K-pop idols want to be your friend. No really, they do. Watch a live video on YouTube or the  Korean platform Weverse (where groups might debrief with their fans after a big concert), celebrate with them before an album release, or just casually hang out in their dorm room, dressed in PJs and eating a late night snack. Stay on long enough and you might start to think that they know you as much as you know them. 

This is a hallmark of K-pop’s wide-reaching popularity—the way idols generate familial closeness with their fans through chatting online and in person, behind-the-scenes videos, and dozens of variety show appearances. It’s a foolproof way to keep a fanbase fully engaged outside of regular music promotions, and it’s incredibly important for international fans who aren’t able to go to in-person fan meetings and local concerts.

But as social media has shifted into an era that embraces newer, more fast-paced modes of communication such as short-form video, casual fans might have less time—and less attention—to spend on hour-long live videos. Perhaps more importantly, international fans—who continue to make up a large percentage of K-pop listeners (a 2023 report stated that the K-pop industry made $900 million from overseas revenue)—often struggle with the language barriers that prevent them from watching their favorite groups talk to them live or chat with them on Korean messaging apps. 

As K-pop continues to spread across the globe, a few emerging groups are adapting to newer, easy-access forms of communication: the sexy-chic KISS OF LIFE, cutesy-pop ILLIT, and emotional pop star RIIZE. Only a year past their debut, these three groups have managed to quickly gain dedicated fans by meeting them where they are: casually, collaboratively, and conversationally.

Promoting Casual Charm Over Music

KISS OF LIFE makes music that sounds like the golden, R&B-tinged pop of the ‘90s—brassy synths, bold choruses, and sultry vocals. But the three most popular posts on the quartet’s TikTok channel—which currently boasts over 500 videos—don’t feature their newest tunes. With 16.3M views, 2.5M likes, and almost 10,000 comments, KISS OF LIFE’s top post is a video of members Natty and Julie dancing to an unreleased Beyoncé song: “Donk,” a snippet of which went viral in spring of this year. The short, 14-second snippet features the two oldest members moving with a sensual smoothness that most fans have come to expect from the group’s best dancers. In contrast, the top TikTok posts from similar emerging girl groups like tripleS, YOUNG POSSE, and Loosemble only have 782.7K, 548K and 295.5K likes respectively, while most feature the groups promoting their own music. 

Rarely do K-pop idols seem as in control of their sexuality as the members of KISS OF LIFE, and while it shouldn’t be assumed that the group has total freedom over their musical and brand identity, the group’s non-promotional content shows a side that is playfully freewheeling. That fun, breezy attitude resonates with their primarily female, international fanbase who prefer to follow the group through short-form video and static posts rather than solely listen to their music—in a combined audience analysis of Instagram, TikTok, Youtube, and Spotify, 33.3% and 32.3% of KISS OF LIFE’s follower count comes from Instagram and TikTok respectively, while 15.5% comes from Spotify. 

In July, KISS OF LIFE released their biggest hit to date, “Sticky.” The cheerful tune is addicting both to listen and watch, with eye-catching, booty-popping choreography set along a rippling tropical beat. It’s also a natural next step for a group that was more well known for darker, R&B-tinged pop—with a release timed for the summer sun, KISS OF LIFE could seamlessly transfer their sex-positive spirit into a brighter concept that would quickly captivated fans and casual listeners. Captivate it did: Since July, “Sticky” has stayed in the top half of Korea’s Melon music chart, and in the top 5 songs for the past six weeks. Notably, the track’s release led to substantial growth on the social platforms they thrive on. KISS OF LIFE saw their Instagram and TikTok followers grow by 33% respectively. Summer may be ending, but KISS OF LIFE’s rising stardom seems all but assured.

An Embedded Fandom Boosts Cross-Collaboration Across Platforms

Not many idols can say that they had a massive fan base months before their debut, unless they were on a globally-aired survival show like ILLIT was. The girl group’s dreamy debut EP wasn’t released until March 2024, but their social brand had been building since September 2023, when the Hybe Entertainment-produced reality competition show, R U Next? aired its finale episode to pick the group’s final five members through a combination of fan votes and label decisions. 

