{"id":198,"date":"2010-10-14T18:05:51","date_gmt":"2010-10-15T02:05:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/?p=198"},"modified":"2010-12-03T04:43:55","modified_gmt":"2010-12-03T12:43:55","slug":"targeting-the-elderly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/2010\/10\/14\/targeting-the-elderly\/","title":{"rendered":"Targeting the Elderly"},"content":{"rendered":"

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As the Baby Boomer generation ages, the opportunities for targeting the elderly, as a market\u00a0segment, expand. Seemingly, entrepreneurs throughout North America would do well to\u00a0focus their efforts on fulfilling the needs of this population within the next decade or two. There are a number of potential difficulties likely to arise in targeting this segment, however. Can segmentation\u00a0on the basis of such a broad demographic, age, be beneficial? Of course the elderly population is a key focus of businesses such as pharmaceutical companies, medical equipment suppliers, certain individual-dwelling apartment developers and banks but the\u00a0majority of popular marketing campaigns in the media are still directed towards younger generations. Why is this so? The current elderly segment of the population (60 years +) consists of a substantial population already, it is growing at a much faster rate than any other (age) demographic and this demographic possesses a significant amount of\u00a0\u00a0money.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, maybe this group is the most financially conservative and wary about spending their money on new and fancy products created for them. This generation does possess greater financial wisdom and experience than younger generations. Many of them\u00a0have come from simpler times and not fully adapted (as this is\u00a0unnecessary in order to maintain their traditional lifestyles) to modern and changing technology.\u00a0If this is a valid reason for the current lack of advertising towards the elderly, the situation is likely to change drastically as more of the baby boomer generation who have lived with technologies such as computers and cellphones for significant portions of their lives age. As this change occurs, the major North American companies that intend to be around for years to come will likely be forced to reconsider whether or not they currently offer the right mix of products and services to their elderly customers.<\/p>\n

Maybe the approach in targeting the elderly is through their children. As the elderly have\u00a0traditionally been significant benefactors of their children’s lifestyles, a continued focus on younger\u00a0generations\u00a0may continue to be as valid as it has been. The younger\u00a0demographic certainly retains its marketing appeal as more and more “adult” children graduate from college or university and begin to live financially through their elderly parents. In any case, the weight that this growing segment will place on companies throughout North American and other places\u00a0around\u00a0the world will not go unobserved.<\/p>\n

For more creative observations and unique insights into the world of marketing, check out Seth’s Blog<\/a>.\u00a0He has some of the most interesting posts of any marketing blog I’ve seen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the Baby Boomer generation ages, the opportunities for targeting the elderly, as a market\u00a0segment, expand. Seemingly, entrepreneurs throughout North America would do well to\u00a0focus their efforts on fulfilling the needs of this population within the next decade or two. There are a number of potential difficulties likely to arise in targeting this segment, however. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1620,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[141],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marketing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1620"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":300,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198\/revisions\/300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lfast\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}