1. Do
Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, or broadly those aged 50 to 70 years,
present a large opportunity in India? If yes, for which segments? Are Indian
brands alive to this opportunity?
Housing 1.22 billion people as a nation we are
entitled to some pretty unique and startling demographic related facts. Close
to 50% of us are below 25 years of age and mere 12% of us qualify in the baby
boomer category.
We are set to don the youngest country in the world
title by 2020 and while that looks like a positive, consider the fact that our
youth dependency ratio is 44% high implying that our youth is unable to
participate in or contribute towards the economic growth of the country in sufficiently
large numbers.
On the contrary, the elderly dependency ratio is mere
8% and this would tell you that our geriatric population wields a significant
economic clout.
For starters, this group appears to have a monopoly
over family real estate asset holdings marking their (high) net worth status
and potential for finance leverages.
In terms of quantifiable numbers the number of seniors
in the top most echelons (A/B) of the Socio Economic Classification amounts to
9 million thus representing a market larger than UAE and close to the size of
Sweden. One may have not realized it but the seniors segment has changed
and morphed into a large business opportunity.
Fact is that the world over Baby Boomers are darlings
and doyens of – medical and healthcare services, pension and annuity plans in
addition they are also heavy consumers of travel, tourism and vacation
services.
Trust USA to recognize the opportunity by designing
homes, civic facilities and entire habitats for its affluent baby boomers.
Little wonder, that Florida is better known as the retirement city coveted by
Americans in their golden years. This only goes to show the world of
possibilities for India. Unfortunately, the opportunity has not been tapped in
to aggressively here.
At Max
Life -
· we
recognized the Retirement needs of baby boomers by launching effective
solutions like GLIP – Guaranteed Lifetime Income Plan that guarantees lifetime
monthly annuity to Policyholders that are 50 years or above age
· Our
other product – Forever Young Pension Plan is also designed to create a
retirement fund corpus between the age of 50-75 years. The corpus can be used
to subsequently purchase immediate annuity
· Senior
living & care is a new and emerging lifestyle - At Max Group we have been
privy to the changing needs of our senior citizens and MAX Antara was created
with the objective of making senior citizen living – a dignified and
pleasurable experience.
That apart, we do see brands targeting the elderly
segment across a range of industries- for example
· There
is the ‘rare’ innovation like mobile devices with larger screens and bigger
buttons for ease of use called “Asaan” from iBall mobiles
· NTT
DoCoMo Japan, tasted success when it launched “easy-easy” or Raku-Raku
featuring a panel with larger buttons and easier to read numbers. In less than
2 months, the model sold more than 200K units
Closer home...
· The
hair colour category has targeted an older audience
· Similarly,
Personal care (hair re growth) category has seen traction with use of
contemporary personalities like – Shane Warne, Gautam Gambhir, etc.
· Syed
Kirmani the former Indian cricketer endorses hearing aids to senior citizens
· Short
haul cruise vacation services and destination management (Asia region) has been
a success at targeting older holiday makers. The key insight that - While travelling
abroad seniors prefer covering fewer cities as opposed to hectic tours designed
for younger people has encouraged more seniors to travel abroad nowadays.
. 2. Is
the youth demographic a more ‘low hanging fruit’ that takes away brands’ focus
– perhaps even rightfully so – from the elderly TG?
It is
quite natural for brands to base their planning around our demographic pyramid
and chase the largest segment (25-54) that comprises 40% of the total
population pie.
However,
many seniors today are wealthier than those in the past. With better living
conditions, improved diet and healthcare facilities seniors are more energetic
than ever before. Their active socal life sees them often travelling to
different cities to visit relatives, and attend family weddings. 60 is truly
the new 50!
Elderly TG
can be viewed as a low hanging fruit for brands that are willing to understand
the needs of this Diaspora and are inclined to invest in this market
opportunity. Like the West, our Life Insurance, healthcare, medical services
industry is uniquely positioned to address this high potential base.
3. Is
this (elderly) segment being targeted well enough? And consistently enough?
This
remains an underpenetrated segment. Given the significant opportunity that
exists in the 25-54 years age group, it is natural that Indian marketers focus
on that segment.
However,
as product categories mature, marketers try to find their niche. Here, 50-70
years audience could be a high potential segment with its unique needs.
Indian
marketers need to invest more on research to understand this segment and create
relevant product and service offerings specifically for this segment.
There is a
large population of entrepreneurs, professionals and private sector employees
who have enjoyed the benefits of economic liberalization of the Indian economy
in early 1990’s and now on verge of entering this age group. This group has
high disposable income and could be an attractive customer segment - example,
for Life Insurance this could be an attractive segment for immediate annuity
plans.
