, they are aged between 6-24. They will soon be the largest living generation, and as of today, Gen Z, or zoomers, constitute almost 30% of the world’s population. As this generation is still quite young, most Gen Zs still live at home with their parents, are still in school and have a low income.
They are highly digitally engaged and have been brought up with social media and a smartphone in their hand. Fun fact, Gen Z is the first generation that has not experienced a world without smartphones. When the pandemic first struck, their smartphone usage hit the roof, and according to data from Global Web Index, almost 6 out of 10 were spending more time on social media.
Learn more about mastering the art of marketing to Gen Z from Blume, a fast-growing cohesive line of clean skin, body and period care.
Common Gen Z characteristics
Gen Z has been brought up in a changing world. They genuinely care about the environment and social issues and are always up for making a difference. For fashion brands, it’s important to stand for a cause that matters and actively contribute to a better world. For example, questions related to working conditions, climate compensation and social issues within your industry.
Gen Zs are conscious about the world they’re living in and they strongly believe that they can change it for the better. But starting at the beginning of their adult life when Covid-19 hit made this generation even more worried about their uncertain future. As a result, they are one of the most changing generations alive in terms of adapting to the world around them. They are well informed and involved in questions that matter to them, which also reflects their consumption.
According to new research from GlobalWebIndex, most Gen Zs say that having a positive attitude, being successful and learning new skills is important to them. The things that increased the most during 2020 was to be successful, standing out in a crowd and challenging themselves.
Here’s an example of how Blume, a fast-growing cohesive line of clean skin, body and period care, communicates the brand’s “why” to their Gen Z target audience.
Visa det här inlägget på Instagram
Gen Z’s Media Consumption
Let’s look into the latest media consumption trends. Gen Z has an attention span of eight seconds, which is is three seconds shorter than Millennials on 12 seconds. They spend most of their online time on their smartphones compared to their laptops. It’s interesting to note that Gen Z’s online time is now up to over 8 hours, with 2 hours and 58 minutes out of those on social media. Before we’re going further into Gen Z’s favourite social media platforms, let’s start with looking at what devices they’re using.
Most popular device to watch content among Gen Z:
- Smartphone 76%
- Laptop 48%
- Gaming console 29%
- Tablet 20%
- TV 21%
Moving on to the most popular social platforms. The ones that stand out in popularity for Gen Z compared to older generations are Instagram (76%), Snapchat (75%) and TikTok (55%). If we add a couple of years to Gen Z and include a few percentages of the millennial audience, aka. people aged 18-29 (Gen Z is aged 16-24), this is their top-five list:
Most popular social platforms among people aged 18-29:
- YouTube (95%)
- Instagram (71%)
- Facebook (70%)
- Snapchat (65%)
- TikTok (48%)
To reach Gen Z for commercial reasons, we recommend focusing on two of the platforms mentioned above: Instagram and TikTok. Why? The possibilities for brands to create entertaining content and drive participation with short-form content is crucial. Also, Instagram has lots of tools for social commerce that makes it possible to lead the customer from a window shopper into a customer and also let them shop your products without having to leave the app. TikTok is heading that way as well and recently reported that its testing possibilities for in-app purchases.
News! Shopping on Instagram just got easier. ?
All eligible businesses and creators in this US can now use our checkout feature, which lets you buy and sell products directly in app. Businesses can also now sell through Live, which means you can buy products in real time. pic.twitter.com/rpdxiEdLuD
— Adam Mosseri ? (@mosseri) August 25, 2020
TikTok made a sudden and crazy entrance to the social media sphere in 2020 and since then it has become the top platform among Gen Z. According to data from GlobalWebIndex, the use of TikTok among Gen Z’s in Europe 2020 increased by 250%! The main reason for using the platform for this generation is to find entertaining or funny videos followed by filling up spare time. Here, it’s all about making entertaining content viral, which fits into what appeals to Gen Z in terms of marketing. Here is an example of a TikTok video by the Gen Z fashion brand PrettyLittleThing, with more than 1,4 million followers.
https://www.tiktok.com/@prettylittlething/video/6962930083535375621?sender_device=pc&sender_web_id=6956211420981708294&is_from_webapp=v1&is_copy_url=0
YouTube is the most popular social platform among this audience, but they aren’t mainly there for commercial purposes. Gen Z turns to YouTube to feel more connected, and according to Google, 80% of them head over to the channel to learn something. Interestingly, YouTube is also the chosen social platform when this generation wants to relax or cheer up, according to Google.
