12


Winter 2018/19


FEATURE


MARKETING TO Gen Z


Just when you were finally learning how to talk to millennials as consumers and as coworkers, a new generation with very different characteristics, expectations, and behavior came along. Meet Generation Z.


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ou have, quite literally, two billion reasons to concern yourself with the generation of young people following


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behind millennials. That’s the number of people globally that make up Generation Z— generally thought of as the group of humans born after 1994. And that amounts to 25 percent of the earth’s population. If that scares you a little bit because


you’re just starting to figure out what makes millennials tick, you’ve got less than a year to get over your fears. By 2020, Gen Z will make up 40 percent of US consumers. They already spend $44 billion annually, and they influence $600 billion in annual family spend, which will make perfect sense to anyone with a teenager and a refrigerator. “The unprecedented sociological behaviors


of this particular generation, largely driven by technology, are defining who and what is most influential in the marketplace today,” says Nancy Nessel, a marketer and parent


By 2020, Gen Z will make up 40 percent of US consumers.


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amplify their voice, along with the creativity and the entrepreneurial drive to become major influencers. For example, an entrepreneurial Gen Z can become a celebrity overnight by creating their own YouTube channel and selling their own merchandise.”


A study by the Center for Generational Kinetics supports this thinking, finding that Gen Z (designated as ages 13–22) is redefining who is influential in today’s marketplace. The same study found that 46 percent of these young people follow more than 10 online


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