Beyond The Scroll: Earning Gen Z’s Attention

[00:00:00] Tessa Burg: Hello, and welcome to another episode of Leader Generation, brought to you by Mod Op. I’m your host, Tessa Burg. And today, I am very excited to welcome Ben Moore. He is the US managing director for BeReal. And we are going to explore some, just always on, very interesting topics about monetizing attention, especially when it comes to the Generation Z audience.

[00:00:26] Tessa Burg: And if you’ve ever worked in advertising, if you’ve ever bought advertising or worked in media, you know that the most successful content is the content that actually resonates with the audience, where they find value, where they feel seen, where they’re entertained. And as marketers, we’re always looking for those moments to connect in real and authentic ways with our customers.

[00:00:50] Tessa Burg: So Ben Moore is joining us to dive into this, and he has had a career in not only better understanding the audience, but better understanding how to reach them, when, and how to make those moments count. Ben, thank you so much for joining us.

[00:01:05] Ben Moore: Thank you so much, Tessa, for having me

[00:01:08] Tessa Burg: So before we jump in, tell us a little bit about yourself and a little bit about BeReal for those who might not be familiar with it, and your role there.

[00:01:17] Ben Moore: Absolutely. so I’m Ben. I’ve been, working at BeReal for about 18 month now, leading the team here in the US, leading the development of the monetization of the platform, overseeing other, things at BeReal like marketing, content creation, creator partnerships, and, and of course our relationship with agencies and brands that have been trusting us to, show up meaningfully on BeReal, and I’d love, to speak more about that.

[00:01:43] Ben Moore: And I’m really fascinated about the, overall topic that we are going to discuss today. I’ve been working social media for the past 15 years. I was at, TikTok developing the monetization as well, but I was also on the agency side. I was at another, video platforms called Dailymotion, which is the French, YouTube.

[00:02:03] Ben Moore: And yeah, as you can probably tell, unlike my last name, and unlike the name BeReal, we’re all very French. BeReal is French. It’s the only s- French social networks, that is, that people know of, at least in the US. And, yeah, we’re very proud of that.

[00:02:17] Tessa Burg: That’s awesome. I shared before you got on the call that I had my first BeReal moment a couple of years ago at a University of South Florida football game with my youngest sister.

[00:02:32] Tessa Burg: She is 22 years younger than me. We’re at a college football game. I’m feeling like very out of place at sibs weekend. But nonetheless, it comes time to take her BeReal picture. She takes a picture of the front, she takes a picture of the back, and then she can see the other moments that people are sharing.

[00:02:51] Tessa Burg: And what I found most surprising is that it led to immediate in-person interactions, and I thought that was like- Surprising but also very special. Tell us a little bit about the purpose of BeReal when it operates so differently than other social platforms. You’re like, you’re not looking to have them take that photo, post it, and keep it there and track all the likes.

[00:03:20] Tessa Burg: It’s actually more about capturing that authentic moment and helping people to connect.

[00:03:27] Ben Moore: Absolutely. so yes, BeReal is a… you, described it way better than I can, I think. But BeReal essentially is about, connecting those 40 million people, that use the app every month globally, and doing it in a way that, feels very human.

[00:03:41] Ben Moore: I don’t like the term authentic anymore because everybody, every platform has been using it, way too much for the past, years now. So to describe, BeReal very simply, we’re the only social network that lets, human beings, people share real moments of their day, with the people they care about that they actually know in real life.

[00:04:02] Ben Moore: And that’s very important because as we all know, social media has felt way less social than it should be or that it should have been in the last, couple of years. And I like to think that, yeah, BeReal is bringing back that social component into this ecosystem, into our industry. And, people do that in a way that is very spontaneous.

[00:04:24] Ben Moore: you talked about that notification that has become iconic for all of our users, and it’s… What it is about, showing up, spontaneously, when the notification pops up on your screen, then checking in on the friends, that have posted, during the notification, and then that’s it. we actually have an end of feed message that says, “Enough screen time for today.

