A TikTok post from Lyft featuring a real driver talking about their new Women+ Connect feature.

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Our new research found that about half of all consumers prioritize authenticity as a top quality in the influencers they engage with. But this drops to 35% for Gen Z (who cares more about things like an influencer’s posting frequency and follower count).
Do you think this is a long-term preference? Should we assume that people who grew up with social see through the “authenticity” facade or is this a preference that they’ll grow out of?
I anticipate we’ll only see more of this, but maybe not in the doomsday way this stat might allude to. Let me start with, yes, authenticity will always be important, but what that means is shifting.

The signals for authenticity on social media today are british indian ocean territory b2b leads very different from what they were. Just three years ago, audiences may have thought authenticity from influencers came from having a good camera presence, fitting sponcon naturally into your content or the idea of raw, unscripted video formats.

Younger audiences are more attuned to how social works as a business—for both brands and influencers. These audiences especially understand that raw video content doesn’t mean that something is inherently authentic. Even the most lo-fi videos are often scripted, planned or re-recorded multiple times to achieve what the creator or brand is trying to portray. But does that mean they’re inauthentic? It depends.


This doesn’t mean that more planned videos aren’t authentic, it just means that our definition of authenticity now means more. It’s more reliant on brand building and value-driven content than ever before.

When we’ve consumed enough YouTube apologies for a lifetime and have been exposed to an increased amount of monetized and sponsored posts, expectations over generations are sure to shift.