By Jim Caruso
The New York Times recently reported that Hollywood’s summer box office slumped to its lowest point since 1981. One factor: media fragmentation. Studios can no longer reach mass audiences with ads the way they once did. So who should they be targeting? Our data shows Gen Z combines three traits -- cross-category breadth, music-driven engagement, and merchandise readiness -- making them the audience every studio and marketer must understand to fuel the next breakout franchise.
No Single TV Path Reaches Gen Z
Gen Z’s media habits are fractured. Deloitte’s 2025 Digital Media Trends reports that 23% of Gen Z cable subscribers plan to cancel within 12 months, reflecting their shift to SVOD: social video, gaming, and audio.
Our data confirms TV captures just 14.0% of this cohort’s attention. Within TV, no network exceeds 1.2% (Fox leads at 1.15%), no genre tops 3% (comedy at 2.95%), and even streaming giants remain single-digit: Netflix 8.75%, Prime Video 7.70%, Paramount+ 6.30%.
Translation: A single TV buy won’t scale. You need packaging across platforms, genres, and networks.
Interests Are Broad and Fragmented
Even interests show fragmentation. Music, the top category, holds just 11.3% of Gen Z’s share. The top three (music 11.3%, sports 9.3%, arts & entertainment 8.4%) reach only ~29%; the top five total ~44%. To cross 50%, you need at least eight interest lanes.
Mass breakthrough is rare. Success comes from bundling three to five adjacent clusters aligned with the title, then layering others for incremental reach. This fragmentation doesn’t just shape what Gen Z cares about -- it also determines how and where they consume content.
Multiplatform Consumption
No single channel surpasses 20%. Gen Z attention divides across: websites 16.1%, YouTube 15.5%, TV 14.0%, Music 12.2%, Podcasts 10.4%.
Reaching even 57.8% requires websites + YouTube + TV + Music. Add podcasts, and you hit 68.2%. Planning must mirror reality: a four to five channel baseline, plus layered interest clusters.
Influence Is Atomized
Creators drive conversation, but even stars are small-scale: Taylor Swift 5.10%, LeBron James 4.56%. Median influencer share sits below 0.01%—0.009% for singers, 0.0068% for hip hop, 0.0057% for basketball. Only a tiny fraction break 1%.
There’s no single cultural icon for Gen Z. Influence is distributed across micro-communities, making micro-influencers and niche voices more powerful than celebrities. Fragmentation is evident not only in channels but also in influence, which is why the lessons for Hollywood apply equally to marketers.
The Lesson
Mass audiences still exist -- but they’re scattered. For both Hollywood and marketers, the answer is orchestration: align channels, interests, and voices so each plays a role in discovery, consideration, and conversion.
For Hollywood, that means opening weekends can’t hinge on one blockbuster push -- they require orchestrated engagement before release and sustained lift after. For marketers, the same rule applies: In a fragmented world, only orchestration delivers scale.
