Life begins at 50 - communicating with older customers

When communicating with older audiences, it’s important not to fall into the pitfalls of using stereotypical images or patronising language.

Jane Silk, director of Mature Marketing, says that to target this lucrative demographic, imagery can be aspirational, inspirational, or even humorous - but never insulting, and examples of successful campaigns include Dove’s 96-year-old ‘poster girl’ for real beauty and Twiggy as one of the faces of M&S.

In this presentation, Jane also points out the dangers of falling into the adult-to-child trap when talking to over-50s – a costly mistake that is bound to alienate your would-be customer.

Finally, using the domestic holiday market as a case study, she considers the challenge of hitting a constantly moving target and how easy it is to miss key target segments if a solution is too simplistic.