Marketing to Generation Alpha: 5 Tips to Make Your Marketing More Effective
Born between 2010 and 2024, Gen Alpha is the newest generation in our society, and they are already one of the most heavily targeted by advertisers. Brands know that, if they can capture the admiration and attention of our newest crop of consumers, they can potentially have customers for the next decade or more.
Just ask the marketing brain trust at Nike; they recently formed a partnership with Fortnite, an online video game that’s wildly popular with children, to advertise their products in the game. Fortnite has specific appeal to Gen Alpha, and Nike knows that the game offers a captive audience.
But you don’t have to be a massive corporation with insider access to the globe’s biggest IPs to appeal to the youths.
How to Connect With Gen Alpha
Gen Alpha is unique, yes, but so is every other generation. Connecting with them isn’t any harder than connecting with any new audience. As long as you hit the right stride with the right strategy, you’re on the path to building a new buyer persona!
As a marketing agency that has worked with lots of kids and toys brands, from PAW Patrol to Squishmallows to a luxury nanny agency, we’ve done the research on Generation Alpha marketing so you don’t have to.
1. Look for Video Marketing Opportunities
Gen Alpha may be young, but they are already plugged in to all the online video streaming platforms. Many in this generation grew up with an iPad in hand and a YouTube video on repeat, so meet them where they are. In fact, more than 30% of Gen Alpha watches two or more hours of YouTube or TikTok videos everyday!
If this generation is devoting that much daily time to watching videos, then you need to be making videos. Period. Or, at the very least, launch ads on video platforms where Gen Alpha thrive.
2. Be Authentic
One of the many traits of this latest generation is their ability to smell a phony. They can tell when they are being pandered to—better than their predecessors—and they don't like it. At all. If you think you can win your way into their hearts by faking it, you are wrong, wrong, wrong.
If you haven’t already, find your authentic brand voice and stick to it. Consistency is key to a believable brand voice. Make sure it is an accurate reflection of what your brand is really about. When you have a clear perspective that resonates with the Gen Alpha experience, you build their trust and get their attention.
3. Reflect Their Social Values (Particularly Diversity)
Among the most important social values that Gen Alpha holds is diversity. It is easy to understand why when you learn that Gen Alpha is the most diverse generation in United States history. Emarketer.com reports:
Children will make up 13% of the US population this year, making the future Gen Alpha about 46 million strong so far, per the US Census Bureau. Within that group, 26% will be Hispanic, compared with 19% for the general population. Some 7% will be two or more races, versus 3% for the overall population.
People buy from people—particularly from people they can relate to. It’s hard to relate to a brand that doesn’t show that they even know you exist. Be sure to show a wide range of human experiences in your marketing and reflect a wide range of human experiences in your team.
4. Lean on Short-Form Content
It is easy to get long-winded when you talk about your own brand, but that’s a mistake—especially with Gen Alpha. We know you have a lot to say, but your content needs to be bite-sized; otherwise, it won’t appeal to an audience that has a notoriously short attention span and is often overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of content available to them.
Use short-form content to break up the noise. You should try to add a little extra punch to the short-form content you create as well. Not only will it combat Gen Alpha’s eight-second attention window, but they will respect your brand more as well.
5. Leverage Influencer Marketing
People trust the people they know more than the people they don’t. Obviously. This is why influencer marketing is so huge. And given what we already know about Gen Alpha, the power of influencers is getting even huger. Gen Alpha is a particularly big believer in influencer marketing, with over half of children saying they want a product if their favorite streamer or content creator has it.
Form connections with select influencers in your industry that have established Gen Alpha fan bases. Be sure to follow our previous tips by choosing influencers who are values-based and authentic and create short-form content for maximum impact.
Partner With a Gen Alpha Marketing Team
To how your brand can effectively market to Generation Alpha, give us a call. We’ve worked with numerous brands to deeply understand the newest generation of consumers and we’d love to share our marketing insights with you!