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May 2006 - Strategy Magazine
Where next

Boom goes your brand

by Lisa D'Innocenzo
page 33

When Nintendo starts producing video games for boomers, you know the middle-aged crowd has arrived. At least in the minds of marketers.

However, if you think the image of an excessively happy grey-haired couple will turn them on, think again. Robert Mason, a principal at Toronto-based consultancy Boomers Marketing, stresses that the last thing boomers want is to be reminded of their age, and that a far more effective modus operandi is to depict age-neutral images that reflect a certain lifestyle. It's a method that can require significant segmentation work but, judging by the experience of the marketers in this story, one that is well worth the effort.

Mason has definitely noticed marketers flocking to the boomer crowd lately and says it's about time. "Advertisers should have been targeting the 'over 50' for the past decade," he says. "It's taken that length of time for the reality to set in that a lot of people are leaving the 18-to-49 target group and going off marketing's radar screen. And companies are starting to realize: 'Hey, we're letting a lot of business get away.'"

Companies like Nintendo. The videogame giant released "Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day" in April and will add "Big Brain Academy" this month. Brain Age, a series of exercises designed to keep the cerebral cylinders firing, is a definite push for the boomer market. On its website, Nintendo goes so far as to tell its new target, "after decades of exercising your thumbs, Nintendo moves to your mind."

A surprising move for a videogame company, for sure, but a smart one too. For one thing, it taps into the reality that middle-aged consumers want to fend off the aging process. And then there's the potential pay-off of connecting with a, well, booming, population segment. As Mason points out, the boomer group - consumers born between 1946 and 1964 - is the fastest growing demo in Canada and it will be for several more years. By 2011, about one-third of Canadians will be over 50.

Consider too that they are relatively debt free; 80% own their homes, and only about 24% carry a mortgage. They earn on average 43% more than their younger counterparts, and they represent two-thirds of Canadians with a net worth in excess of $100,000. Specifically, the 50+ crowd controls 55% of Canada's discretionary spending. No wonder marketers are salivating.

But that doesn't mean they're getting it right. In fact, for many, quite the contrary. "When a print ad is done for the over 50, everything we know about advertising gets tossed out the window, and they stick on a visual of the smiling, grey-haired couple," says Mason, himself a boomer at 53. "We really don't need to be reminded of our age. What I want is for you to tell me the benefits of your product or service. Sell me."

Mason has worked in the ad biz for 30 years, first at Procter & Gamble, and then on the account side at agencies like Young & Rubicam. With partners, he founded Boomers after he turned the magic age of 50 and suddenly realized his opinions no longer mattered to marketers. "I used to do a lot of research panels. They would ask screen questions, like 'what age bracket do you fall in?' I said '50 and above,' and it was 'thank you, we don't have any more questions.' The plug was pulled on me."

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