Understanding Gen Z’s media experiences and entertainment preferences is a priority for publishers because they provide a proxy for the future of digital media. Already, according to a McKinsey analysis, Gen Z accounts for 40% of global consumers while a Barkley US report estimated that they hold $143 billion in spending power.
To gain insight into this generation, Digital Content Next (DCN) commissioned Seidmon Associates to research Gen Z’s attitudes, values, and behavior regarding digital content. Through a 20-minute online survey, they queried 1,556 respondents aged 16-40 between May 14 and June 5, 2021. Approximately half (792) of respondents fell into the Gen Z demographic, ages 16-24, and the remainder (764) into Gen Y, ages 25-40. DCN’s goal in conducting this research is to help their members better understand the way that Gen Z experiences content to build audience reach and engagement. Note that the research included a Gen Y sample to offer a contrasting perspective and a better understanding of Gen Z.
Attributes and access
High quality is the most important attribute that influences digital media brand loyalty among both generations. Trust is the next most significant attribute among Gen Z and Gen Y. And privacy and authenticity also matter a great deal to both generations.
For both Gen Z and Gen Y, mobile rules – with nearly half of both generations saying their phone is valued above all else. DCN’s research found that Gen Z values video more than any other media platform – by a margin of roughly 2-to-1 over social, gaming, music, or Google search. Both generations have more paid subscriptions for video than any other content type (a little over three each).
In terms of devices and hardware, the mobile phone is clearly most valued, followed by gaming consoles and devices. However, videogame consoles are second in importance among Gen Z, while laptops are second among Gen Y.
Video and attention
There’s a significant intersection here, as video is highly accessible at all times, given these consumers’ tendency to view it on mobile. Both generations see video as part of their social fabric and say that it is part of their daily conversation. According to DCN’s Vice President of Research, Rande Price, “That means that major marketing campaigns aren’t lost on them. Big announcements like of Marvel series drops on Disney+, the reintroduction of chess due to Queens Gambit on Netflix, etc. – these are all part of their social conversation.”
The research finds that, in general, both generations prefer shorter-form content. Gen Z attributes this to their “short attention span” while Gen Y value short form as a time filler. YouTube, Instagram and TikTok are most popular with Gen Z, while Gen Y prefers YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram (in that order). Both Gen Z and Gen Y prefer user-generated over company-produced digital media content by a 2-to-1 margin. In particular, Gen Z respondents felt that user-generated content was “more authentic, honest, and relatable” than professionally produced content.
As the report concludes, Gen Z are digital natives, born into a world with it all – social media, instant messaging, video games, live streaming, traditional TV and movies. Therefore, “understanding Gen Z’s media experiences and entertainment preferences is a priority for publishers because they are the future.”
The full report also covers a wide range of topics including Gen Z’s rational around paying for subscriptions, attitudes and preferences on news, ethical and social considerations, and more. DCN members can access the full report here.
Digital Content Next (DCN) commissioned Seidmon Associates to research Gen Z’s attitudes, values, and behavior regarding digital content. The goal of this research is to help DCN members better understand the way that Gen Z experiences content to build audience reach and engagement.
A 20-minute online survey was conducted among 1,556 respondents aged 16-40 between May 14 and June 5, 2021. Approximately half (792) of respondents fell into the Gen Z demographic, ages 16-24, and the remainder (764) into the Gen Y demographic, ages 25-40. Note that the research included a Gen Y sample to offer a contrasting perspective and a better understanding of Gen Z.
Research highlights include:
High quality is the most important attribute that influences digital media brand loyalty among both generations. Trust is the next most significant attribute among Gen Z and Gen Y. And privacy and authenticity also matter a great deal to both generations.
Gen Z values video more than any other media platform – by a margin of roughly 2-to-1 – over social, gaming, music, or Google search. Both generations have more paid subscriptions for video than any other content type (a little over three each).
In terms of devices and hardware, the mobile phone is most valued, followed by gaming consoles and devices. However, videogame consoles are second in importance among Gen Z, while laptops are second among Gen Y.
Both generations prefer shorter-form content. Gen Z attributes this to their “short attention span” while Gen Y value short form as a time filler.
Full research report for DCN members only. Log in or Register to download. The link will appear immediately below.
When it comes to media consumption, consumers have never had it so good. From streaming services to social media, movies to music and video games, to a variety of linear TV channels, options abound. With so much choice, comes inevitable competition for the providers, as they try to court the consumer. So how can media and entertainment brands form meaningful relationships with audiences? According to the latest Digital Media Trends survey it’s all about understanding generational trends – in particular Generation Z, who could cause the next wave of disruption.
The 2021 survey, which was conducted by Deloitte’s Technology, Media & Telecommunication practice, found that Gen Z demonstrate strikingly different preferences. Other research—and experts—back this up. Let’s take a closer look.
