Comment: Overlook older shoppers at your peril
Marketing and advertising is perennially aimed at the younger end of the population while the older grouping is all too often ignored. Companies are wedded to the idea that if they attract customers when they are young then they will stick around and they’ll have them for the long-haul.
There are growing issues with this strategy. Failing to talk to them on their terms and language risks turning them off a brand. The underlying problem with this myopic view is that it misses out on the fact that the population is ageing and older people have more disposable income than youngsters nowadays. This is an issue in both the retail and hospitality sectors.
Subscribe to TRBThe communicational disconnect that so often occurs was highlighted in a local pub when I mentioned to the two twenty-something’s behind the bar that I had once interviewed Giles Coren in a pub in Kentish Town. They had no idea who he was, even with my prods of, ‘he’s The Times’ restaurant critic and has appeared on TV in a series with Sue Perkins’. ‘Sue who?’ they asked. I tried the fact he has a sister Victoria who is also on TV and is married to a comedian. Thankfully they managed to recall that she fronts a quiz show. Needless to say I didn’t mention Giles’ late father, the renowned writer Alan.
What’s needed is a broader mix of servers in pubs including greater numbers of older workers who can communicate with their more mature customers. Addressing the needs of older customers, whether it is in pubs or shops, is clearly very sensible when you consider the ongoing ageing of societies in developed economies.
By 2050 the number of adults aged over 65 is forecast to double to 1.6 billion – and they control a serious amount of discretionary spending power. In the US, the over-50s are projected to rise further in influence to account for 61% of total consumer spending by 2050, according to US-based AARP. It’s a similar story in the UK.
The misunderstanding of how to communicate and deal with older consumers is not just an issue in physical stores. It is just as glaringly problematic across digital channels. There remains a misconception that older people are technologically illiterate. It’s fair to say youngsters are truly digital natives but this does not mean that the rest of the population doesn’t know its way around a smartphone.
The 55-64 years-of-age cohort is the fastest growing group on the likes of TikTok and these individuals have gone gung-ho for buying on such platforms where they greatly value the social aspect. This was evident at The Retail Bulletin’s Retail Ecom Connect conference in London in October last year where Daisy Kelly, founder & CEO at Glow for It, suggested: “It’s not young, value-led customers on TikTok. The perception of TikTok is that it’s like QVC.” Her business attracts plenty of strong-spending older shoppers on the TikTok platform.
These customers do not want a one-dimensional, human-less transaction, according to Hilary Large, owner of Wardrobe at The Cross, who stated: “We are constantly doing live events and the conversion during these is massively greater than normal sales levels. The website is a static sale but when we do ‘lives’ it’s a conversational sale and the conversion is much greater. It’s about storytelling to 60-65-year-olds who are totally uninterested in static transactions. It’s all about the story, sustainability and them asking lots of questions. It’s the social element they want.”
Nobody is getting any younger so the recommendation to retailers would be to more intelligently communicate with the growing grouping of older shoppers. They are an increasingly important part of the economy so to focus too intently on just the younger demographic is a flawed strategy.
