Whether you’re about to launch a startup, or you’re a fully-fledged business, you must have a good grasp of who your audience is. If your products or services appeal to seniors, your marketing campaigns need to be tailored to their needs to boost revenue and keep your company on top.
While you may think that you need to increase the size of fonts or display images of seniors in your advertising campaign, there are other elements that you must factor into your marketing methods. With that in mind, here are five tips for marketing to seniors.
Use Relatable Language
To effectively market to seniors, you need to speak their language. If you don’t have experience in this field, you may use trendy language, teenage jargon, or internet slang that is completely alien to your audience. Baby boomers are different to millennials and Gen Z in the sense that all they want to know is if your product or service will improve their quality of life. For example, if you’re selling electric wheelchairs and scooters, some unfold at the push of a button which is something you must include in your description. Doing so will show your senior audience how the wheelchair will make their life easier and encourage them to buy into your products.
Understand Their Needs
When selling a product or service to an audience, it’s common marketing knowledge that you’re not selling them ‘the product’ but instead how the product can benefit them. Regarding seniors, while they may not be interested in the same things that a teenager likes, that doesn’t mean they do not want the same product. You’re able to sell the same sort of product to all age ranges. However, you need to understand your audience’s needs and why they would want to purchase it.
Make Things Easier for Them
Unlike millennials, baby boomers did not grow up with a smartphone in their hands. This means that when you’re marketing to seniors, you need to make the experience as simple as possible. For instance, seniors may have no idea of what a hamburger menu is, or whether they should click on it. If an aspect of your marketing campaign requires seniors to click on a symbol or read the fine print, you face losing a large portion of your audience. Seniors will benefit greatly from a straightforward sales process.
Personalize Their Experience
When seniors were growing up, excellent customer service was never automated. Baby boomers received personal attention and care, meaning there was always someone to speak to at the other end of the phone. If you personalize their experience, they’re more likely to appreciate and remember it. Whether you use email marketing tactics and address your customers by name, or have a live person available to answer customer service queries, showing that you care and value your senior audience can go a long way.
Use Multi-Channel Marketing
It may come as no surprise that only a small percentage of adults over 65 own a smartphone. Although the number is increasing year on year, it’s a good indication that many seniors live most of their life offline, rather than hooked to a computer screen or mobile device. This means that you will have great difficulty marketing to your seniors if you only rely on mobile and internet marketing. To reach more of your audience, you should use multi-channel marketing which can be used to target seniors online and offline. Putting an advert in the local newspaper or in a catalog can drum up sales and interest in your brand.
If the baby boomer generation is your target audience, all the tips above can help you create effective marketing campaigns that will make seniors take notice of your brand and use your products or services.
