Seven Principles for Marketing to Seniors

At Maricich, a number of our healthcare, hospital and ophthalmic marketing programs are targeted to senior audiences. Whether the marketing plan targets a Medicare Advantage plan or products and services related to lens replacement procedures—the same basic principles apply when reaching senior audiences. We thought we’d share some of our knowledge within this subject.

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Thanks to advances in nutrition and medicine, Americans are living longer than ever. The elderly population in our country represents one-third of the population, and is growing faster than any other segment of society.

What images come to mind when you think of the senior citizen consumer market? Do images of stodgy penny-pinchers abound? While grumpy old men and women are out there, these typecasts are far too narrow-minded to fit everyone ages 50 and up. Seniors are actually a diverse group with considerable spending power.

Overlooking the interests of seniors when creating a marketing campaign could mean missing out on the world’s largest consumer audience. Why are seniors such a desirable audience for marketers? And what factors need to be considered when marketing to seniors?

Why market to seniors?

The U.S. Census Bureau predicts that by the year 2030, the over-65 age group will reach 70 million, representing 20 percent of the total U.S. population. The aging of baby-boomers (the 76 million Americans born after the end of WWII in 1945) and increasing life expectancy are factors behind this rise in numbers. Not only are they a very large group in numbers—it is estimated that people age 50 and over control 70 percent of the total net worth of U.S. households - representing an enormous amount of buying power.


What are the steps to take in effectively marketing to a senior audience?

1. Evaluate who your audience is

AARP (the American Association of Retired Persons) membership begins at age 50. At the turn of the century, age 50 was considered a life expectancy. Now people at age 50 might have half their life left to look forward to! With today’s active lifestyles, many new AARP members probably don’t have much in common with the organization’s older constituents. And many people don’t consider themselves ‘senior’ until they have reached the over-65 mark. In order to clarify whom you’re targeting, it might help to group seniors into different sets: for instance, pre-retirees are 50 to 61, retirees are 62 to 74, and older retirees are 75 and up.

Seniors are not one uniform group. Thinking that all seniors are sedentary and cantankerous is a major selling mistake. Because of the wide range in people who are considered ‘seniors’, many are actually vibrant, active, and young-minded people. Huge portions of seniors are technologically savvy and interested in active lifestyles.

2. Determine your audience’s priorities.

Research has shown that the two greatest priorities of the over-65 age group are health and financial security. For most seniors, having enough capital to live on during retirement is an overriding concern that drives their purchasing behavior. While most have established a ‘nest egg’ meant to last throughout their retirement, many still worry over potential unexpected expenditures, and try to plan accordingly.

Other major concerns and interests of mature audiences include caretaking, wellness and fitness, travel and leisure, spirituality, finding new romance, beauty products and treatments, sports, restaurant dining, philanthropy and charity work, advocacy, and family. Specific concerns of seniors in your area can be determined through research and community outreach.

Marketers must be careful, however, when communicating to seniors on topics such as medical conditions and financial concerns for their final years. If not done well, seniors may find some of these messages to be condescending or stereotypical. Senior experts advise that most seniors regard themselves as ‘young inside’ at every age. Keeping things upbeat and focused on the vibrancy of seniors is a better approach.


3. Acknowledge the differences

Though many seniors are active and perfectly healthy, they are many who have health issues that might affect their view of the world. Mobility, hearing, and vision problems abound within the senior population. Many seniors are facing new situations due to the loss of a life partner, and many are watching every penny to stretch their planned retirement savings.

Keeping these issues in mind when preparing to market to a senior crowd is essential. For printed materials, legibility is important. All materials should be printed on high quality paper with non-glaring finishes, in colors that contrast well from a reading standpoint, using minimum font sizes of 12 to 14 points. Stores should consider having legible signage as well as low volumes on any in-store music.

Relaxed environments with available seating, straightforward navigation, and easily accessible entryways are always attractive to those with physical limitations. Community-oriented settings are huge draw for seniors who might be battling loneliness, so having living room settings and refreshments will allow people to feel at home. Finally, businesses should always have a friendly face on hand to answer questions—establishing a welcoming atmosphere is appealing to all demographic groups.

4. Understand their place in life

Experts suggest that seniors' greatest fears often center on isolation and loss of independence. For this reason, safety and sense of security are strong selling points when marketing to seniors. Any hidden meanings or fine print will be a major turn-off to a senior audience that craves stability and familiarity.

Traditional business approaches that come across as honest and customary are draws to senior audiences, who may be wary of being swindled. ‘Brick and mortar’ operations seem stable to mature audiences. ‘Nostalgic marketing’ is a concept often applied when targeting a senior audience—seniors are often drawn to familiar, throwback styles that hearken back to the days of ‘mom and pop’ business operations. One of the most famous examples of this is the Cracker Barrel Old Country Store and Restaurants—their old-fashioned eatery style has won great acclaim for its appeal to mature audiences.


5. Recognize that seniors have wisdom and life experience

Don’t neglect the fact that seniors know a thing or two about life. In recent years, threats of identity theft have created a new breed of highly suspicious senior. They have gathered their nest egg, and are interested in protecting it and making the most of it. Seniors are often wary of new propositions and deals that sound too good to be true.