Video content is something that overall is very popular among Gen Z, so having a brand presence on the platforms is definitely recommended. Instead of turning to YouTube for commercial purposes as a fashion brand, focus on creating educational and engaging content e.g. about your products and trends within the fashion industry.
A note about Snapchat versus TikTok, research by eMarketer shows that TikTok will surpass Snapchat in popularity and usage by 2023. The social media sphere is moving fast! To not be left behind, it’s critical as a fashion brand to stay up-to-date if you want to reach this generation effectively.
Facebook is slowly decreasing in usage among Gen Z. Most of them own an account and they still use the platform on a daily basis, but compared to Instagram, the usage of Facebook on a daily basis is a lot lower.
Gen Z vs Millennials
Looking at how both Gen Z and Millennials shop online, the social platforms are today’s shopping window and where they seek inspiration, research products and get to know brands. An example of this is that 84% of Instagram users (primarily Millennials and Gen Z) say they find new products on Instagram. This is why it makes sense to sell to them on social media!
The differences between these generations aren’t huge, but are still important if you want to reach them effectively. If you asked me to describe it simply I would say “Gen Z is a more extreme millennial”. Which is true! But definitely not enough information for you to head over to your marketing team and tell them that you’re now going to do marketing to Gen Z.
Let’s start from the beginning.
Millennials have been brought up with the internet and Gen Z has been brought up with social media. If you’re a millennial, you might remember your first mobile phone; accessing the internet was incredibly expensive and texting was done by clicking several times on each button to get the right letter. Gen Zs are used to having access to the internet and constantly being connected and available online. This is why Gen Z often are a bit more tech-savvy and have less attention span than millennials. They also spend more time on social media than millennials and are more socially-conscious. As I touched upon before, they also differentiate in preferred social media platforms with Gen Z spending more time on TikTok and Snapchat than millennials.
Most popular social platforms among millennials (age 26-35):
- Facebook (78%)
- YouTube (77%)
- Instagram (63%)
- Twitter (48%)
- LinkedIn (37%)
Gen Z’s are trendsetters and care about their appearance. They decide what’s trendy, and I would say that they have a big impact on especially the younger millennial audience when it comes to fashion and beauty trends. Another reason why fashion brands definitely should invest in this audience, even though they have not much disposable money themselves.
This characteristic is most likely the cause for why they want brands to be bold, trendy, innovative, young and playful. If you’re guilty of recently buying a pair of non-skinny jeans – you’ve been exposed to Gen Z. They are known for being the generation that brought back loose fitting jeans and making skinny jeans out of fashion.
If you, as me, need tips on how to style the new jeans trends – here’s some inspiration.
@tayhage I rarely wear skinny jeans and usually wear these styles instead #tiktokfashionmonth #skinnyjeans
As they take technology and connectivity for granted (unlike millennials), they have higher expectations on brands and businesses. If they don’t feel noticed and appreciated by brands – they will simply turn their backs and walk towards another brand.
Gen Z and influencers
We touched upon the importance of social media for Gen Z. But what about influencers? Influencers have a significant impact on how this generation makes their purchase decisions. Research from Kantar showed that almost 9 out of 10 Gen Zs follow at least one influencer on a social platform and 44% say they made a purchase decision based on an influencer recommendation. This is almost double compared to the older generations at 26%. Additionally, Gen Z are twice as likely to buy a product that they have seen advertised by an influencer, according to Statista’s Global Consumer Survey.
