Welcome to Marketing to Gen Z, a regular column from Quad Insights. In this installment, we take a look at how influencer marketing works — or doesn’t — with the demographic. (For a primer on the generation, see “Marketing to Gen Z: Why brands care so much about this demographic.”)
More than half (51%) of Gen Zers believe that social media influencers create new trends, according to a study conducted by youth culture agency Archrival, per Vogue Business. But the full extent of influencers’, well, influence on what Gen Z consumers actually consume is uncertain at best.
How does influencer-generated content impact Gen Z spending?
Despite all this disjointed, sometimes contradictory information, Gen Z overall is generally reported to have the “most favorable attitudes” toward influencer campaigns, per the NCSolutions report, with YouTube and TikTok this generation’s go-to platforms for brand and product discovery.
Making sense of influencer marketing’s influence over Gen Z
All this is to say that Gen Zers are obviously not members of a monolithic, predictable cohort — and their highly variable social media and shopping habits bear this out.
As the Archrival study puts it, “The consumer funnel was built for the old world — and Gen Z doesn’t live there anymore. … Consumption today is an infinite loop of inspiration, exploration, community and loyalty.”
Meanwhile, when it comes to those Gen Zers who — at least in surveys — balk at the idea of influencer campaigns? At least some of them may be embracing the “deinfluencing” trend, which, as Business Insider’s Hannah Getahun puts it, “involves shedding light [on] or calling into question popular products often promoted by creators online.”
“It’s no small irony that ‘deinfluencing’ has been popularized by, yes, various social media influencers,” says Heidi Waldusky, VP of Brand Marketing at Quad. “And deinfluencing also has to do with the ‘underconsumption core’ trend, which connects to larger macroeconomic factors, including inflation, that consumers of all ages are grappling with.”
Underconsumption core, The Conversation’s Omar Fares and Seung Hwan Lee explain, “encourages people to maximize the utility of their purchases and buy only what they truly need. … Underconsumption also appears to be a reaction to overconsumption — especially the way influencers have normalized it by posting haul videos. By promoting underconsumption, online users are rejecting and pushing back against this aspect of ‘influencer culture.’” (The term “underconsumption” may not be quite right, though. As Megan Doherty Bea, Assistant Professor of Consumer Science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, told CNN Business’ Krystal Hur, “A more apt term for underconsumption would be normal consumption.”)
How to market to Gen Z in a social media–centric world
So, how can marketers appropriately, effectively message Gen Z consumers who may be influencer-influenced and/or deinfluencer-influenced?
“The key is to stop thinking of Gen Z as a coherent, cohesive demographic and instead think of members of the cohort as individuals who may or may not behave the way some demographers expect them to behave,” says Lily Wen, Director of Product Marketing – Data & Media at Quad. “To reach Gen Z, brands need an omnichannel strategy that isn’t overly reliant on any one approach such as social media.”
And remember, Gen Zers bridge dramatically different life stages. Some are still in school living with their parents, while others are well established in their careers and are paying off their own mortgages. “That’s not to say that there aren’t some general behavioral shifts among younger consumers that brands can and should try to stay on top of,” Wen adds. “But when it comes to marketing to Gen Z, the way to do it is with a personalized marketing approach that speaks to specific individuals, not an entire demographic.”
For more from Quad on personalized marketing, download our 2025 audience strategy guide.