[00:04:45] Ben Moore: Go back, to your game or go back to, seeing what your friends are up to in real life.” And that’s what… That’s the beauty of, BeReal. We’re an enabler. We’re a catalyst of, real-life moments. And, yeah, I think we miss that a lot now in social media, and I think it was, meant to be like that 20 years ago when the, the big blue, tech platform, came out.

[00:05:05] Tessa Burg: Yeah. I think it’s really interesting because you were at TikTok 2021 to 2024, which is, right in the pandemic. That is when I discovered TikTok, and something that immediately stood out to me was how good the algorithm was. Like, I… It was, easily addicting, but also the advertising was spot on.

[00:05:27] Tessa Burg: Now, at BeReal, how does that change the way you’re monetizing that attention because you’re not keeping people scrolling within the app?

[00:05:40] Ben Moore: Yeah. I think, a lot of people, a lot of platforms are selling attention when they’re actually not, in reality selling attention. They’re selling, people just scrolling, quickly with their thumb on an ad that is, inundated, between, AI-generated content and just content in general that, is being uploaded on those platforms.

[00:05:59] Ben Moore: And what BeReal, promises or actually, delivers for those advertisers, those brands, that are actually, showing up on the platform, whether it’s organically or with, with ads, is that, we deliver a moment that I like to associate with the primetime of TV. Primetime was a thing, in the ’90s, 2000s, and then, it lost its meaning because of the, algorithmic optimized feed, the, infinite loops.

[00:06:28] Ben Moore: And what I like to, to tell clients is that when you show up, when you actually advertise on BeReal, you have this chance to be the only brand that people are actually, seeing because they’re engaged, with the content that they’re seeing after posting their BeReal. So it there’s a– there’s the, the notion of attention is much more human and, intentional overall on BeReal, and that’s what makes, that’s…

[00:06:53] Ben Moore: everybody can sell attention, but not everybody can sell presence. And on BeReal, every impression is a person who opened up the app on purpose in the moment.

[00:07:05] Tessa Burg: I love that. And that’s what we tell our kids when we ask them to put their devices down too, is be more present.

[00:07:14] Tessa Burg: So it makes sense when they pick it back up, because they’ve taken those long breaks, that they’re gonna have that extra focus, that extra attention, and I really love the way BeReal makes it this wow moment, that you know at that moment everyone you care about is having a shared experience even when they’re not together.

[00:07:36] Tessa Burg: It feels, I mentioned before, my sister is the one who introduced me to this app. She’s in a completely different generation, Gen Z, and right now Gen Z is teens, they are college students, they are young professionals, but we know they’re even more diverse than that. What are the types of Gen Z groups that you’re seeing in BeReal, and is there a group that’s the most engaged or the fastest-growing on the platform?

[00:08:05] Ben Moore: first on BeReal we have 85% of Gen Z globally. So out of- Oh my gosh … the 40 millions, yeah. that’s a lot of, Gen Z, globally, with our biggest markets being the US, Europe, and Japan. And I’d say that, the average user, in the US is the college student, but also the young professional.

[00:08:24] Ben Moore: because of, when BeReal came out, four years, five years ago now, those, younger, younger, students or young professionals were actually in college or high school. And so they’ve grown, they’ve aged with the platform. And they’ve stuck with us because today it’s, the only platform where they don’t have a content that is being served by an algorithm, but effectively it’s the only platform where they can stay in touch with the people they met in real life, during those years of high school, college, or first, job, experiences.

[00:08:55] Tessa Burg: And that’s so important. I r- remember that transition. The only way I keep in touch with my college friends now, I feel like, is fantasy football. I love that, BeReal creates that shared experience. When you see people growing with the platform, how is that impacting their usage of the app?

[00:09:14] Tessa Burg: Is it going up, down, or are you seeing greater usage for those coming in those younger years?

