Texas State student named inaugural Gen Z voice of the year

She’s a marketing student with a concentration in sales and a minor in theatre. She competes in national sales pitch competitions, has built a growing presence as a social media influencer, and now – she’s been named Gen Z voice of the year by Her Campus Media, a top online magazine and digital media platform written by and for college women and Gen Z.

Kylie Hill, a senior at Texas State University’s McCoy College of Business, is showing everyone you can do it all.

The Her Campus Media team flew Hill to New York earlier this summer to attend the InfluencerHer Awards at #HerConference26, where she accepted the award. She was selected from thousands of applicants through a combination of public voting and an internal review by the organization.

"It’s a big title to give to one person,” she said. “There are so many Gen Z voices that I can't take all of the cake, but for that to be given to me, I feel like that means speaking with authenticity and being unafraid to be bold and unapologetically yourself [will get you recognized]."

The Gen Z Voice of the Year award recognizes a creator who is authentic, shapes conversations, and represents Gen Z's voice.

“All of these people have been in the social media space for a while and have very defined brands,” Hill said of the other nominees. “Seeing myself among them made me think, ‘Oh, wow, I must be doing something right.’ It was a full circle moment."

Finding Her Voice

When Hill started posting videos to social media two years ago, she wasn't trying to become the voice of a generation. In fact, she wasn't entirely convinced she wanted to become a content creator at all.

Her content creation journey began at Texas State. She previously served as co-director of NOVA Marketing Agency (formerly BOKO Marketing Agency), a student-led marketing agency within the American Marketing Association that worked with small businesses in the San Marcos area. The agency specialized in short-form video content, giving Hill some of her first experience creating content.

It was her mother who eventually encouraged her to turn the camera toward herself.

“My mom was like, ‘Kylie, you post all of these things for other brand pages, but you don't have anything on your own, so you don't really carry it with you,’” she said. “I told her that's called being an influencer, and I felt like it was scary. I don't want people to think I'm a try-hard. And she said, ‘Well, you are a try-hard.’”

Hill initially worried about how friends and classmates might react. Still, she began experimenting, posting videos about coffee shops, “a day in the life” — a popular trend about the daily lives of content creators — and whatever else caught her attention. There was no strategic curation behind the early posts.

"I was just throwing noodles at the wall," Hill said.

Over time, Hill found that not following what everyone else was doing could become one of her strengths. A video comparing the Marvel and Barbie universes gained significantly more attention than her previous content and made her realize what resonated with viewers: her ability to talk directly to the camera and offer her own perspective.

“It just clicked,” she said.

Today, Hill produces content through her digital brand, "Cordially, Kylie," while serving as director of social media at MyLeadGuys in the Greater Houston area. She previously was one of four students selected for Texas Monthly's inaugural summer 2026 sales internship program.

"I think that conveniently enough, all of the things that I juggle kind of coincide with one another," Hill said. "At the core, it comes down to: I like building communities, and I enjoy talking to people."

As Hill's audience grows, authenticity is central to her strategy. Rather than building every post around the latest online trend, she often draws ideas from conversations with friends, pop culture, or moments from her everyday life.

Her goal, she said, is to "make social media feel a little bit more real."

It's also the lesson she would pass along to other Texas State students interested in content creation, marketing, or building a personal brand. Hill remembers worrying about whether her first posts would seem "cringy" or whether people would judge content that wasn't immediately successful.

“Just do it,” she said. “Embrace who you are more uniquely as a human versus trying to follow advice pages on social media about how to thrive, get followers, and people to engage with your videos. It's really easy to fall into those traps and try to make it formulaically correct when there is no right way to do social media.”

Hill is scheduled to graduate in May 2027, but she isn't limiting herself to one vision. Her experience with Texas Monthly gave her a closer look at a potential career in sales, while the continued growth of "Cordially, Kylie" has opened another path.

For now, she is comfortable allowing those possibilities to develop together.

"I will believe myself to be successful as long as I am continually pushing and being passionate about things every day." ✯