Baby boomers more digital than ever

The Silver Summit at the Consumer Electronic Show was quite an experience.  The program put together by Susan Walker, Robin Raskin and Mike Sarfartti was great! Eric Dishman of Intel gave a compelling presentation on the need for reform on Digital Health. He shared three important trends: Demographic Disruption and showed a map of what the world would look like in 2020; Technology Disruption and Economic Disruption. These three forces together cause a need for innovation and reform. I had the privilege of hosting a panel on lifestyles. Lee Ranie, of Pew Internet Research group gave an important update on the changes of the boomers regarding 2.0 media. He gave the following data points of boomer use of 2.0 media in 2008: 74% use the Internet, 62% have broadband at home; 72% use a cell phone, and 43% connect to the Internet wirelessly.. What is new and important is the move toward fast, mobile computing among the boomers.  

The ‘other news’ according to Pew is the growth of social networking applications. Pew research cited the following: 91% of the boomers use search engines; 78% search in health care, 30% use online ratings, 38% share video feeds, 26% read blogs, 17% share creations, 16% have a social network profile, and 7% blog.

 Also on the panel, Howard Byck, shared the latest strategy regarding the lifestyle area at AARP. He discussed the uber environmental trends of increasing singledom, delayed retirement, going green and technology. He also talked about the AARP member’s (40 million strong) unmet needs for control, thriftiness, desire to stay fit and achieve peace of mind. These trends and needs were important to their new strategy for products and services related to travel and entertainment, discounts health and wellness, lifelong learning, technology products and services and pets. 

 The increase of boomers using social media is why we decided to make that an anchor theme for the What’s Next Boomer Summit (www.boomersummit.com) in Las Vegas on March 19. In this down economy, every dollar spent has to matter. We want to help our conference sponsors and attendees develop sales strategies that can work in this new economy. With consumers spending less, it simply takes more of them to meet 2009 goals.  Finding more business means a fresh look at new strategies and new distribution channels.

Hope you will be joining us on March 19 in Las Vegas.

Mary Furlong

Is marketing to baby boomers going to change?

The economy is taking its toll on baby boomers.  Those on the leading edge — late 50s and early 60s – have seen their retirement dreams deflate along with their 401(k) accounts.

So what’s it going to change about their lifestyle and their attitude?

We’ve spent a lot of time as marketers getting into their psyche, researching them from every angle — does it all still stick? And if it doesn’t, what has changed?  Or are we going to have to find new marketing messages to reach baby boomer customers?

This is one of the big topics we’ll be talking about at the conference in March.  What do you think?  What are you seeing in the behavior of your customers and prospects?