What Gen Z blocking TikTok creators means for influencer marketing strategies

Gen Zers on TikTok are leading an online uprising against dozens of high-profile influencers and celebrities that is leaving brands even more uncertain about how they should approach creator partnerships in an already volatile influencer marketing landscape. Earlier this month, tens of thousands of TikTok users began bringing a so-called “digital guillotine” down on a slew of celebrities and influencers who they’ve accused of failing to leverage their massive social media followings to speak out against the Israel-Hamas war. The social media movement, most commonly referred to as either #Blockout2024 or #BlockTok, focuses on identifying an ever-expanding list of influential figures for TikTokers to collectively block across social media, including Kim Kardashian, Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez and James Charles, among many others. “We gave them their platforms,” said TikTok user @ladyfromtheoutside, who coined the term “digital guillotine,” in a video that’s amassed more than 2.7 million views and nearly 600,000 likes since May 8. “It’s time to take it back—take our views away, our likes, our comments, our money—by blocking them on all social media and digital platforms.” Her video also includes the inciting incident that kicked off the #Blockout2024 movement—a now-deleted video of influencer Haley Kalil dressed in an elaborate Marie Antoinette-inspired gown for the Met Gala and mouthing along to an infamous quote often attributed to the French queen, “Let them eat cake.” TikTok users quickly dog-piled on Kalil for choosing that audio clip, which many viewed as insensitive when juxtaposed with horrific images coming out of the Israel-Hamas war on the same night and the ongoing cost of living crisis in the U.S. An influencer straight up making a “let them eat cake” video at the met gala last night. No self awareness at all. None. pic.twitter.com/39rYMZqzLe— Read Let This Radicalize You (@JoshuaPHilll) May 7, 2024 Since then, TikTokers have shared more than 50,000 videos using the hashtag #Blockout2024, more than 23,000 of which were posted in just the past week. The hashtag itself garnered nearly 12 million views in the past seven days alone, per TikTok data. Alternate names for the influencer revolt, such as #BlockTok and #BlockParty2024, have appeared on thousands of videos over the past three weeks, too. “We’ve monitored this wave on TikTok since the Met Gala and have noticed that it’s giving audiences power to refine who they feel resonates with them, based on how those creators are using their platforms,” said Krishna Subramanian, founder and CEO of influencer marketing platform Captiv8, in an email. “They want to connect with creators who reflect their values more and more.” For brands, that will require scrutinizing their selection of influencer partners more closely than ever to ensure the values of both the brand and its creator collaborators align with their own, he added. As the #Blockout2024 movement pushes more creators to post about the war in Gaza to avoid being added to an influencer block list, finding creator partners who haven’t taken a stance on the conflict “in some way, shape or form” will become increasingly difficult, if not impossible, said Victoria Bachan, president of talent management company Whalar Talent. Though not all TikTok users agree with the movement, with some questioning how effective blocking influencers and celebrities truly is, the pressure being put on creators to speak out about the Israel-Hamas war is already driving at least some results. Just a few days after TikTok users began to lob criticism at Kalil for her Marie Antoinette impression, comedy creator Brittany Broski posted a TikTok video encouraging her audience to donate to humanitarian organizations supporting Palestinians. During the same week, over 30 creators teamed up on a “Creators for Palestine” fundraising campaign that has since crossed over $788,000 in donations. @brittany_broski Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund https://www.pcrf.net/ UNICEF https://www.unicefusa.org/stories/helping-gazas-children-cope-trauma @UNICEF Doctors Without Borders @Doctors Without Borders / MSF World Central Kitchen https://wck.org/ @World Central Kitchen World Health Organization https://www.who.int/ Headcount https://www.headcount.org/ @HeadCountOrg @Erin Hattamer IG ACCOUNTS TO FOLLOW: @eye.on.palestine @aljazeeraenglish @palestinianyouthmovement @byplestia @motaz_azaiza @impact #freepalestine🇵🇸❤️ #eyesonrafah #gaza ♬ original sound - Brittany “[Brands] are going to have to understand that creators are very multifaceted, and they’re not just going to talk about skin care—they’re also going to talk about major conflicts,” Bachan said. “Yes, there are legalities involved in all of these things, but you have a lot of people who have a lot of care for other people right now, and that’s where this movement is coming from. Now is the time to