Building Brand Equity for Generation Z in the Digital Landscape: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

The digital age has affected how brand equity is established, communicated, and maintained — especially for Gen Z, who spend much time on digital platforms and use interactive media. Older ways of creating brand equity (awareness, loyalty, perceived quality, and associations) will be less effective due to the increased use of social media, influencer marketing, e-WOM, AI-driven personalised advertising, m-commerce, and digital storytelling. Using a systematic literature review approach, this paper identifies key issues for firms attempting to establish brand equity digitally, with a focus on Gen Z. Studies relevant to the paper's objectives were located via searches of top-tier academic databases using predetermined search terms, then reviewed systematically. The findings from the review synthesise the available research to identify the most prominent themes and concerns about how to build brand equity for younger generations digitally. Findings indicate that Gen Z's formation of brand equity is significantly influenced by authenticity, trustworthiness, the degree of personalisation, social proof, influencer credibility, and the overall experience within an interactive digital platform. At the same time, there are many barriers that firms encounter in developing a sustainable brand equity relationship with Gen Z. These include digital clutter, distractions stemming from fractured attention patterns, consumer concerns about privacy, the volatile nature of loyalty, a vulnerable reputation, and rapidly changing preferences for the digital platforms used. This review concludes that developing brand equity in today's digital environment is no longer a one-way (linear), firm-controlled process, but rather a dynamic co-creative process driven by consumers/influencers/algorithms/online communities. Additionally, this study contributes by integrating disparate research into a coherent framework of current challenges in digital brand equity, providing a basis for future empirical research and strategic guidance for branding efforts.