Video games
Boomers love streaming video while Gen Z is obsessed with gaming. The group, aged 14-24, place video games as their number one entertainment activity (26%). That’s followed by listening to music (14%), browsing the internet (12%), and using social media (11%). Only 10% of Gen Z said that watching TV or movies at home was their favorite form of entertainment.
“For the first time since we started this survey, Gen Z did not pick watching movies or TV shows as their favorite media. It was gaming,” says Kevin Westcott, Deloitte’s Vice Chairman and U.S. Technology, Media and Telecom Leader. “Obviously there was quite a bit of growth during the pandemic. Gaming is a social activity and a way to stay connected. However, video games were already significantly growing before Covid-19. It will be interesting to see if these preferences persist now that lockdown rules are relaxing in the U.S.”
With the dominance of video entertainment being challenged, media companies need to take a more diversified approach. Publishers should experiment with different storytelling techniques on social platforms, and gamification is a great place to start.
“If a media brand isn’t in the games business, they need to look at how they can make things more engaging,” says Westcott. “Gen Z are looking for more participation and this is where transmedia could help. By utilizing a range of platforms, the audience can interact with content and influence it, rather than just watching it.”
Source: Digital Media Trends, 15th edition
Social media
Beyond connecting with the world, social media is a common gateway for consuming a wide range of media content. Although all generations use social media, consumption varies depending on age. According to the Digital Media Trends survey, Gen Z and Millennials both rank listening to music as their main activity on social media. However, Gen X prefer to consume news. The second most popular activity on social media for Gen Z was gaming. For Millennials it’s watching TV shows and movies.
News
Interestingly, despite these social media usage trends for news, 50% of Gen Z still rank social media as their preferred way to get news, while only 12% select news from network or cable TV. Boomers are the opposite, with 58% getting their news from network or cable TV, and just 8% using social media.
According to a report by Flamingo, commissioned by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University, younger audiences differ from older groups in terms of what they want from the news. Young people are largely driven by progress and enjoyment, which translates into what they look for in news. As such, they want news to feel easy and accessible. That means creating formats that are native to mobile and social platforms, as well as including these ideas on their own websites.
The report, entitled How Young People Consume News, also suggests that the news media need to change the way they report the news. This includes tackling issues such as stereotypes, diversity and negativity. It should also influence how news brands present themselves and their content on third party platforms.
Commercial media
A report by the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA), called Making sense. The commercial media landscape, found similar disparities with the way different generations spend their time on commercial media. Ages 16 to 34 spend 53% on a smartphone or tablet and just 22% on a TV. Conversely, those aged 55 and above spend 53% of their commercial media time on TV and just 14% on a smart phone or tablet.
“The way to drive engagement in younger audiences on broadcast TV is to ensure content is available across multiple platforms,” explains Simon Frazier, Senior Research and Marketing Manager, IPA. “Younger audiences are always media multi-tasking, which is a challenge for media. But broadcasters that tie in with a variety of touch points and blur lines between entertainment and reality enjoy good engagement and a good commercial performance.”
Content
According to a report from VICE Media, in partnership with Ontario Creates, Gen Z is redefining how content is being discovered, consumed, and shared. Three quarters of respondents (75%) report that original content is important to them. Music, video streaming and video games are the top paid services, while cable or satellite TV subscriptions don’t even make it into the top five for Gen Z.
This younger demographic also wants more diversity. Half say that there is a gap in gender diversity, sexual identity, and ethnic representation.
Source: Gen Z: The culture of content consumption
Along with good content, they want ease of discovery. Gen Z were born on social platforms so they play an important part of their content discovery. YouTube is their number one content source, with Instagram a close second, followed by Facebook, and Snapchat. TikTok is also gaining popularity. Gen Z tends to like content on social platforms that is transparent, with few barriers between the creator and the audience.
“With new voices and new platforms entering the media landscape by the minute, the competition for young people’s attention has never been greater,” said Julie Arbit, Global SVP of Insights, VICE. “Combine that with a young generation that has never been hungrier for content or savvier about how to access it and you have a whole new approach to content consumption. Understanding this new mindset is essential for anyone who is trying to reach this young audience.”
Subscriptions
The VICE study also found a massive 90% of Gen Z are willing to pay for content if it offers better quality (61%), better experience (56%), and more convenience (50%). Only four in 10 said they wanted an ad-free environment. However, with consumers losing income due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Digital Media Trends noted an increase in churn rates, across all generations, in the past 12 months.
“During the pandemic, churn across streaming more than doubled,” says Westcott. “We call it ‘hit and run’. So, they join for the hit show and then leave to join another service.”
