Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

This category seems awful quiet for a forum set up for the fastest growing
start up generation, so I thought I`d set a ball rolling, asking boomers for
their opinion as to how best to market to boomers.

Ever since rock and roll we`ve been an independent lot and my guess is the
older we get, the more independent we get. This means the marketing guys
have real trouble deciding how to catch our attention.

So what is the best way to get new messages across to boomers, and
persuade them to try something new?

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Serious about focussing your business on customers?
visit us at http://www.frontofficebox.com

It seems the only way to get a Boomer to do something is when it will benefit them financially, health, and activities to keep them aware of other boomers. Think about products that they need like the AARP. If these terms are involve in your product text, you will get your business off the ground rather quickly.

Boomers have never cared about anything except instant gratification, for the most part. Yes, I know I`m totally generalizing, but we`re old enough that we`re starting to show some historic trend information.

Overall, the boomers split into two general categories. We began back in the mid-60s with two premises. The one was to "do your own thing, man." ("Man," for those of you youngsters, means the same thing as "doode.")

The other half of the generation decided to continue with the traditional values of getting a job, working until 65 to retire, buy a house, raise a family, and have an investment portfolio.

It all worked fine for about 25 years until AOL (America OnLine) became popular. At that point, the two halves of the generation came back together to compare notes. Those who`d lived as "rolling stones," doing their own thing, and focusing on personal satisfaction, had few real assets. They felt they`d missed out on security and tradition.

Those who`d raised the families, built the assets, felt they`d missed out on all the adventures and personal "growth" that was going on. So the two sides looked at each other over the fence. Then came the dot-com bust, Enron, and 9/11.

In one, fell swoop, a huge number of investment portfolios and retirement plans were wiped out. Whole pension funds went under, and all sorts of markets began to collapse. Outsourcing and early-retirement pushed a whole lot of those traditionalists out into the cold. And so there came a sort of equalizing effect.

I think that the current situation is a sort of "shock" situation. Many boomers have followed the rules, grown up conservatively, and watched everything collapse. The other half, tending still toward the liberal outlook of the antiwar folks, rock `n` roll good-time adventure are getting too old for that kind of nonsense, but have nothing to show for it.

Because of the way we grew up---with no problems in the real sense---I think the general sense of the boomers is that they want some sort of security. We remember those "silly old establisment parents" of ours, who had a long-time job, a retirement plan, owned their home, and had little debt. They got to old age with a spouse/companion, retired, got to enjoy their grandkids, and died.

We laughed and pointed, and did our best to overturn that whole "stupid" thing, claiming it was unrealistic, lost in "Leave it to Beaver-ville." Power to the Revolution, Man....and we tore it all down.

Now it`s gone...we`re the same age...and by gosh, there`s that old Reality staring us in the face. Where`s the security? Gone.

Why didn’t someone tell me it was time to give up and there is no hope?

I am a boomer…I manage multiple ventures daily…I am active in local government, non-profit and environmental projects...I like helping businesses getting started…I like rock’n roll and country…I am helping my kids start their own businesses…I run, hike, bicycle and/or kayak over 40-50 miles every week…When I travel or workout I listen to podcasts…Email is my life blood and I hate SPAM…I feel like our government is trying to destroy all I work for…I feel like I can never get everything I want to do done…I plan to work to the day I die and enjoy every minute.  Most of my friends in my age group do many of the same things and feel the same way.  

From Craig’s post I am not sure if I am fit the profile of a boomer.  But to market to me you will only have a few seconds to get my attention and it better hit one of my hot buttons in the same amount of time.  I can tell you that marketing to any boomers like me will be hard.  It will be interesting to hear what others have to say.



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Bert at Harvey Software, Inc.
Multi-Carrier Shipping Software and Supply Chain Solutions for Internet Retailers

Also a provider of free shipping information and resources at Harvey Software`s Parcel Shipping Blog along with free tracking solutions at TrackingPage.com...

Bert, in case you missed the memo: We`re Doomed!


I think what I was trying to say is that Boomers want a return to the security we experienced growing up, then got rid of, then discovered mattered. Remember the old Joni Mitchell line, "paved paradise; put up a parking lot?" Then there`s the associated, "ya don`t know what you`ve got till it`s gone."

So to market to boomers, all one needs to do is demonstrate that the item will support their sense of security in an increasingly chaotic world. Easy....right? :-)

Consider Bert`s post. WHY is he, like countless other boomers, doing all these things and running his own business? Why is he teaching his kids that self-reliance? Because unless you`re running things on your own, you`re also increasingly likely to be sidelined.

Another line from a much older song, "God bless the child who`s got his own."

All that high-speed rushin` around Bert`s doing is to push the business, increase the family fortune, and somehow protect some of it from a growing amoeba of a giant Government that`s taking it all away. It`s a desire to get back to the basic values we grew up with, where you earned money, got to keep a lot of it, then enjoyed the things you could buy with that money.

