The book I wrote with Kim Walker - Marketing to the Ageing Consumer - is all about making all of the customer touchpoints "age friendly". This means everything from the first awareness of a product/brand via the Internet or magazine through the purchase process to using the product or service and finally ensuring it is supported. Lots of touchpoints (about 200).
If a product is expected to be used by all ages then one component of good design is that it is age-friendly. Cutting to the chase, brilliant design is invariably age friendly.
It is only when you start looking (as is explained in this blog posting) that you see how bad so much design is because designers just don't think (or care) about how their products are actually used. Increasing the function count is too often the designers main objective.
Have you ever wondered why Apple products are disproportionally popular with older people? The things are more expensive and far from perfect but the design is brilliant and so is their age-friendliness. Sure I can point out a lot of ways they could be improved but it is only when I am forced back to Windows or Android that the difference becomes clear. Dick Stroud
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