Generation Z (better known as GenZ) spend over 10.6 hours engaging with online content each waking day. In theory, that’s a lot of time for brands to reach these new young customers: in reality it’s getting harder to be heard above the noise.

Born digital natives, GenZers learnt how to tell compelling stories to captive social audiences from an early age; it’s almost in the their DNA. They’re active and opinionated online publishers and they aren’t prepared to just sit passively and listen, equipped as they are with mental and digital ad-blockers, which makes them a singularly elusive audience to reach . Oldies often complain that the problem lies in the fact that the average attention span has now dropped to eight seconds. But maybe it’s just because GenZ is bored. Bored of your content, and especially bored of the cynical marketing sloshing around the web.

So why bother with them? Well, the problem is that they are also a highly desirable audience to reach, accounting for $29 to $143 billion in direct annual US spending. Across the globe, the story is the same. GenZ is on the rise and we need to take note of them, because they represent the market of all futures, not just their generation. One of the primary market-demotivators for GenZ is inauthenticity. They’re savvy and skeptical, and if they think they’re being sold to (or told to), they switch off. Ad-blocker forcefield at full strength.

To reach GenZ (and market actors of the future) brands need content that is both believable and relatable — anything that simply looks slick or feels staged just won’t cut it. Mad Men are you listening?

Actually, GenZ’s less-fooled attitude puts not just Madison Avenue in a bind, but also the entire online marketing edifice: how to source authentic, engaging material? How to facilitate and measure macro and micro trends through rapidly changing content across billions of devices? The “campaign” as advertisers have known it for decades is over; astro-budgets, celebrity faces, and glacial lead-ins over premium channels are over. Instead, today a product’s market stamina is best facilitated by macro-trends initiated by micro-content. But, again, where to get that content?

Who better then to turn to than GenZ themselves? GenZ has the digital marketing chops that millennials and older marketers had to learn through trial and error. Reverse engineer a typical teenager’s social presence and you’ll find highly active, cross-channel communities with engagement levels brands can only imagine. Not to mention a regular feed of fun, honest content delivered in an authentic voice.

Think about it, who would you trust more, your best friend or that lady on QVC selling you “the world’s best ever mop”? Does anyone really trust the five second YouTube ad from someone who’s obviously been paid thousands to market a face mask?

Word-of-mouth recommendations from friends, family and honest reviewers are a valuable currency. Especially for marketers who currently use a broad mix of tools, including Google Adwords, retargeting, social media campaigns, influencer marketing and more, but struggle to see ROI despite continually increasing their budgets.

One great example of consumer-driven marketing is Apple’s ‘Shot on iPhone’ campaign. With very minimal text needed, all that was needed for Apple was to source the photo. In an effort to showcase the capabilities of the iPhone’s camera, Apple deferred its marketing to its users creating a simple but enormously effective campaign described by Business Insider as a ‘game changer’. Take a look at Apple’s Instagram and you’ll see countless photographers fighting to be featured on Apple’s account, allowing both Apple and the participating photographers to benefit from the exposure. It looks easy.

The typical teenager doesn’t have the reach of a brand like Apple. Their follower count will never stack up against influencers pushing product placements on YouTube or Instagram. But their audience trusts them. In an era of fake news and social media scandals, where 77% of consumers are more cautious about the content they engage with online than they were half a decade ago, that’s a scarce and valuable commodity.

This is why we are launching the WOM Token, to give all the word-of-mouth marketers a new way to connect with their favorite brands and get rewarded fairly for their content through blockchain technology.

Leading video shopping platform YEAY, and its community of 170,000 predominantly GenZ users, will become the first platform to use the WOM Token to empower people to earn money through user-generated content, while helping brands source, track and reward fan advocacy.

Tomorrow’s customers won’t be reached via high profile celebrity influencers or professional affiliate marketers. The honest, authentic content people share with one another has more relevance, reach and resonance with their peers than unsolicited ads on social media ever could. The next generation of consumers might be elusive to brands but they are listening to one another. And they are happy to get involved in marketing and recommend the brands and products they love — providing they are recognized and rewarded for their work.

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