[00:09:22] Ben Moore: the first feeling I have about that is that I’m very proud because, the OG users of BeReal, especially in the US, those five million users we have that have been posting since day one, are the ones being our best, advocates, our best ambassadors.

[00:09:36] Ben Moore: And they’re using, BeReal more as a diary, something that, they can go back to remember those, precious moments of their life, whether it’s, graduation, a football game with your aunt or your big sister. those really, those real moments that might be simple, that were very, spontaneous, the day of, but years later, month later, they felt like they were special, precious overall.

[00:09:59] Ben Moore: And I think it’s, yeah, it’s- it’s also what’s unique about the platform, the memory component. And people, love using BeReal to capture those moments that they can essentially gather in that time capsule that BeReal is representing to them.

[00:10:15] Tessa Burg: Yeah. So I don’t know if this is a real thing or something that, elder millennials like myself and young Gen Z’s are projecting onto younger people, but I’d like to think that there’s some screen fatigue, and I’ve seen it in little doses, that Gen Z’s are really looking for more experiences and less on the screen.

[00:10:37] Tessa Burg: Are you seeing BeReal as an app replace other apps? are they dropping Instagram or dropping TikTok or, what’s the other one?

[00:10:50] Ben Moore: Snapchat.

[00:10:50] Tessa Burg: Yeah, Snapchat. That’s the other one- Yeah … that my sister uses. are th- or are they limiting time on that in favor of something more like a BeReal?

[00:10:59] Ben Moore: I don’t think they’re replacing any other apps.

[00:11:01] Ben Moore: I think BeReal is more a, a complement or something different that they know that they can turn to, to actually, stay connected, to the people that they’re really, connected with in real life. And we’ve, we’ve done the work, we’ve looked into our audiences, globally, and we know, for instance, that we…

[00:11:18] Ben Moore: 20 perc- 25% of our audience is not on Snap. 40 plus, percent of our audience is not on Reddit. … but we still have, the majority of those users that are using, Instagram, for instance. And so we know that, yeah, people come to BeReal because of the ritual, that iconic notification we talked about, but we also know that, they come because they’re not here to scroll.

[00:11:43] Ben Moore: And the reason we’ve been growing again, this year and for the past two years, that, BeReal has had that, comeback, I would say, is because of the screen fatigue, but also the AI, fatigue. a lot of Gen Zs-

[00:11:56] Tessa Burg: …

[00:11:56] Ben Moore: are moving away from those everything apps that TikTok, i- is trying to become with, TikTok Shop and all the entertainment that people consume on it.

[00:12:05] Ben Moore: And I think it says a lot about the future of what social media is going to be soon. That, fourth or fifth wave of, of digital overall, which is, for me, going to be about the, that presence we talked about. But beyond just being present, proving that it’s really you, proving that it’s a human being, shooting that content or capturing that moment.

[00:12:28] Ben Moore: And yeah, overall, that proof of life trend that a lot of people, experts have been talking for the past year now is, for me, the most interesting, trend that is going to hopefully, bring or put back the social, into the social media ecosystem.

[00:12:45] Tessa Burg: Yeah. And I love that. I love the focus on real content and real people.

[00:12:51] Tessa Burg: I will admit, here at Mod Op, we do use AI to… we have done a couple of AI-generated campaigns, but it’s- been disclosed. to create a character or to create a background image, it’s, we don’t imitate real life. But then we also just use AI in some processes, like for resizing ads or translating.

[00:13:15] Tessa Burg: BeReal’s global. If we were to create a campaign that we want to run in multiple countries, we would likely use AI to translate that, help us translate that for us. We recently did a campaign. We translated creative, I’m thinking to 60 different languages. still went through h- human editing. All the creative was handmade creative.

[00:13:36] Tessa Burg: So when you’re looking at what is AI, what is not, how are you using it to detect it, and would it catch things like that, where the content is actually real, but it may have been edited or translated or resized by an AI application?

[00:13:51] Ben Moore: When it comes to automation and, making our life easier, I think AI is fantastic.

