<\/p>\n
At the start of this year, a video of 8 year-old twins Haven and Koti Garza went viral for proclaiming their status as Gen Alpha influencers.<\/p>\n
The video, posted from the Garza Crew account run by the twins\u2019 mom, seemed designed to poke fun at critiques of young influencers. \u201cOf course we don\u2019t have toys,\u201d Haven says at the end of the video, before pushing a slime kit that she\u2019s been playing with offscreen.<\/p>\n
The twins may still play with toys, but the Garza Crew account also regularly posts the type of videos it poked fun at, including \u201cget ready with me\u201d videos in which the sisters slather on moisturizer and present \u201cfit checks\u201d for school. At the same time, backlash to content from younger influencers like the Garzas has grown, with some expressing fear that kids are, through social media, being pushed to grow up too fast.<\/p>\n
The first wave of Gen Alpha, classified roughly as those born between 2010 and 2024, are now entering their teen years, and have never lived in a world without social media or influencers. As some become influencers themselves, brands are navigating the moral gray area of the space, both when it comes to reaching young people and potentially even encouraging some of them to become marketing mouthpieces themselves. All of this is happening as activists, experts, and some legislators push for more rights and protections for child influencers and determine whether children should be allowed on social media at all.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s this two-part question for brands,\u201d Elise Alverson, group strategy director at Ogilvy, told us. \u201cFirst, is now the right time [to engage Gen Alpha], yes or no? If it is, then what are the strategic and creative guardrails that are going to help us do that in a way that is not harming them?\u201d<\/p>\n
Kids wanting to be grown-ups is not a new phenomenon. But the \u201ctween\u201d market, which once consisted of brands like Delia*s and publications like American Girl Magazine and Teen People, have largely gone by the wayside. Instead of looking to tween brands for inspiration, younger girls may be spending more time looking to grown-ups on social media, said Lauren Neff, a strategist at Ogilvy\u2014which could be why some of them are adopting skin-care routines featuring high-end brands like Drunk Elephant.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re looking up to influencers instead of getting the Delia*s catalog and circling what they want,\u201d Neff told us.<\/p>\n
Because of that, Neff said, many Gen Alphas are drawn to adult brands, adding that \u201ceven if [brands] are not intentionally marketing to kids, they\u2019re still gravitating towards them because they\u2019re seeing influencers and people on their feeds that are wearing that.\u201d<\/p>\n
That can put those brands in a sticky situation. In response to a surge of interest in its products among Gen Alpha, Drunk Elephant released details on which of its products are safe for kids to use. Other brands are lasering in on the trend as a marketing message: Dove released a spring ad campaign that asked, \u201cIs it even possible to look 10 years younger at 10?\u201d<\/p>\n
On the flip side, some brands seem eager to work directly with Gen Alpha creators. Thirteen-year-old influencer Evelyn Unruh, who goes by Evelyn GRWM, has in the last year worked with makeup and skin-care brands like Anastasia Beverly Hills and Cocokind. Ayla Palmer, another prominent Gen Alpha influencer who completed the first grade in June, has worked with brands like Cult Gaia and Claire\u2019s. And the Garzas have worked with brands ranging from Shein to Casetify.<\/p>\n
The payoff can be big if brands embrace the youngest generation, which skin-care brand Evereden learned firsthand. Carolyn Curry, Evereden\u2019s marketing director, told us that its kid-friendly collection, which was released in 2021, has \u201creally blown up in the last year or so\u201d as more parents seek safe products for their kids\u2019 newfound skin-care regimens. Right now, she said, kids products are \u201csignificantly driving [Evereden\u2019s] total brand growth,\u201d with triple-digit YoY growth in the category.<\/p>\n
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Within the last year, she said the brand has shifted from targeting Gen Alpha parents to aiming to reach kids more directly through organic content on YouTube and TikTok. On TikTok alone, she said the brand has gained 100,000 followers this year, a 950% YoY increase.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to talk specifically to Gen Alpha, to teens and tweens, because we feel like a lot of brands aren\u2019t speaking directly to them,\u201d Curry said.<\/p>\n
The brand has partnered with creators including the Garzas, and it has recently upped its gifting efforts to Gen Alpha creators, Curry said, lowering its typical follower threshold and sending \u201ca few hundred\u201d packages to younger customers each month. The brand also maintains a program where Gen Alpha ambassadors get free monthly gifts, invites to in-person and virtual events, affiliate commission codes, and early access to product testing.<\/p>\n
The brand\u2019s paid ads remain geared toward parents, both to avoid directly advertising to kids and because, at the end of the day, parents are the ones paying, she said.<\/p>\n
Caner Daywood, global director of content strategy at creator agency Buttermilk, said he feels it\u2019s important for brands to conduct more due diligence when working with Gen Alpha creators compared to older talent.<\/p>\n
\u201cVery young people [are] very impressionable,\u201d he said. \u201cAs they\u2019re becoming more of a commercial entity for us to explore working with, what does that look like? Who is their manager? Is it their parents?\u201d<\/p>\n
At Evereden, Curry said the brand goes through creator content with \u201cmore of a fine-tooth comb\u201d before posting to check that it\u2019s age-appropriate. It also only works with parent-managed or parent-run accounts or Gen Alpha creators with a talent agency.<\/p>\n
Claire\u2019s, which has been running a year-long collab campaign with Gen Z and Gen Alpha influencers since the spring, also looks for parent-managed accounts, Meghan Hurley, VP of global marketing, told us. The brand also uses SMS to reach parents with deals that they\u2014or their kids\u2014can take advantage of when shopping.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Gen Alphas] share a ton on how to get the best deals and things that are limited or exclusive at the stores,\u201d Hurley said.<\/p>\n
While she noted that Gen Alphas are digital natives, Hurley said demand for in-person experiences isn\u2019t aging out\u2014and demand for e-commerce among Gen Alpha isn\u2019t as high as older generations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey really value in-person and the discovery of our stores,\u201d she said, adding that Claire\u2019s has gone so far as to create a special section in stores for its youngest customers, complete with smaller versions of products sold elsewhere in the store.<\/p>\n
Evereden and Sol de Janeiro have also reported success in reaching Gen Alpha through in-person events, and earlier this year, Hollister reported seeing an uptick in in-store foot traffic, similar to Claire\u2019s.<\/p>\n
Even with some signs pointing to a mall renaissance for teens and tweens, Hurley acknowledged that there\u2019s still a lack of third spaces for today\u2019s tweens. \u201cHopefully we\u2019re filling that gap,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
In the meantime, the kids are still very much online, which means we\u2019re likely only going to see more Gen Alpha influencers emerge.<\/p>\n
\u201cKids are on social media whether you like it or not\u2026and they\u2019re being fed the same algorithms as adults,\u201d Curry said. \u201cJust like when I was a kid, and I got my cues from Seventeen magazine and music videos and movies, kids these days are getting their cues from social media in a more direct way.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n