As we have seen many times, marketing to mature consumers is still in its early stages. It is still prey to countless prejudices, and the vast majority of advertisers and agencies know next to nothing about the target group. As a result, while
“The Old Continent” is in the midst of a so-called ‘grandpa boom’, the all too rare advertising campaigns aimed at seniors are generally inappropriate, if not appalling. And yet with just a little common sense, even without being an expert, it is possible to come up with a worthwhile campaign. Here are six traps to be avoided at all costs if we want to get through to ageing baby boomers and seniors:

Confusing marketing to seniors with depiction of seniors

When asked about marketing to seniors during an interview for a popular TV program, the head of a large Parisian advertising agency brushed the subject aside, claiming that ’showing seniors in an advertisement only works for a small number of products.’ This is a good example of a typical blind spot!

Who ever said that marketing to seniors means ’showing seniors’?

But many advertisers believe that it’s enough to show a few old people in good health and to use larger typeface in order to sell successfully to the over-50s. Needless to say, most of the time this approach leads to disappointment. Being a senior means, first of all, having experience. Any 60-year old member of society has 60 years of consumption behind him. It’s easy for him to see through the creative platforms behind the advertising campaigns that target older people. In these circumstances, how can we possibly imagine that showing his peers will be enough to win him over? Without a soundly argued case for the real added value of the product, any campaign will be doomed to failure. It could even damage the brand, to the extent that it will often be perceived as sheer opportunism. One comment that often comes up in our qualitative research is: ‘Now that they’ve finished fleecing the young, it’s our turn …’. Having said that, we should be careful not to go to the opposite extreme. If it is based on a proper strategy, the use of seniors in advertising can make a real contribution to the success of a targeted campaign, particularly one aimed at the very old, who can both recognize themselves and instantly understand that the message is addressed to them. In this context, endorsement by a personality popular with their generation is particularly relevant, as it adds a real measure of credibility. Let it be clear that on no account is this a panacea, but rather another avenue worth exploring.

Ignoring the consequences of ageing

It’s a well-known fact that art directors are terrorists. Especially when it comes to the copywriters, who work away furiously at polishing texts destined to become unreadable, inaudible and invisible. Yet if there’s one rule of marketing to seniors that’s clear to everyone, it’s the following. We all grow old – no matter what generation we belong to, or what age we are. Vision, hearing, touch, mobility … all our bodily functions reach their peak around the age of 20, and steadily deteriorate till we die. Given that fact, why do so many advertising executives expend their efforts on making their ideas inaccessible? Do they overestimate the importance of their profession? They must know that advertising is never more than a kind of unavoidable ‘pollution’, at best a distraction between the news and the weather forecast. Seniors aren’t keen on our profession. They have been promised too many things that have never come off. And as nobody is very interested in them these days, they have switched off. If no effort is made to meet them halfway, there is no point in expecting the slightest interest on their behalf. Even when a campaign is strategically sound, it won’t stand a chance of influencing them unless it goes back to first principles. Here’s a fun activity to do: get yourself a magazine for seniors and analyze it. You’ll be surprised at how many ads are in very small print, have coupons that are too small to fill in, or use pink text on a pale blue background. Do the same in front of your TV set. In most commercials, the voice-over is drowned out by music, the sequence is too fast, the telephone number is impossible to get down, etc. Do advertisers really have to put up with such mistakes?

Making a laughing stock of them

Older people are known to be a popular butt for jokes. Portraying them as embittered, ridiculous, or overtaken by events is far from new. It probably comes down to settling scores with age. Advertising, in particular, with its obsession for the cult of youth takes every opportunity to have a go at the elderly. In most cases, of course, advertising does not resort to this kind of behavior to target seniors. That would be the last straw! But this doesn’t mean that seniors are blind or impervious for all that. So many commercials, posters, advertisements are put across from this negative viewpoint that enough is enough. No, really, they don’t find it funny any more. The older ones feel totally rejected. As for the younger ones, these fifty-year olds in their prime, at best they don’t feel concerned, and at worst they feel their parents are being got at.

Touching a raw nerve

At the age of 50, the effects of ageing are beginning to be felt. Menopause, far-sightedness, cholesterol, death of parents, retirement looming … we need go no further. But here is another game at which advertising executives excel – that of making us feel guilty for being old. Whether it is done to poke fun or not, we are shown worn-out bodies, declining performance, minds that are slowing down, etc. Sometimes, it’s just to make us aware of a problem. But what’s the point of taking a negative approach? Seniors are not dangerous drivers who need to be reminded that people get killed on the roads. Every day they combat ageing with all their energies. Pointing out that that particular battle is a lost cause may not be the best way to win seniors over to the brand in question. All the more so when, as is fortunately the case, they have a positive outlook on life. Getting the generation wrong

When seniors are lumped together in a homogenous group called ‘the old’, the mistake is relatively easy to identify. For example, it’s a well-known fact that even though legibility is important to the over-50s, the youngest among them have absolutely no need for things to be written in Size 18 typeface. Similarly, it’s obvious that showing a grandfather climbing the stairs with ease has no relevance to a 55-year old. An error that is harder to deal with, in that it requires ongoing knowledge of the senior population, is the failure to apply the principles of generational marketing. This can sometimes be subtle, but it can make all the difference to a message being appropriate. An example would be thinking that a ‘Master’ (50-59 year old) would be affected by an Edith Piaf song when in fact he or she is a Beatles fan. Conversely, it’s also the hope of bringing all the age brackets together round the values of the baby boomers. The ‘Liberation’ generation of today were not part of the May 68 student movement. And thirty years on, they do not – nor will they ever – have the slightest nostalgia for the Hippy era. The emergence of a new generation of seniors will, of course, break down many barriers. But even so, the effects of age and life cycles and the cultural differences in relation to younger age brackets are not going to disappear. We are currently witnessing the advent of a new kind of conflict between thirty-year olds and their parents, despite the fact that the latter are supposed to be a very open, understanding generation.

Two years ago, the magazine Technikart put it this way: ‘The fifty-year olds who wanted to forbid the forbidden can no longer tolerate the idea that we can revolt. They have become as reactionary and smug as their fathers.’ (Patrick Williams, aged 30).

Having a good grasp of all the generational variables, dealing with the points each group has in common and knowing where they diverge, and anticipating how consumers will evolve at each stage in their lives – these will probably underpin seniors marketing in the futuret. But given the ground that still needs to be made up on even the most basic questions, it is likely to take a good many years yet.