Good article in a recent DMNews titled Marketers' boom town discusses marketing to Baby Boomers and how marketer's should not necessarily consider them a "senior group".
While the older boomers just started filing for Social Security benefits this year, millions of younger boomers, often called trailing edge boomers, are mistakenly categorized as seniors when in fact, many are in their late 40s and raising young children.
As Laurie Bitter says, president of JWTBoom, "There are 62-year-olds who have young children in the house — they're not just going to roll it up and retire."
Much of this is common sense and as marketer's we must define our audience carefully and adjust the messaging accordingly. It's somewhat challenging because their is a gray area (no pun intended). For example, if you are selling products and services relating to the aging population you must realize that Boomers in this case can be both direct consumers of these services as well as purchase influencers if they are themselves caring for aging parents.
This requires careful attention to the copy of your campaigns. A good example is how the NCOA positions their popular BenefitsCheckUp service - online screening screenings to help "seniors" find programs to help pay for prescription drugs, energy assistance, food stamps and more. The NCOA is careful to market the service to both older adults and those caring for older adults which can be family caregivers, social workers, etc. Seems obvious but not all senior care marketer's are taking enough care to segment their market and adjust copy accordingly.
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