The benefit with influencer marketing for Gen Z is that influencers are often seen as friends – and who do people trust? Their friends! A study by Edelman shows that when a message comes from a regular person, rather than from a company – it’s inherent in our nature to respond to it on a deeper level. When marketing to Gen Z, realise the importance of peer-to-peer communication in complement to your brand-to-peer communication. With influencers’ high credibility and authenticity, it builds trust among the audience to have influencers talk about your product or brand. And for Gen Z, trust is important!
Here is an example of an influencer-generated TikTok video from our collaboration with Puma.
@rebekkabjerre #Reklame har modtaget de fineste sko fra @puma ? #puma #CRUISERIDER #pumawoman #foryou #foryoupage ?
As we touched upon before, 97% of Gen Z consumers use social media to discover products and brands. When adding influencers marketing to that aspect, social media becomes an even more powerful channel for fashion brands in their effort to reach Gen Z. Why? Influencers are called influencers because they influence people. They have a big impact on how and what this generation shops. Because of influencers’ high presence on social platforms where Gen Z spend a lot of their time, it also makes sense to sell to Gen Z on these platforms. The possibilities to do so is, well almost, overwhelming. Instagram has lots of features that makes it possible for brands to sell directly on the platform; product tags, shops, liveshopping, checkout within the app, etc. TikTok is close behind and announced that they’re already up and running with tests on similar eCommerce options in the app.
Use influencers to tell your brand story, reach out with relevant marketing and content, as well as involve Gen Z in the discussion by talking about e.g. social issues, product development, and to showcase current and upcoming trends within your industry.
In addition to this, influencer marketing is valuable as this generation is more prone to use ad blockers. They don’t want to be disturbed with marketing that isn’t relevant for them. Using influencers, you can reach and talk to this generation with marketing that is relevant and authentic – as they follow this person because they think his or her content is relevant and inspiring.
What’s important when marketing to Gen Z?
Gen Z knows they are important for brands and this is why they expect brands to reach out to them with relevant and appealing marketing.
A study in 2021 found that 82% of Gen Z care about environmental sustainability, and 78% of both millennials and Gen Z want brands to be pro-diversity. We mentioned the socially conscious aspect of Gen Z earlier and this is definitely important for fashion brands to keep in mind. The study actually mentioned that brands that do not take a stand in, or whose values do not align with Gen Z’s on important questions like environment, diversity, sustainability etc., are more likely to be abandoned by not only Gen Z but also millennials. A benefit is that young shoppers are more prone to pay more for fashion that is from a sustainable or socially conscious brand. Win-win for everyone! By communicating these efforts you can improve trust among Gen Zs. Here it’s important that you’re clear on where you stand and have a strategy for how you can make a real difference within your standpoints. Definitely avoid “woke-washing”, as it will only damage your brand.
Gen Z spend almost 3 hours on social media daily. As a fashion brand you need to have a strong presence on platforms that are important for Gen Z, like Instagram and TikTok. Social interactions like networking and sharing personal details has been their top motivations for using social media but has now decreased the most. Instead, entertaining and interactive content has increased.
Gen Zs follow brands they like and are thinking about making a purchase from on social media, so it’s important that you have a presence where they spend time and that you develop a strategy so that they can discover and interact with your content. Be creative and on top of trends with your social media marketing. Keep your ears close to the ground so that you are able to tap into what Gen Zs are talking about. You’re not leading the conversation – they are.
I hope you find this article insightful and inspiring for your upcoming marketing efforts towards Gen Z. If you have further questions on how to get started with influencer marketing to Gen Z or just want to stay on top of what content we’re posting, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn or send our in-house influencer marketing experts at Cure Media an email here.
If you want to learn more about how to succeed on social media and with fashion influencer marketing, don’t miss our podcast where we cover topics around digital marketing and social media to help you stay up to date and become a better marketer.
