It can’t have escaped anyone’s notice that 2020 and, for now, 2021, has tilted how many brands position themselves to their audience in an already-crowded marketplace.
This is just as much the case with brands eager to impress Gen Z and Millennials hungry for new experiences and products after educational and career opportunities have been dealt a heavy blow due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
With the so far successful vaccine-roll outs, brands will likely soon be able to realign their youth marketing strategies to include away-from-screen campaigns. That’s as well as all the usual social stuff to entice Gen Z and Millennial audiences.
Time For a New Journey
Rather than taking that old familiar well-trodden path, brands are waking up to the realisation that post-pandemic they have a new youth audience keen to start living, learning and having fun – and not just on their screens at home.
A Youth Marketing Agency can help your brand refresh or relaunch its approach to youth marketing and ensure it has a permanent place on the winners’ podium.
ZAK is one of the top creative agencies in London. Here are just a few of our thoughts on why we think talking to a creative agency is the first step to youth brand recognition 2021-style.
Marketing Challenges
We understand that there are plenty of challenges involved in marketing to Gen Z and Millennials. These are people who are awash with daily information, ads, blogs, social posts, emails and so on from brands trying to elbow each other out of the way to attract the attention of their much-coveted youth market.
Why not cut through all that? Our diverse global collective of U30s social natives give us fast, unique and unparalleled insight into what they do, think and feel. It means the brands we look after know how their products are perceived before they hit the streets.
Check out what we did for Topdeck Travel to reposition their brand to appeal to young travellers keen to ditch the superficial for travel that feels real.
Brand Alignment
Gen Z and Millennials expect more from a brand than just a great price and an excellent looking product. They want to feel that brands are aligned with them on values and social issues.
A large percentage of the youth market will turn away from a brand if it fails to take a stand or speak out on issues they care about. This is a sharp departure from older audiences’ behaviours less bothered about buying products that reflect their political beliefs.
Life Has Changed
It may take years to fully understand and feel the full and seismic impact the pandemic, BLM movement and political changes in the US have on our world. A recent Deloitte Global Millennial Survey 2020 found that despite their own anxieties resulting from the pandemic, Gen Z and Millennials continue to be absorbed in and by social issues, where people matter more than profits.
The right creative agency in London or elsewhere understands this and works with brands who want to understand and reflect it. Forget about returning to the way things were. It’s time to embrace new ways of talking to your audience.
Have a look at our work with Amazon Prime Video. We worked with Gen Z and Millennial women’s sisterhood to share messages of support from social communities and influencers to young women feeling the lockdown pain.
Value For Money
The right youth marketing agency will not only give you value for money via integrated omnichannel campaigns including print, video, social and word-of-mouth. But it will also understand that your youth target market expects to receive value for their money.
In particular, millennials and Gen Z are financially careful and cautious, saving money with severe concerns for future financial stability.
Our work consistently delivers across the board value for money for brands. Take a look at our big brand storytelling for New Balance to reach new global youth audiences through football. Alternatively, our work with Barbour Beacon, introducing long-lasting non-throwaway fashion to an independently-minded young audience.
Demonstrable Success
If your brand recognises the need for a more imaginative and creative approach to attracting and retaining new Gen Z and Millennial audiences, now is the time to act.
When you’re talking to any youth marketing agency, ask it to demonstrate their work with your target audience and evidence their campaign reach with metrics and analytics. There’s no point in investing in a new creative relationship if you’re not going to get good value for money.
If you want to ensure that your target audience is on your side, talk to ZAK. We’re a next-generation marketing agency. Get in touch and say hello.