By Adam Wakefield

A man who believes over 50s are ignored by the advertising industry is Bob Hoffman, the mind behind the popular Ad Contrarian blog and the former chairman and CEO of the Hoffman/Lewis advertising agency from 1991 to 2013. Hoffman refers to the passing over of the 50-plus market as? “The Age Delusion”.

In a speech to CBC & Radio-Canada Media Solutions clients in November 2015, Hoffman said marketers target young people because they see everyone else doing it, and “they assume that somewhere, there must be someone who knows why the hell we’re doing this”.

Citing figures from a 2012 Nielsen report titled Introducing Boomers: Marketing’s Most Valuable Generation, Hoffman says that in the United States those over 50 are responsible for about 50% of all consumer spending, yet were targeted by just 10% of marketing activity in the United States.

He cites several reasons for this phenomenon. One is the advertising industry believes its own stereotypes about over 50s, such as they are stuck in their ways, which is not based on scientific fact. Another is because “there is no one over 50 left in advertising”.

“Our neglect of old consumers and our pandering to young people is nothing but narcissism disguised as strategy. It’s marketing by selfie-stick,” he says.

So, how does this translate to South Africa?

According to the Media Information Communication Technologies (MICT) SETA‘s 2013 sector skills plan, of 7647 employees recorded in the advertising sector, 3965 (51.8%) were under the age of 35, while 3237 (42.3%) were between the 35 and 55 years of age. The rest, 445 (5.8%), were over the age of 55. This is suggestive of Hoffman’s perception that advertising is now a young person’s game.

What about the market local advertisers are working with? Where do over 50s fit in?

According to the June 2014 South African Audience Research Foundation’s (SAARF) 10 LSM Groups for the June 2014 AMPS, those over the age of 50 made up 30.7%, 27.7%, 26.9%, 23.9% and 22.9% of the Group 10 (the highest living standard) through 6 (mid-level) respectively.

While not definitive, the SAARF’s numbers strengthen the view that over 50s do offer gains for brands and advertisers. If over 50s are being passed over locally, why? And is Hoffman onto something when describing the industry being beholden to “narcissism disguised as strategy”? 

Breaking stereotypes

Paul Jackson, managing director of advertising agency Grey Africa, finds merit in the notion that young marketers and advertisers (M&A) inadvertently are targeting themselves whether it’s intended or not. 

“Because of the obsession by the increasingly youthful M&A’s to target and feature younger consumers under the age of 30, especially teenagers and ‘tweenagers’, mainstream advertising practically ignores the over 50s,” Jackson says.

Even worse, Jackson points out, is that stereotypes of older consumers in many adverts are patronising or even offensive, with the marketing industry needing to appreciate more the importance, value and sensitivities of the 50-plus market. Complicating the picture even further, research shows over 50s are less brand loyal and more experimental than previously presumed, debunking myths about them within the industry. 

“It is evident that there is a receptive 50-plus audience waiting to be addressed. As such, greater consumer insights coupled to effective segmentation are needed for the clichéd stereotypical attitudes towards ‘seniors marketing’ to be broken,” Jackson says.

The cost of reaching different markets

Petra Liu, managing director at Wetpaint advertising agency, agrees that the over 50s market is a “potential goldmine” but the problems faced by the industry lie in the targeting methods, the mediums used and, ultimately, the cost. 

Liu argues that the over 50 market’s relative unpredictability regarding brand loyalty and media consumption made them unattractive to M&A’s who are seeking the best ROI possible from their ad spend. 

“We know where 90% of the youth will be. Over 50s can prove challenging by the mere fact that their media consumption is so diverse,” Liu says.

“The over 50s market still predominantly enjoy mass media, with a smaller percentage in new media. Large TV and radio campaigns are not always viable, while the youth being online and social platforms are bigger, cheaper and easier to gauge results through.”

Facebook’s audience insight tool indicates that in South Africa, of their female users, 8% are between 45 and 54, 5% are between 55 and 64 and 8% are 65 and older. For males, 7% are between 45 and 54, 3% are between 55 and 64, and 5% are 65 and older.

With budget constraints and ROI demands by clients, agencies weigh up their options of how to get the best ROI in an environment where spend is lower than ever before.

An under-valued market

Jackson bemoans the fact that while over 50s spend more, especially on discretionary items, and have a higher percentage of wealth and savings than younger consumers, they are frequently ignored by the advertising industry who remain with younger markets.

Using the word “paradox”, Jackson says research has shown that while the advertising industry focuses on the youth, they underestimate and misunderstand the value of older consumers. 

“While marketing teams and creative agencies are by and large very young themselves, this focus on youth is understandable, but nonetheless lends credence to the contention that the advertising industry is ostensibly marketing to themselves,” Jackson says.

Not as predictable as first thought

Ostensibly, the reasons over 50s are not targeted as much by advertisers has to do with how advertising agencies are staffed, financial imperatives within the industry and being a victim of the times they live in.

As described by Liu, if agencies “received bigger budgets that allowed multiple messaging over multiple platforms” over a longer period of time, older markets can effectively been tapped into. 

However, as budgets get smaller and the pressure to produce results increases, strategies favour mediums such as social media which is a natural home for younger audiences.

With youth-orientated marketing entrenched in the industry, as indicated by Jackson, a consequence is less attention is paid to understanding the habits of older consumers, which leads to “illogically skewed outcomes.”

According to Jackson, M&A’s tend to view over 50s as an uninteresting, undifferentiated and inflexible mass of older people and not as a potentially lucrative market, a “completely contrary view”.

In fact, over 50s tended to have less in common with each other than younger generations do with their peers. Rather, it was younger consumers, those between 20 and 35-years-old, whose close association with global media and technological trends had led to them being more predictable.

“Perhaps it is this [market] size and predictability that has made the local 20 to 35-year-olds such an attractive target,” he says.

Where to from here?

Judging by the thoughts of Hoffman, Jackson, and Liu, as well as accompanying data, over 50s do not receive as much attention as they possibly should from advertisers. However, the reasons why are not black and white. 

There is the need to get the best ROI on ad spend and the rise of younger M&A’s who intentionally or unintentionally market to themselves.

The structural landscape of the advertising industry is also not predisposed to over 50 M&As, as the broader economic, technological and cultural environments make the industry more pre-disposed to younger M&A’s than over 50s. 

Ultimately, the current state of the adverting industry and the environments that influence it has led to a sliding scale of entropy the older the demographic. For this to change would require an overall shift of mind sets within the industry as much as increased ad spend.