Great cartoon from Tom Fishburne about a current fad in mainstream marketing-land…

“Marketers are in a mad rush to target Millennials. They are the largest consumer group in history and expected to spend more than Baby Boomers by 2017.

Millennials also came of age with a different relationship to marketing and brands. This creates tension as marketers figure out how to communicate to a new wave of consumers who can be resistant to marketing communication.”

Here’s the whole post “marketing to millennials”.

Just so that we’re clear about WHO we are talking about…

…the “Millennial Generation” is the population group born in the last two decades of the 20th century.  There is no precise set of dates to define this group.  However, the most common starting point seems to be 1983 and the end point the year 2000 (the Australian Bureau Of Statistics uses this definition).

Sometimes known as “Generation Y”, to distinguish them from a previous marketing-demographic fad, “Generation X” (anyone remember them?).

So, hopefully you’re now clear about all that.

Just from the vagueness of the definition, you can see a potential problem if you decide to go about “marketing to millennials”.

And there is going to be a BIG difference in the outlook and behaviour of someone born in 1983 (now aged around 30) and someone born in 2000 (now aged around 13).

But there’s an important questions to be asked…

…is it even worth “marketing to millennials”?

Let me elaborate a little.

As a business owner, it’s essential to be as clear as possible about who your customers are.

And I’m not disputing that there may be some businesses that are very much for a younger demographic (although it’s unlikely that an age range of 13-30 would form a coherent target group).

However, for most businesses, the customer profile will be more complex than a simple age range.

And for many businesses, the millennial group simply won’t be an attractive target.

Indeed a much OLDER demographic is likely to prove far more attractive.

That’s the…

…Leading-Edge Boomers And Seniors group…

…discussed in the Dan Kennedy book “No BS Marketing To Leading Edge Boomers And Seniors”.

It’s worth noting that in the USA…

1. The combined Boomer and Senior consumer population tops 117 million (with an annual spending power of $2 TRILLION)

2. Over half of the nation’s wealth and a larger proportion of discretionary spending power is in the hands of leading-edge boomers and seniors

It may be unfashionable to focus on this group, but the reality is that this is a group with considerable spending power.

Probably much more than the “millennials” group, in fact.

So, avoid being distracted by the latest marketing fad and chasing after a supposed “hot” demographic that may not be a good fit for your business.  Stick with the marketing fundamentals and do the simple things well.

As for the question posed in the cartoon…

…well, smart direct-response marketers won’t find themselves in that position.

That’s because if you target your prospective customers well…

…and communicate clearly how you can help solve their problems…

…not only will it be easier to reach those prospects…

…they might even end up finding you.

UPDATE (18 August 2013):

From the August 2013 GKIC “No BS Marketing Letter”, Dan Kennedy makes the point probably better than I have above…

“From a marketing standpoint, this cautions of ever growing difficulty of reaching the 30 and under consumers by any means other than in their online world – which makes them undesirable consumers for most marketers, as that world is unbelievably cluttered, competitive, chaotic, price competitive, dominated by giant discounters like Amazon and 99-cent apps and free, free, free plus worse than goldfish attention spans. You can think I’m writing them off because I’m old, but if you examine how many successful companies in a wide variety of categories are turning their attention and investments away from this age-bracket, you’ll find a mega-trend, not a grumpy old Dan…

…Of course, I’m not describing universal abandonment of an age-demo.  Google is pushing into the video game market, because they can, and in keeping with another mega-trend: more dollars being spent on “entertainment” by 16 to 35 year olds than on anything.  But more and more companies are pivoting to the 40-50, 50-60 and 60+ age brackets.”

Another good reason to take a look at “No BS Marketing To Leading Edge Boomers And Seniors”.

I think Dan may be missing a trick when considering the under 30 demographic.  It may well be that stodgy old direct mail might actually be a good way to reach them!  After all, there’s probably little competition and an old fashioned letter will certainly stand out from the online world.  Of course, I’m assuming that this group still opens the mail.  I recall some further details on this in a previous “No BS Marketing Letter”.  I’ll update if I can find more on this point.