As Gen Z moves into decision-making roles within businesses, B2B marketers face a new kind of buyer – one that expects the same immediacy, authenticity and emotional resonance they get from consumer brands.
(L-R) Forrester's Nicky Briggs, Meta's Andrea Gellert, JPG's Jorge Narvaez and UM's Dan Chapman.
At The Drum’s B2B World Fest, a panel featuring Meta’s VP of global business and product marketing, Andrea Gellert, GPJ’s SVP head of creative EMEAI, Jorge Narvaez, and Dan Chapman, chief strategy officer at UM, gathered to get into what Gen Z buyers really want and how vendors can engage.
From the start, Gellert dispelled misconceptions and said this generation’s approach to business buying mirrors their consumer behavior. “They expect a lot of information to be shared with them online. They are doing a lot of buying online and you really have to rethink if… historically, your goal has been, how do I get them offline as quickly as possible? But you’ve got to think about how to change the ratio. Give them much more information up front, because, quite frankly, that’s what they’re expecting.”
Gen Z’s preference for autonomy in research doesn’t eliminate the role of sales. Gellert noted that marketers instead must meet this audience where they already are: “We’re seeing them interact across not just Instagram, which I think people would expect, but also Facebook, which might be a surprise. And so when we think about that community. And similar to the consumer side, they’re really interacting with creators and influencers on these platforms.”
In fact, Gellart added, its research found over 60% say creators shape their purchase decisions.
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While efficiency matters, emotion remains a powerful differentiator to engaging this younger buyer, they said. “The emotional side of it is so, so important. We’ve always known that, but I think that Gen X and the boomers were quite happy with sort of the more pragmatic approach to brands, whereas today, because those lines blur. They want to see the emotional side of the brand as well as product. It’s absolutely fundamental.”
Narvaez agreed, emphasizing that authenticity and community are central to building trust. For him, connecting at physical, IRL events is the most effective way to achieve that.
“At the end of the day, when we want to close deals, the big deals, you want to have them in the room. I want to be able to see you in the room, see your face and know that I can trust you. And IRL events are how we bring them in and create worlds and communities that they’re part of.”
Given the advances in technology and how upcoming buyers are using the tech to help make buying decisions, the panel agreed that vendors can’t sleep on the opportunities that generative AI is presenting to adapt and personalize comms. However, Chapman said that as this proliferates, it will make that physical connection more important.
“AI can generate thousands of different assets, get a lot of reach and be very personalized to a degree, but the last mile needs that human factor. Marketing, at the end of the day, is how do you become memorable in somebody’s mind so they can recall it in that moment? I think that’s where generative AI will allow us to get more reach and be seen and create many beautiful things, but that last mile will be getting to know each other.”