Another age-related rant from Adweek.com…
Is the Nation’s Richest Market Virtually Ignored?
65-plus -- Is there anyone in the agency business remotely close to that age?
By Piet Verbeck
The advertising business seems to be way out of touch with one of the fastest growing and certainly the richest market of all: 65-plus. The reason could be that there is nearly no one in the agency business even remotely close to that age.
At age 65, most people in America don’t just start living on a tiny fixed income in a small condo and then shuffle off to the nursing home. They begin, in fact, to consider how they will spend the money that they have spent their life accumulating. That money, dear friends, is more than two-thirds of the nation’s financial wealth. In 2030, the 65-plus population will double to about 71.5 million, so please listen up.
Sixty-five-plus is the time for us to travel to places we’ve never seen, move to places we’ve always wanted to live, shed our work clothes and buy some cool vines, buy toys for our grandkids, communicate and buy on the Web, and work on our bodies to stay in shape. In short, 65-plus is a whole new life for a huge market that’s never seen so much money and never had so much time.
It’s a pity the advertising business has such a hard time relating to these people. Think they already do? Look at the spots on the nightly news tonight or check out CNN during the day. Most of the ads are done without an ounce of feeling, care or creativity.
You know people have to be coaxed into watching a commercial. So why don’t you coax the 65-plus market. Instead, you yawn, bang out the facts, shove the spots on the tube and run them with jackhammer frequency. Here’s news: You cannot bore this market into buying, not any more. We are not really interested in what the Flying Nun thinks about our bones, what Florence Henderson thinks about our pets, what Ed McMahon thinks about our bathrooms or what Robert Wagner wants us to do with our mortgages.
[Read the full lecture here.]
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