It just takes a whole lot more energy and speed to do it these days.

O.K. Saxmansteve and Raisecapital02 or any others at SuN, Craig and I have outlined the demographics of most boomers.  I have a Boomer Widget I want to sell to boomers, how would you market to this group?

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Bert at Harvey Software, Inc.
Multi-Carrier Shipping Software and Supply Chain Solutions for Internet Retailers

Also a provider of free shipping information and resources at Harvey Software`s Parcel Shipping Blog along with free tracking solutions at TrackingPage.com...

Bert

actually I kicked this off because I`m interested in marketing to boomers,
have some ideas and keen to get more.

For the record I`m right in the "not done yet" boomer bracket with you,
and trying to do something really modern in a market where the boomers
are the people making it happen.

I don`t think these people get influenced much by advertising or direct
sales. To my mind their only influences are people they know - family,
friends, people they do business with or members of the same networks.

Gladwell explains in the Tipping Point the role of Morvens - people who
stay in touch with what`s happening and pass on the good news to the
guys who don`t.

So the answer would seem to be viral marketing and there needs to be
something in the product/service which drives the passing of the
message.   The question is how to kick it off and interest enough people
to get to the tipping point. Seems to me readers of Start up Nation are
mostly in the Morven category and so are better placed to know how they
can be reached.

Understanding this better will certainly help me and probably a lot of
other readers here.

The stats we saw in the original post for this forum show us boomers
starting their own businesses is a phenomena which, along with other
things, will bring big changes to the business world, and opportunities
for all of us - it we can figure it out.


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Serious about focussing your business on customers?
visit us at http://www.frontofficebox.com

I agree that viral marketing is one good approach and I agree with everything else you are saying too.  It is my opinion that boomers can see a sales pitch coming a mile off and will throw up walls to block it immediately.  I have also feel that some of our current low unemployment statistics (when there has been so many layoffs) is because boomers would rather start a business of their own than collect unemployment.  Regardless how risky the new business they start would be.  Yes, this is a tough group to market to because they are in self-preservation mode.

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Bert at Harvey Software, Inc.
Multi-Carrier Shipping Software and Supply Chain Solutions for Internet Retailers

Also a provider of free shipping information and resources at Harvey Software`s Parcel Shipping Blog along with free tracking solutions at TrackingPage.com...

Bert

thanks for that.

Seems to me the way to get to boomers is to put them in control.

They`re responsible people who understand hard work and expect it to
make life better. That`s the way most of us were brought up and we still
want to define our world, for ourselves, and for others.

Over the last few years other generations have done what they can to
marginalise us, but it hasn`t worked. We`re still the "My Generation"
generation.

I guess most of us plan to keep doing it. 60 is the new 40, and when we
get there 70 will be the new 40.

Sounds coooool to me!

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Serious about focussing your business on customers?
visit us at http://www.frontofficebox.com

Actually, I don`t agree that boomers don`t get hooked with regular advertising. But how about if we change that to modern advertising with loud, raucous, noise?

I watch movie trailers or culture-type products as they`re advertised and it sort of reminds me of an acid trip. LOL! That`s another thing we were in to---hallucinogens--where today, not as much! ANYway...it`s all like strobe lights, noise, disjointed jumble. I hate that.

First, when I see a marketing device, I want it to make sense. It has to actually tell me something about the product. Movie trailers are a great example because so often they tell me nothing at all, they just "sound" like there`s urgency and excitement involved. I want to know the outline of the plot.

Secondly, I`m tired and older. I don`t want a sound-byte bunch of over-stated hype. I`m "skeptical," I think, based on "never trust the establishment" and "don`t trust anyone over 30," and all those other slogans. I want to know what the product is, what it does, who`s making money from it, and whether or not it`s a cool thing.

I also would make an argument that the boomer generation "may" be the last generation that actually experienced some sort of substance, rather the unbelievable superficiality of today`s culture. We had to still know how to read, write, and do `rithmatic when we got out of school.

Gen-X and "Y" seem to have benefited from the steeper curve of the dumbing down of America. They seem more attracted to that superficiality, glitz, flashiness, and "bling-bling." They don`t seem as analytic or as concerned about a wider context.

Boomers tend to also want to know how a product will make their overall life better. We also are at an age where we`re starting to really wonder "what`s it all about." There were two influential songs: "What`s it all about, Alfie," and "Is that all there is?" Remember those? The songs don`t matter---the titles do, because they stick in the mind.

So a third aspect of marketing to boomers, I think, involves longevity of the product and its quality. Our fathers often came back from WWII and complained about that "damn Japanese junk." Of course today that`s 180-degress the other way, but we remember "products built to last."

Everything today seems a commodity, made to throw away if it breaks, with nothing lasting longer than it takes to get it out of the package.