Great to see the interest in older consumers but this is old, old news

I  should be delighted to see an increased interest in marketing to older consumers. For the past ten years I have been pleading with companies and agencies to face reality and dump their obsession with youth centric marketing.

iProspect with their The Ageless Internet event and report have realised the importance of the older traveller and the primitive way that companies pitch for their attention and business. Do watch the video (message to iProspect - why is it not on YouTube) and download the report. One note of caution when looking at research. The 70+ figures must be for that sub-group that is online - so the actual numbers will be a lot less. For detailed data look at the Ofcom report.

Rapp published a report (A life less linear) that makes the eminently sensible points that the older market is not homogeneous and that their views might not be that different from their sons and daughters.

This is all terrific stuff but it is old news. No it is ancient news.

This is marketing 101 to the older consumer. To be honest there are zillions of articles and books (a lot written by me) about this subject. The far bigger issue, and where our clients are now focusing their attention is responding to the way the physiological ageing impacts the customer experience.

There is a lot more to targeting older consumers than making the content a bit more relevant and segmenting the marketing on dimensions other than age.

Still it is a start. You cannot say these old messages too many times. There are lots of brands that haven't even reached this first stage of understanding what is happening to the very fabric of their market. Dick Stroud