For this reason, seniors are often very brand-loyal consumers. They have likely learned over the years that quality translates into value, so they are often willing to pay more for a brand they know and trust. New entries into any market should work on establishing their credibility and reliability through marketing in order to win over a mature audience. But don’t let brand-loyalty make you think seniors aren’t open to change: they generally are, but are shrewd enough to want their short-term spending to translate into long-run value.

6. Consider launching senior programs

Whether it be a ‘senior discount’, having a consultant on hand who caters to seniors, or organizing a grandparents outing, having a special program for seniors will help establish your company as senior-friendly. Word-of-mouth can travel quickly amongst older consumers, since many are involved in leisure activities with other seniors or live in community settings. Making a name for your organization as a place that caters to the specific needs of the mature market could be a terrific boon to your organization.

Other ideas to attract mature audiences include having a toll-free phone number. This will make it clear to all audiences that consumers will in no way be charged for phone communication with your company. Consider creating a club or membership program, as this will promote brand-loyalty, but make the club open to all interested parties—seeming exclusive to seniors might deter that patronage of younger audiences.


7. Do your research

Information about health care, lifestyles and senior buying habits are available from a multitude of sources, including websites, academic centers, gerontologists, and demographic services. The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases an annual Consumer Expenditure Survey, which can provide you with detailed information on how mature adults are spending. Get to know some of the senior-oriented websites, and see for yourself what some of their major concerns are. Focus groups with seniors would be a great way to learn their concerns and tastes, especially working with seniors in your target area.


About Maricich Brand CommunicationsMaricich is a brand communications firm with a focus on marketing health and lifesaving brands—those that play an important role in saving lives or restoring quality of life. We are a branding, advertising, public relations and web development firm with and expertise in promoting products and services in healthcare, medical, pharmaceutical and safety categories. For more information about our agency, contact Mark Maricich at (949) 223-6455 or visit us at www.maricich.com.

Online Brochures You’ll Flip Over

No matter how ubiquitous the Web becomes, there will always be a need for brand communications materials to appear in the printed, tangible form. At Maricich, we’ve found that this is especially true in the healthcare, pharmaceutical and medical device categories, where brochures remain an important sales tool, and in hospitals, where printed newsletters remain a vital part of the marketing mix. These materials can also play double-duty by being posted on company websites in the form of PDFs, but Web-based PDF documents aren’t always user friendly, and the emotional connection one experiences when flipping through the pages of the actual printed piece can be lost in the electronic form. However, now there is a free and simple solution at Issuu.com(beta) ―a slick “flip-page” solution to presenting publications online.

Creating an Issuu account is easy, and once you have, you can simply upload your brochures, newsletters, catalogs and magazines into the flip-page format, and all documents will be hosted on Issuu’s servers. The size of any one file is limited up to 100mb and/or 500 pages, which is more than enough capacity for most marketing materials. Once your document has been uploaded, the file’s searchability settings can be set at either public or private, and a handy measurement tool is available for tracking downloads. Also, there are a number of options for embedding your Issuu document into your own web site. The whole application and ease of use makes Issuu essentially the YouTube of online document hosting.

The following are a couple of example links for reference, which show two items we’ve uploaded to Issuu, including our Maricich agency profile and a white paper on establishing marketing budgets.

http://issuu.com/maricich/docs/maricich-profile

http://issuu.com/maricich/docs/maricichmarketingbudget2_11_09

In addition to Issuu, there are several other similar options for posting documents online, including Scribd, DocStoc (no flip page option) and Turn-Page (just offers the flip page, but for a fee). But for us, we’ve found that Issuu is the best overall solution for meeting our needs and those of our healthcare, medical, pharmaceutical, medical device, hospital and biotech clients.

Marketing Budget Planning, For 2009―And Beyond

It’s a little past the beginning of the New Year and many companies’ marketing budgets have already been established―or have they? With increasing uncertainty in the economy, some budgets may be in limbo until other important business decisions are made. Nevertheless, an ultimate budget number will need to be determined.

At Maricich, we focus on marketing lifesaving brands—those in healthcare, medical, pharmaceutical and safety categories. And some of these clients operate on fiscal years vs. calendar years, which means that people are planning their marketing budgets at various times throughout the year. This overview on marketing budget planning may be helpful for those who are currently in planning mode.

BEFORE YOU BUDGET, Ask yourself a few questions:

• Who are the customers you’re trying to reach?
• What stage of business are you in?

• Do you need to attract new customers, or is your focus on retention?

• What are your objectives?
• How often do you need to reach your audience?
• What do you think is the most compelling way to reach them?
• How much do you think your competitors are spending on marketing?
• How much have you spent in the past, and did you get results?
• How much can you realistically spend?

Answering these questions will help you pinpoint the specifics of what you’re seeking from a marketing campaign. From these answers, you can research the costs associated with specific tactics, and frame out the numbers on paper. For more comprehensive info on this topic, Maricich has written a strategic white paper, entitled “5 Guidelines for Establishing Your Marketing Budget” , which is available for download.