“Instead of focusing on adding new subscriptions, media providers need to shift their focus to long term subscriptions. And the way to do that is to broaden their range of content, and offer exclusive, original, high demand TV series, plus games and music.”
Advertising
Despite the growth of subscription-based services, IPA reports that 63% of 16 to 34-year olds spend their time using platforms that are commercially funded by advertising.
“This represents huge opportunities for reaching this audience through commercial media,” says Frazier.
In the same group, four out of the top five commercial media properties are socially driven. These findings were backed up by Digital Media Trends. They found that social media influencers and ads on social media are the two most persuasive channels influencing younger generations’ buying decisions. They also typically liked ads on social media more than ads in streaming video content and other channels. On social media platforms, 62% of Gen Z and 72% of Millennials would rather see ads personalized to their likes and activity than generic ones.
Growing convergence
Despite these differences, there is a growing convergence of behavior across several generations of consumers, as younger age groups influence older audiences.
Source: Making Sense: The Commercial Media Landscape
“Ten years ago, we did a study on Millennials,” says Westcott. “We thought, as they aged, they would become more like us. But that didn’t happen. Instead, they have influenced older generations, who are now behaving in similar ways. The only way they really differ is that 26% of Gen Z rate gaming as their favorite entertainment, verses just 10% of Gen Z and 3% of Boomers.”
It is this preference for gaming that could challenge video as the leading form of media consumption across all generations. However, according to the IPA report, there was a significant drop in the correlation between how younger and older generations consumed commercial media during lockdown 2020.
It found just an 8% similarity between 16-34-year-olds and 55+ during lockdown 2020. This was down from 21% before the Covid pandemic and 58% in 2015.
“What is clear is that the lockdown has undoubtedly reinforced the dominance of key media for the different audiences and exacerbated the differences,” says Frazier.
So, while media companies may still be video-first, it seems that younger generations are moving away from this platform. The question is, are media brands and advertisers prepared to follow suit?
After playing catch-up to evolve their approach to reach Millennials, marketers must move quickly to connect with Generation Z. This generation, born between 1997 and 2011, is estimated to count 2 billion members globally – approximately 27% of the world’s population. Gen Z will present unique challenges to marketers, adding to the already difficult slate of changes that a rapidly evolving digital marketing environment is presenting.
At the top of the to-do list for marketers is a need to gain a rapid understanding of the needs, aspirations and behaviors of Generation Z. To be accepted by this key group, marketers must develop mobile-led creative content that appeals to the generation’s imagination and passions for design and music. Marketers will also have to innovate to build better brand experiences and connected consumer journeys.
For Gen Z, development of more engaging content and more sophisticated, brand-infused programmatic targeting is critical. Less intrusive media approaches that will help play their part in discouraging ad blocking, which Gen Z is prone to. Finally, marketers will have to take advantage of new technologies that enable cross media placements that work together to drive synergies and deliver enhanced ROI. Marketers who most enthusiastically tackle these challenges and embrace these opportunities will lead the way.
Be True and Transparent
Perhaps most critically, while described as both frugal and brand-wary but also industrious and collaborative, Gen Z will challenge not only how brands communicate, but also the very notion of a brand’s authenticity and transparency in digital.
The reason is simple. Gen Z is one of the first groups to come of age in a post-linear digital world. They have knowledge about everything at their fingertips and on demand whenever they want it. They’re also emerging at a time of institutional instability. Consequently, Gen Z presents a conundrum for brands because they place a high emphasis on personal privacy but also expect full transparency from brands.
The Big Shift
Successful brands will need to embrace three paradigm shifts moving forward:
Brands should invest media dollars and focus activity in digital platforms that allow consumers to co-create a shared brand experience. Unlike the personalization coveted by Millennials, Gen Z will be hands-on: They want to try it, take it apart and re-create it.
Brands will need to give their target consumers a deeper look at themselves through owned media (social, apps, and websites). In addition to products and services for sale, brands must share their story, their purpose and details about their supply chain and production processes, so that Gen Z can determine if the brand’s values match their own. This narrative and underlying content will be further cascaded through strategically placed branded and sponsored content.
Brands should aim to shift their focus to right-brained influence. The foundations of the internet and digital media were left brain – with a focus on the linear, factual and linguistic. Digital media for Gen Z will be right brain with a focus on imagination. This may take the form of augmented reality and virtual reality. The emphasis should be on experience through non-verbal immersive formats and stronger visual imagery as well as emotion, emphasizing music and narratives.
These shifts, when embraced by brands, will help drive brand growth and increase the power of digital as a channel for brands to meaningfully connect with this audience, as it exerts ever greater economic power and influence.
Joline McGoldrick is Vice President of Insights and Strategic Marketing for the Media and Digital Practice of Kantar Millward Brown.