In the hours after the finale, ILLIT’s social accounts wasted no time introducing its new members to the world, releasing exclusive photos and videos across Instagram and YouTube for each young star. With an average of 78K Instagram likes and 135.5k YouTube views in those ten days after the finale episode, ILLIT’s fan engagement before their official debut was modest at best—compared to the first Instagram post from another recent girl group that formed from a survival show, izna, the difference is Instagram likes is over 200K. But ILLIT’s fan engagement rate (ratio of likes to followers) was uniquely higher than other groups: going into November 2023, their Instagram Engagement rate was at 35%, 10% higher when compared to another young, popular girl group, BABYMONSTER. And as of September 17, ILLIT’s TikTok engagement rate stands at 14.39%, which is significantly higher than their star labelmates, NewJeans, currently at 7.07% as of September 17. 

With a constant stream of content on all social media platforms ILLIT could spend time training in six months preparing for their debut while also satisfying their many dedicated fans—95% of which are outside of South Korea—in the month before their official debut, ILLIT saw their Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube following grow by 17%, 28%, and 8% respectively. By the time their first EP SUPER REAL ME dropped on March 25, ILLIT’s audience was so embedded into the fandom that it could mobilize quickly to support the group by streaming and creating content on short-form video apps. ILLIT’s already impressive growth exploded thanks to viral short-form content by the group and their fans on Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts—by 173%, 146%, and 109% respectively.

The subsequent success of “Magnetic” likely could have spread just by the song’s charm alone: its lo-fi, demure sound fit well with an audience that had enjoyed similar songs like Fifty Fifty’s “Cupid” and labelmate NewJeans’ “Super Shy.” But ILLIT’s boost to fame was no doubt spurred by a fandom eager to hop on dance challenges, fashion updates, and even prestige TV sets. The second most viewed TikTok using the “Magnetic” sound isn’t by ILLIT but a fan account, where it currently sits at 50.1M views and 3.6M likes; by contrast, ILLIT’s top TikTok using the “Magnetic” sound has 39.7M views and 3.3M likes. ILLIT’s early social engagement strategy no doubt gave them a robust fandom who could lead their faves to an explosive start in the K-pop scene.

Meeting Fans Where They Are

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The first photo on RIIZE’s Instagram page isn’t the glossy photoshoot that we’ve come to expect from K-pop idols, but a blurry mirror shot in a practice room. The post—released in July of last year and two months before RIIZE’s official debut in September 2023—is perhaps most reflective of the way newer idols are communicating with fans in a fast-paced digital age. RIIZE’s introduction, as imperfect as it looked, gained immediate attention because they appeared less like idols and more like regular humans. The post currently has 550K likes, over 400K more than the first, more professionally-looking Instagram posts of other similarly-aged idol groups like TWS (164K) and BOYNEXTDOOR (110K).

RIIZE’s laid back casualness has created an incredibly close bond between the boy band and its fandom on social accounts. RIIZE’s TikTok channel is known to reply to fans, comment on fan creations, and even make stitch videos that teach dance movements or respond to silly observations. And, to account for their primarily international fanbase (only 17% of their estimated overall audience is based on South Korea) all those comments, TikTok captions, and personal day-in-the-life videos are in English—a sharp contrast compared to most K-pop idol feeds. While RIIZE still uses their social accounts to promote their own music and record dance challenges, the members clearly want to do it in their own fun and goofy way, like by dancing to their funky track “Boom Boom Bass” in hotel bathrobes, or being silly on a music video set.

This isn’t to say that RIIZE’s talent is overshadowed through their social presence—it’s actually far from the case. The group’s music—what they often call “emotional pop” in press—is bright, energetic, and matched with frenetic yet totally synchronized choreography. Most of RIIZE’s most popular posts on Instagram and TikTok are dance challenges with fellow idols like ENHYPEN and aespa. All of RIIZE’s eight singles have charted on the Circle Digital Chart in Korea, widely considered as the Korean equivalent of the Billboard Hot 100. But it’s the way RIIZE interacts and plays with their fans that allows the members to relax and goof off without feeling pressure to maintain constant idol-like poise, earning them significant TikTok popularity—the group’s average TikTok likes currently stands at 243M, higher than peers like TWS, BOYNEXTDOOR, and ZEROBASEONE. Meanwhile, fans have lovingly taken notice of RIIZE’s effort to communicate with them on their playground.

Visualizations by Sarah Kloboves; cover image by Crasianne Tirado