[00:13:55] Ben Moore: And don’t get me wrong, I’m not, anti-AI. I’m just pro-human. Yeah. Especially, since we’re talking about social media and the premise of what it was, meant to be, which is to connect, actual, people, right? I think it’s, yeah, it’s really facilitating our daily task, especially when it comes to automation.

[00:14:12] Ben Moore: But I think it’s a, it- it’s a bit like fire. it can, burn… It can be very dangerous overall. I like to, yeah, to say it’s, you know- … fire was the greatest, invention of humanity, but it has burned down, countries and forests. So I think, yeah, that parallel is interesting.

[00:14:27] Ben Moore: and I think overall we should definitely find a way to keep that, human spark alive and, and yeah, we know it now. Gartner just released a study, just two weeks ago, in the US showing that 65% of consumer says that brands overall push too much AI content. So it’s not just for the versioning- it’s not just for the subtitles, but it’s effectively to produce, content. we can see it in the comments on, of other, platforms. Every time there’s a, an AI flagged, ad or content that is pulling– being pushed by a, a brand, there’s a, a lot of backlash, by the users, that follow this brand.

[00:15:05] Ben Moore: And, yeah, Gartner also said that 57% of those users, trust less brands, because they use AI. So not only most people thinks brands are now pushing too much AI content, but it leads to having their, consumers, their clients to trust them less. And overall, if you ask me what’s, being real mean in this world of, manipulative algorithms and AI, slops, everywhere, being real means being trusted.

[00:15:36] Ben Moore: And if you can’t be trusted, then you can’t get that, meaningful attention that you’re, paying for when you launch an ad on any platform.

[00:15:44] Tessa Burg: Yeah, I, first, I love that you opened up with you are not anti-AI, you’re pro-human. That is exactly how, we feel at Mod Op and how we approach it. And I feel like a lot of brands are getting caught up in the narrative that they can use AI to save money, and not realizing that when you lose that trust with your consumers, you’re losing money.

[00:16:14] Tessa Burg: And you really have to look at that other end of the equation. The only people pushing a narrative that AI needs to replace people, that AI can do things cheaper, are the actual foundational models and hyperscalers themselves. But it’s like brands don’t have to be a part of their monetization model. The more we stay focused on, “Hey, where can AI help me unlock new ways to connect?”

[00:16:39] Tessa Burg: I, that’s what I really love about translation, because that used to be very cost-prohibitive. It used to be t- too time-consuming. And so you might be able to do so- a really cool, quick campaign in a couple countries, but never before could you connect with everyone all at once in a global scale.

[00:16:55] Tessa Burg: And, that’s, super exciting, but human-centric. and I don’t know if it saved money or not, but it certainly allowed the brand to do something and connect with their audience in a way that was not possible in the past. And that’s where I think the combination of BeReal kind of having this approach to social media about shared experiences, and brands staying true to who they are to be, to want to participate in that shared experience in a way the customers value, is just a great combination.

[00:17:26] Ben Moore: I agree.

[00:17:27] Tessa Burg: It’s also very rare to hear about, because there is so much hype and so many headlines crowding the space. But when we look at Q4, and there are a lot of bright spots coming out, what brands have you seen do a really good job make the most of that moment so far?

[00:17:49] Ben Moore: I’d say that, Q4 is all about the holidays and, the Black Fridays, and all of these, events that, really, culturally speaking, users are, engaged, with platforms. they show up because they wanna buy something, and I’d say that with BeReal, CPG retail brands, have been really, adopting Q4 or adopting the platform to show up, during this, this very important quarter of the year.

[00:18:13] Ben Moore: And, the… Yeah, the brands that, that, I was gonna say success the most, but that get it, just get it. They understand that with BeReal, having the most polished content or trying to, just replicate their strategy, that they have on other platforms to BeReal doesn’t resonate, doesn’t get that level of trust, that they can effectively get by just leveraging the platform itself.