Not since the introduction of the television have entertainment and media consumption shifted so rapidly. It’s easy to overgeneralize that this rapid shift in media consumption means that everything goes mobile (particularly for younger audiences). However research we released last week in our Getting Audiences Right report, shows that the real headline is the extent of audience fragmentation across both media consumption and shopping behavior.
Nonetheless, this is not a disorganized fragmentation, rather we see that screen engagement coalesces around two organizing principles: the generation which an audience is a part of (we studied Millennials, GenX and Boomers) and the digital task which an audience member will perform.
The Audience Generation Generation is so important in how we understand media consumption and channel receptivity, because generation rolls up not only life stage events (career, children, and retirement), but also a set of beliefs that that cohort holds about itself (consider, for example, a 2010 Pew Research poll that asked audiences of these generations if they thought their own generation was unique, about 60% of Boomers and Millennials said yes, in contrast to half of Gen Xers). These life events and world views influence generations’ preferences for channels, devices, and even how they purchase.
In our Getting Audiences Right Research we see three generational trends emerge:
Millennials have moved to mostly mobile (particularly smartphones) and have moved away from traditional entertainment channels (like network and cable TV) for more curated entertainment (like Netflix and YouTube);
GenX is task-dependent and gender plays more of a role for men in entertainment consumption than any other generation (for example 68% of GenX men report using YouTube on a weekly basis compared to 47% of GenX women).
Boomers, who often pride themselves in their facility with and use of technology (31% of them shop online via their laptop more than once a week and 18% shop online with their smartphone once a week) still prefer traditional channels for entertainment (cable TV is still the screen they’re most likely to watch on a weekly basis — 68% of women watch cable on a weekly basis and 62% of men).
The Task at Hand Nonetheless, in the consumer path to purchase, all generations lean towards PCs as the device of choice.
Even Millennials rely heavily on PCs and laptops for shopping activity. The largest proportion of Millennials had searched or purchased consumer packaged goods using their laptops/PCs (39%) and the same was true for consumer electronics (36%) and financial services (31%)
GenX was most likely to use a laptop/PC for all purchase paths and were particularly strong adopters of laptops for the search or research of consumer packaged goods (49% of GenX had purchased or researched consumer packaged goods on their laptop in the past 6 months, compared to 27% having used smartphones for the same). Interestingly, GenXers use of tablets for CPG search/purchase was higher than that of other generations (20% of GenXers had used a tablet to research or purchase consumer packaged goods in the past 6 months).
Finally, Boomers shared a preference for laptops (54% of them have used a laptop in the past 6 months to search/research consumer packaged goods, 46% for consumer electronics and 41% for researching or purchasing travel).
All audiences stated that the primary drivers of their screen preference were screen size and the performance and speed of the device. However, our research also reveals that task time plays a large role in screen preference. Almost all audiences (81%) prefer to complete a five minute task on a smartphone. However, that percentage drops to 43% for tasks over 10 minutes.
The Message for Marketers Task and generation are so important because advertising is much more successful when contextualized and when the advertiser’s call to action can be heeded without switching tasks (or devices for that matter). We think that these findings give rise to the following three considerations for marketers:
The marketers who are beginning to consider how time shifting and on-demand viewing affect their full communication plan will be a step ahead, particularly with audiences under 50 (GenX and Millennials). The use-case for YouTube may be easier to grasp as marketers begin to understand the elements of good pre-roll, but the marketers who understand the role of advertising and the type of advertising that is effective in over the top will have an advantage.
GenX is the perfect generation for experimentation with a brand’s media mix, because GenXers still consume traditional television content (though more on cable than network TV), but have also moved to emerging channels like over the top (OTT). Given GenX’s omnichannel behavior, marketers must consider the ways in which messages can be sequenced across the channels. They must also be mindful of whether the content running on the channels ladders up to the branding objective for that channel.
Even though mobile resonates with younger audiences, Millennials (and the emerging Gen-Z (audiences under 18) still lean to laptops for lower funnel purchase behaviors. Continued expansion of and investment in the PC/laptop consumer journey is still essential in achieving maximum digital ROI.
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Note: Millennials: Born after 1980 (18 to 34); Gen X: Born 1965-1980 (35 to 50); Boomers: Born 1946-1964 (51 to 69)
Joline McGoldrick is a Research Director at Millward Brown Digital. Joline was an early member of the Dynamic Logic Team, beginning in 2001 and is well versed in studying how audiences respond to Digital advertising. Joline is a product designer and marketer and a frequent speaker and panelist on understanding the digital audience experience. Joline’s work has been featured in Forbes, Adweek, AdAge, the Economist, Media Post, and Mobile Marketer and she has spoken at conferences including the ARF, MRIA, OMMA, MRMW, the Market Research Event and AdTech.
Joline is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Carnegie Mellon University
