Digital Out of Home: The Key to Marketing to Gen Z

Ran Ben-Yair, CEO and Co-founder, Ubimo

By Ran Ben-Yair, CEO and Co-founder of Ubimo.

The advertising industry as a whole is on the verge of a seismic shift. After two decades of learning about and acclimating to the shopping habits of Millennials, they’re being supplanted by the ascending Generation Z, the first generation of true digital natives.

Add to that the rise of digital out of home media and maturing location intelligence abilities, and it’s clear that we’re entering an exciting time for the field.

Gen Z and How They’re Different

This year, Gen Z — approximately between the ages of 18 and 24 — makes up a full 40% of all US consumers, representing $44 billion annually in buying power, as well as an additional $600 billion annually in influenced family spending.

They are a large and important demographic, and they’re completely flipping the script when compared to Millennials.

For one thing, Gen Zers regularly use five different devices — TVs, laptops, desktops, iPods or iPads, and of course phones — compared to Millennials’ average of three. Because of this, they’ve become incredibly efficient at sorting and evaluating huge amounts of information quickly. With so much messaging, coming from so many outlets, they’ve had to develop this skill. This holds true outdoors, as well, particularly in urban areas crowded with OOH and DOOH properties — Gen Z is as quick to parse those signals as the ones they see on their phones.

Finally, there is the fact that, unlike Millennials, Gen Z is showing a strong preference for in-store shopping over online shopping. Driven by a range of factors, this trend brings Gen Z shoppers to shopping districts, shopping centers, and even shopping malls. And the more time they are out shopping, the more exposure to OOH and DOOH messaging they get.

This all paints a strong picture: a powerful demographic with expert-level information processing ability. They spend time out and about shopping in the real world, in prime OOH territory, but they know how to cut through the clutter and focus only on the messaging that speaks directly to them.

OOH and Smart Location Intelligence Will Win Gen Z Over

Given this penchant for shopping at physical locations — and other Gen Z trends, like a strong attraction to new, fun brands, and brands that connect with them on an individual level — a lot of marketers are going to be turning to OOH and DOOH properties to woo them.

Aside from literal increased visibility — DOOH signage is brighter and can display moving images — DOOH offers a number of capabilities that typical signage doesn’t. DOOH allows for programmatic buying, for example, which is a big draw for advertisers and is impossible with OOH. It also allows for the use of real-world conditions — like the weather or traffic — to have a real-time impact on what ads are displayed at a given time.

Of course, when you’re marketing to a demographic as unique and particular as Gen Z, you need to be smart and precise in addition to bright and flashy. They might be doing more shopping in physical locations, but they were still raised on the internet — this means they’re used to the highly targeted, individualistic methods used there.

This is where smart use of location intelligence comes into play. Simply having a billboard at the busiest intersection in town — even a technologically sophisticated DOOH billboard — isn’t necessarily going to be enough to score an account with a brand targeting Gen Z. That brand is going to be looking for deep, granular audience data, the type that they’re accustomed to from buying digital ads.

Location intelligence makes that a reality for OOH and DOOH properties. It bridges the gap between the physical and digital worlds, putting mobile phone data literally on the map. With it, instead of offering a marketer a billboard near a popular park, you can offer them audience-based buying and planning – as in, a billboard that attracts a Gen Z audience which visits Shake Shack and over indexes at Adidas Stores.

A Brave New World

Gen Z is changing the way retail works, shifting it to its very core. Agile, innovative brands and marketers are on trend and are adapting. They’re not only changing their marketing tools but the very way they do business to capture this emerging demographic.

And in order to keep your OOH spaces competitive, you have to offer them the location intelligence that they need to stay competitive.

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