LIVE FROM AMDOCS AMERICAS SUMMIT, ORLANDO: Having discussed Generation C (anyone who is connected, regardless of age) on day one, day two saw conversation turn to Generation Z – those born in or after 1998, the same year Google was born.

In a global study across 10 countries conducted by Vanson Bourne, Amdocs found that being connected is extremely important to this generation, who will not put up with bad customer service and believe operators don’t understand their lifestyle.

They believe fast internet connection is a human right, 56 per cent said they feel lonely when they are not connected, and 78 per cent reckon they will live to have an interconnected device embedded on their arm, “so a smartwatch with a SIM is a no-brainer,” said Daniela Perimutter, head of product and solutions marketing at Amdocs.

However, despite the urgency to be connected at all times, they love Google and Facebook more than they love their service providers, despite the latter being key to being connected.

Providing them access to the internet “is not enough to keep them satisfied,” and service providers must do more, said Perimutter, adding that “their lifestyle dictates that customer service be instant and contextual and cross-channel”.

In fact, only 12 per cent believe their service provider understands them and has developed services to match their needs.

Operators must “move from usage to attention–based offers: in the right context, with the right content on the right channels and with the right intent,” said Perimutter.

Operators only look at who pays their bills, which is usually the parents, but they must decouple the bill payer from the actual user.

30 per cent of respondents said they experienced bad customer service (61 per cent in the Phillipines, 53 per cent in Brazil and 22 per cent in the US) and just under half said bad service would mean they would not use the provider again.

What’s more, 33 per cent said they would tell their friends not to use a particular provider they had a bad experience with.

Relationships
At another session, Chris Runge from ad agency Archrival echoed these sentiments, explaining that the youth values collecting relationships above all else and since for them time is currency, businesses must be very wary about how they handle their time.

Generation Z wants catered, on-demand services and they believe when they pay for a service it affords them the rights as an investor into a brand’s practice and if they don’t like something they will spread it across all social media until the business is forced to change.

They may not be loyal to a particular brand but they are loyal to creativity and innovation, Runge concluded.