[00:18:36] Ben Moore: And during Q4, we love to see brands, really adopting the native codes of BeReal, which is the front and back camera, as you, … described it earlier. being very, so the least polished possible, sorry. And, yeah, just, also trying to, d- to show up during those moments, those cultural moments, whether it’s Black Friday or the holidays, or something else, Thanksgiving, for instance, where people are trying to reconnect, with their friends or their families that they, that they follow on BeReal.

[00:19:04] Ben Moore: So yeah, it’s all about, being, very, authentic in the content that you, that you decide to post, as an ad or that you, decide to launch on BeReal, organically, but also being very, culturally, intentional about the, the event, that you pick to, to display, your, your advertising messages.

[00:19:24] Tessa Burg: I love it. And then what’s next for BeReal as a platform as we head into 2027? Is there anything you’re looking forward to? Do you have any big launches or activations coming up?

[00:19:36] Ben Moore: We do have a few, interesting updates. So we, are bringing back one of the most, interesting feature, which is called the Behind the Scenes, which, was, one of the features that people used to love on BeReal.

[00:19:48] Ben Moore: We took it away and then by, because of so many users asked for us to bring it back, we’re bringing it back in Q4 in the next release of the version. So that’s product-wise. It’s a s- it’s a small video that plays, as you capture your content, and it’s a bit like, your, iPhone, photos if you take them live with this, little, feature.

[00:20:07] Ben Moore: You can see, two, three seconds of video, as you capture the content, especially the picture. So there’s that product-wise, but overall, the vision is to keep growing, to, keep, delivering new features that help our, 40 million users to stay connected to one another, to show up auth-authentically, hopefully to have a better adoption of the video, which is our growing, part of the, the adoption of the product.

[00:20:33] Ben Moore: and yeah, overall, keep, continuing to, work with brands and agencies that are trying to diversify, their, media strategy with new platforms, new channels, and hopefully convince them that BeReal is, yeah, effectively the only platform, that can, bring that, primetime moment that they used to have on TV because of the random notification that is so iconic, again, for our users and because the…

[00:20:58] Ben Moore: of the, the fact that there’s no upload, no filters on BeReal, and once you post, you scroll through, 10, 20 other posts, and then there’s no algorithm keep… that keeps refreshing, the feed. There is that end-of-feed message. There is a finite feed on BeReal. That is, something we, we care about because we’re not optimizing for time spent.

[00:21:20] Ben Moore: We’re optimizing for that presence, that attention that we, talked earlier, which for me is, overall, beyond BeReal in the social ecosystem, the most, important, thing we should talk about. How do we make sure that, the proof of life, the proof of human is, is, yeah, is being, demonstrated, is being verified across all social channels?

[00:21:42] Tessa Burg: Now, Ben, we’re at time. Thank you so much for joining us today. This has been a fascinating conversation, and I hope the advertisers and agencies explore BeReal. 85% of Gen Z globally for primetime moments, you really cannot replicate that anywhere else. And as someone who experienced it firsthand, it is magical.

[00:22:06] Tessa Burg: It is And I love being a part as a brand, as an agency of that light, of that moment of, happiness and joy when you make those connections simultaneously with the ones you care most about. so excited to see where BeReal goes, and thanks again for joining us.

[00:22:22] Ben Moore: Thank you so much, Tessa.

[00:22:23] Tessa Burg: If listeners want to ask you questions, where can they find you?

[00:22:28] Ben Moore: You can find me on LinkedIn, but they can also find me on BeReal. my handle is ben3, the number three, more. happy to connect, and just like our CEO and, and founder, Alex, happy to, yeah, to read your comments about what we should improve or, what other, features we should, work on.

[00:22:46] Tessa Burg: Awesome. And if you want to hear more episodes of Leader Generation, you can find them on our website at modop.com/podcast or just search Leader Generation wherever you listen to podcasts. Until next time, enjoy the pretty good weather in San Francisco and California.

[00:23:06] Ben Moore: Thank you, Tessa.

[00:23:08] Tessa Burg: Bye.