4. Is
traditional mass media advertising relatively more effective in targeting this
demographic? What other channels could work well?
Mass media
works for “mass markets”. Using large format media vehicles to speak with the
baby boomer segment will result in un-necessary spill over and media
wastages. Lower age consumers (media age 35 years) have very little in common
with baby boomers and hence the spill over will be a losing effort without any
ROI.
Instead,
the media mix has to be custom-configured to ensure a sharp delivery of the
messages by using specific print media publications and magazines to
effectively resonate with the higher age-group consumer.
Interest
specific media properties (Health, Wellness, Lifestyle, Medical, Travel, News,
Devotional and Spiritual genre) can be utilized in the electronic media space
to drive campaigns.
However, a
robust media mix would also feature Direct marketing campaigns reaching out to
the baby boomers in their natural surroundings and habitat – parks, community centres,
recreation clubs.
Pushing
the boundary line further, the space is ripe for creating and thereby owning
large communities of baby boomers. These communities can be started online in
the social media space over Facebook or by offline channels. The communities
are a potential ‘marketplace’ for collating brands, offerings and its consumers.
5. Should
messaging for the elderly TG be specially created?
Any
communication has to centre around the audience, its social and physical needs,
its situation in-life and motivations. Since baby boomers are unlike any other
mainstream consumer segment there is a need for customizing the messaging and
creative environment catering to this audience type
We have to
bear in mind that senior citizens are awfully smart! They drive a hard bargain
and look for value-for-money offerings coupled with long-lasting quality and
service commitment.
Seniors
are also not as hung up on brands as younger people. They are not looking at
image or the emotional component of brands. To them, brands provide a
reassurance of quality and a responsible organization that will address any
issues that they may have vs a vs product/service issues.
More than
brands, seniors are likely to look at corporate reputation to assess the
company for honesty, fairness, financial stability (will not close down) etc.
so that they know that they can trust the company.
All
elements of the communication, its tonality and its creative language therefore
has to take reasonable account of all these messaging ingredients and designed
appropriately.
6. The
convenience of e-commerce should be a reason for the elderly to use the
channel. Have they been educated and incentivised enough to shop online?
This remains a key opportunity area and a challenge area for brands to
translate financial capital of the baby boomer in to online monetized
opportunities. Consider this – less than 5% Indian netizens are 55-64 years old
whereas 75% internet users in India are 35 years or below. When compared with
other BRIC nations India’s online population is significantly younger.
As a first
step, we have to consciously onboard baby boomers to the online universe before
we can talk e–commerce with this group.
Matrimonial
classifieds market seems to be an exception that has bucked this trend. It is
interesting to see how these brands were able to target senior citizens to try
their services while evaluating potential alliances for their children.
If we can
get a baby boomer to sample matrimonial services online, we should be able to
on board them for a variety of other services too.
Data
Source for Internet Use: ComScore India 2013, Future in Focus
7. Can
you think of any brand campaigns that have effectively targeted this
demographic in India? And internationally?
At Max
Life Insurance - We had an interesting insight about the cycle of human life
that helped us plan our brand campaigns targeting the baby boomers.
You start
off in a rat race and aim to make more and money your entire professional life.
The irony is that you never have time to savour the sweet fruit of your labour.
Exactly the reverse happens during your retired life when time “freezes” and
you are left with all the time in the world but at this juncture of life it is
most likely that you have no rewarding or creative pursuits.
Now
imagine if your retired life finds you in the pink of financial health. Would
you then be able to live 2nd innings of your life to the
fullest, travel wherever you pleased and do whatever you wanted to?
This
thought sparked our campaign idea allowing us to boldly re-interpret Retired
life and reposition it as the fun and carefree part of a seniors’ life that is
usually associated with the life of a teenager ie. Stress free and carefree
abandon.
The brand
campaign stood out because of its refreshing take on senior citizens breaking away
from the stereotypical imagery of old people who are frail, or have little
enthusiasm to live life.
The
campaign creative showed how a retired person is able to travel
enthusiastically across the country attending weddings of distant relatives
while also indulging in theatre/musical events – all for his personal
entertainment and leisure. And who wouldn’t – if time and money were freely
available?
Since the
campaign vibed with audiences we extended this positioning into creating
products and solutions where the fun that starts during retirement does not end
with the end of a policyholders’ life; rather the benefits continue for the
surviving partner or spouse.
Looking
back there is a sense of satisfaction having gone beyond format advertising to
create products specifically for baby boomers.