think more like a human and less like a brand.” An influencer marketing minefield Influencer marketing has become increasingly perilous for brands to navigate since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, particularly for those insistent on only partnering with creators who haven’t spoken about the conflict on social media. For any brand courting Gen Z consumers, avoiding any discussion of political or social issues is no longer an option, said Austin Null, influencer marketing strategy director at full-service agency McKinney. And that extends to their choice of creators. “You can’t be passive anymore. We’re in an age where literally every single thing is talked about and seen [on social media],” he said. “With this new generation of consumers, especially the way that people are mobilizing on TikTok, there’s no way of getting around that anymore … It’s not like you have to talk about [the war] all the time, but you can’t pretend like it’s not a thing and just continue to move on with your normal content. That goes for both brands and influencers.” Gen Z certainly hasn’t avoided discussing the Israel-Hamas war. On the night of the Met Gala, for example, hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters—many of them students at Columbia University, New York University and other nearby colleges—marched toward the Metropolitan Museum of Art intending to protest outside of the annual event, but were intercepted by police on their way there, according to Bloomberg. Some of marketers’ trepidation around partnering with creators who have been vocal about the war likely stems from them recently witnessing Gen Z consumers slice the “brand guillotine” through companies such as Starbucks and McDonald’s for their perceived pro-Israel stance, Null said. For instance, Starbucks CEO Laxman Narasimhan appeared to be pointing to a TikTok-driven boycott of the coffee shop chain when referring to “misperceptions about our position” as a key factor in the “softening of U.S. traffic” during Starbucks’ fiscal first-quarter earnings call in January. @sabyhesri #boycottstarbucks ♬ original sound - erica 📚🍉 #Blockout2024 is effectively a boycott of influencers and celebrities who are “brands in and of themselves, whether they want to think of it that way or not,” Null said. An influencer’s follower count is their “livelihood,” and holds as much weight for them as stock prices do for companies, said Brooks Miller, executive VP of influencer marketing at Edelman. After all, the size of a creator’s audience and how engaged those followers are with their content are determining factors in whether they’re able to secure brand deals. Brands don’t need to—and shouldn’t—abandon influencer marketing entirely due to this social media movement, Miller added. #Blockout2024 is just one example of what Miller and her team have dubbed an “elevated moment,” or pop culture controversy (often amplified by social media) characterized by “a lot of volume and complicated discourse.” She anticipates several more of these “elevated moments” will arise in the coming months as the U.S. heads toward the presidential election—and rather than completely avoid partnering with creators for the rest of the year, brands can do more to plan ahead for potential controversies when running influencer campaigns, she said. Read about Ad Age’s 2024 Leading Women here “We’re trying to educate people more and more that an influencer campaign is actually just like a brand collaboration,” Miller said. “It’s your brand and it’s their brand. And so the way you would tell a brand partner about something that’s happening … you would want to tell [influencers], as well, so that they’re able to speak to it. And if you want to go the extra mile, you can give them talking points, too.” Opinion: 6 lessons for brands from Bud Light’s debacle Brands should also be actively researching what consumers are saying about them and their current influencer partners on social media in case either of them ends up as a target of the #Blockout2024 movement, she said. And if one of the creators a brand is working with gets caught in the crossfire of online discourse, the brand can pause its campaign with them rather than turn its back on them, she said. “We spend a lot of time and money trying to make brands feel like humans, like Flo from Progressive and Jake from State Farm,” Miller said, speaking broadly of characters used in advertising. “And that’s great, but what’s so special about influencers is they already are human, and they have experiences and lives and passions. But humans also say things that are stupid or maybe make a tone-deaf TikTok. Humans mess up. So, it’s about navigating the world in which they are so important in our marketing mix while also allowing them to be human.” Ad Age Gen Z Contributor Column We welcome Gen Zers to submit fresh takes exploring Gen Z within the ad industry Learn more here

What Gen Z blocking TikTok creators means for influencer marketing strategies

Featured Stories