Email marketing for Generation Z is becoming increasingly important as those born after 1997 move into the workplace and control how and where they spend their money. Just as Generation X and millennials both have their own preferences, so does the upcoming generation. Marketers need to be aware of these tastes if they want their businesses to build beneficial, long-lasting relationships with them.

Specific research into how each age group uses email to communicate with businesses, friends and family can shed some light on these differences. Many of today’s users have multiple email accounts, both in use and outdated. Therefore, it’s important that you use an email verifier to make sure that your information will be landing in an inbox. In addition to this tip, below are some of the key findings that can be incorporated into your email marketing campaigns.

Email Use

Regardless of what generation someone belongs to, email has become a staple form of communication. This is likely the main reason that email marketing is consistently regarded as the top marketing strategy for businesses when it comes to reaching out to and engaging with target audiences.

Email is used at least once a month by all generations, and the percent of usage rises with age: 85% for Gen Z, 89% for Millennials, and 92% for Gen X. Generation Z primarily uses email for their personal interactions and to receive news from businesses.

As Generation Z develops and becomes a greater part of the workforce, this is expected to grow further. This is dissimilar to Gen Xers, who tend to view email as being ‘business-only,’ rather than something for personal use.

34% of Gen Z respondents considered B2C email communication as essential. The younger generations use email as a tool for communication as early as college. From there, it’s not uncommon for the technology to be a vital part of workplace contact, either.

Email is an extremely important part of daily communication, and most expect usage to increase or at least remain the same over the next 5 years. In light of this, marketers should be ensuring their emails provide relevant, essential, and contextual information for this group.

Promotional emails that are overly ‘sales-y’ or irrelevant to your Gen Z audience should be avoided. They could harm deliverability, decrease engagement, and ultimately cause recipients to unsubscribe from your database.

Future Projections

Gen Zers are more confident than any other cohort that their email communication will increase within the next year. 39% of Generation Z’s survey participants expected to receive more advertising or marketing emails from companies sending them relevant information or coupons.

Taken with the above expectation that email will become increasingly important and more frequently used over the following five years, marketers should be considering strategies that add value to the Gen Z segments of their email campaigns. 70% of those surveyed showed a preference for communicating via email for business to consumer interactions. This was a full 43 points higher than online advertising.

There are indications that Generation Z cares about authenticity more than any other generation, and that they want to feel as though they ‘know’ the brand or person behind the camera. Therefore, personalization will become increasingly important to this younger generation across all marketing efforts, but especially email campaigns.

Making Sense of it All

When building an email campaign, the distinct benefits provided by A/B testing, segmentation, and analyzing results are important for any marketing strategy. In order to nurture links and build relationships with the younger generation, businesses should stop lumping millennials together with Generation Z and instead start taking note of their diversity.

Consider testing generational segments against each other to identify similarities and differences in engagement. A/B testing within generational segments and across sectors can also deliver interesting insights that can be put to good use in terms of building both genuine connections and customer leads.

If possible, data collection should include age group references along with other relevant data. This will enable you to connect more deeply with your target audiences, regardless of their age or phase in life.

On average, a member of GenZ can use five screens at a time, compared to only 3 for their Gen X counterpart. Capturing and holding the attention of Gen Z can be a battle. Given that in just two more years they’ll account for 40% of all consumers, the time to start tailoring your email marketing campaigns to their needs and wants is now.