What do Bill Gates, the late Steve Jobs, “internet founder” Al Gore and a local inbound marketing strategy all have in common? If you say computers, I’ll have to tell you that’s not all. They are all Baby Boomers and almost every organization has one or other product or service they want to sell to baby boomers. Jobs and Gates were both born in 1955 and Gore was born in 1948. Baby Boomers are not only the largest market segment today, they are also the local inbound market segment with the most dispensable income – in other words, they have money to spend!
So, the question is: Are you using the information available about this group in developing your baby boomers local inbound marketing strategy? How are your personas for them look? Baby Boomers are the forty-something-to-sixty-something crowd that are the most likely to have a reasonable amount of spending power and the insight on how to spend it. Just what do you know about them?
The term baby boomer, defines anyone born between 1946 and 1964. Now while that could indicate one demographic or one generation, what you will find is there were actually a "Baby Boomer One" and a "Baby Boomer Two," also called the Generation Jones; and those are two different groups or cohorts. The difference comes between those born in the first phase of the baby boomer generation and those born within the second phase.
Related article: [Video] Local Inbound Marketing: Generation Jones Reaches its Zenith
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Positivity of the Baby Boomer One Group
Each of them share a lot of same characteristics. Still, if you're doing local inbound marketing to them the difference is the group born within the first phase of the baby boomer experience had the general feeling that life was going to continue to progress and get better. They shared a general understanding of how they would live their lives and marketers sold to their idea that everything was going continue to be rosy. This group were actually able to purchase and spend more than they were saving because they didn't worry, thinking that as time progressthey were going going to get more money.
Negativity of the Second Group
The cohort consisting of the second baby boomer group reacted to life a little differently, although they had along with the first group believed they could buy now and save later. The difference was they became adults at the time of Watergate and Vietnam and those experiences negatively colored their spending view. This group felt that things were getting worse, so they might as well spend now while they could. Their attitude toward paying for the purchases was that they could get different credit cards or loans if they needed them. They were also very fearful that something would happen so they went out and spent while they had the money.
Review your personas
Personas are a way to understand your local inbound marketing segment or cohort. I’ll bet you think you know all about your personas. But do you have them promintently on display? Are you using them to define your market segment or are they sitting in a notebook somewhere totally forgotten? I thought so. Your target segment person can be anyone. And this can be a problem since you wouldn’t use the same advertisement style with an 8-year-old girl as you would for her 50-year-old grandmother. In order to know what the best way to target your specific market is, you still need to know who your ideal buyer is. Let's look at the overall Baby Boomer segment in this infographic. Be sure to have your persona information out while you go over this. You just might need to makes some revisions.
Jaco Grobbelaar is the owner of BroadVision Marketing. BroadVision Marketing works with business owners to put in place inbound and outbound marketing strategies that consistently secure new clients. The BroadVision Marketing Training Center is located in Petaluma, CA and primarily serves companies in the San Francisco Bay area.
Jaco can be reached at jaco@broadvisionmarketing.com or 707.766.9778 or connect with Jaco on Facebook - www.facebook.com/broadvisionmarketing - and LinkedIn - www.linkedin.com/in/JacoGrobbelaar. He can also be found at Jaco+.