MARKETERS SELL HOUSES, TOO
by Barbara Caplan
Is it really true that “if you build it, they will come?” I don’t think so. Dream fulfillment isn’t on automatic pilot for the active 50-plus market, or any other group for that matter. Nor does it hinge mostly on a home’s design, features, attributes, location, price, resale value, and so forth. These are the centerpiece of a home’s worth, but they only come to life when they capture consumers’ emotions and aspirations. Quality design and construction perk up all the senses like visual appeal. But how does a home speak to them?
How do consumers link a home to how they feel and the experiences they value? What prompts them to imagine how they would live in a home and how that home would enhance their own lives and lifestyles? It’s critical for builders to help their potential buyers envision these important decision points, especially as brand differentiation becomes more fuzzy and difficult to achieve.
Yes, this is a mainstream phenomenon. But its relevance to the 50-plus market deserves special attention, especially when it comes to the substance and tone of marketing to them. It’s important to focus on key product and design issues such as first-floor master bedroom suites, luxury kitchens, and fitness facilities, but it isn’t enough. Builders must drive their understanding home. They must communicate real insight into these active consumer’s needs and wishes and the housing solutions that match them. Speak to vigor and energy and not the adjustments of aging. “They’ll get it.”
By now, it’s presumably “old” news that boomers retain much of their “boomerness” as they age and become empty nesters. It almost borders on cliché to say that members of this famous generation won’t easily give up re-defining every life stage they enter to match their youthful perspective. Hot buttons for these buyers are self-expression, entitlement, vitality, adventure, and rule breaking. But what’s not such “old” news is that there is often a lag between what builders say and do and how they tell their story to the marketplace. It’s time for builders to communicate that they understand the 50-plus market. History won’t help them much. Understanding and research will. Never before has an older generation been so different from its predecessors.
Marketing as a Brand
Here’s where marketers come in. It’s their time to shine. Their role should extend beyond executing the ideas of others in their organization. Effective communication with consumers requires collaboration, so that every business function speaks with the same voice to establish and distinguish the builder’s brand. In fact, a bigger and better role for marketing is not just better promotion of a builder’s brand; better marketing makes for a better brand. It becomes part of the brand. It’s a great, competitive differentiator.
Builders should look to marketers as strategic players in building and selling homes for the 50-plus market. For starters, it’s their job to understand how and in what ways the 50-plus age cohort has changed. It’s their job to develop a language that connects with those changes. Older consumers want to hear about their pep and not their presumed decrepitude.
But reaching them is not a slam dunk. Like most consumers, their resistance to marketing as usual is growing. Chief complaints are that it is intrusive, pushy, loud, and irrelevant. Two studies conducted in 2004 and 2005 by Yankelovich, a nationally recognized market research and consulting firm, paint a sobering picture of major disconnects between what marketers think and what consumers think. Consumers ages 50 and older are aligned solidly with the younger population.
What’s ahead? There’s little question that marketing resistance will accelerate because marketers fail to acknowledge there is a problem reaching this resilient, booming market. Further technological advances, such as ad blockers like Tivo, and direct marketing restrictions can make it even easier to filter unwanted marketing. On the bright side, out of trouble comes opportunity. Superior marketing practices and experiences that resonate with these consumers can create a competitive advantage. How can this be done?
The Cornerstones of Marketing to 50-Plus
What’s needed is a new marketing model. Yankelovich has developed four cornerstones for successful marketing. They include:
- Precision. This means talking to the right people. Targeting is an essential first step. Demographics of age and life stage are not accurate enough. While necessary, they’re not proxies for lifestyles that strongly influence purchase decisions. Database information and insights are important, but they’re not the only route to reaching out effectively. Learning to be a good listener is both intuitive and learned. The same applies to information gathering. Plus, it’s important to focus on areas that typically have received little attention that revolve on who people are, what they want, how they want to live, and what in a home brings life to living? The knowledge gap is significant when targeting the 50-plus consumers since the boomers already are re-defining retirement as we’ve known it, and there is not one script to follow. Without reliable and actionable insights, marketing can be nothing but clutter if people lack interest. Just because boomers are turning 50 doesn’t mean they should fall off the marketer’s radar.
- Relevance. This is a cousin to precision. Once you have a pretty good idea of the “right person,” you can craft the marketing message to match practical and emotional interests. This goes beyond spam. There’s too little time to bother with even the best executed advertisements and marketing practices if they don’t touch on a personal level. Builders might consider a “relevance” segmentation centered on lifestyle characteristics to reflect the great diversity of the 50-plus population. For example, family, health/fitness, cultural pursuits, and work can set up a platform for relevant content and messaging.
- Power. The 50-plus market cut its teeth on the quest for power. Toyota’s tagline says it best: “We relinquish power to you.” We’ll customize as you wish. In effect, Toyota is giving up some control to get it back in the form of trust and loyalty — and business. Question: How can marketers create a process in which consumers can be involved? Have a say? How can feedback be collected and turned into an opportunity to know their customers and respond to their needs and desires?
- Reciprocity. Where’s the quid pro quo? This is what reciprocity means. It can be information about homes, the community, financing, services, and amenities across media. It can be entertainment on Web sites such as Jerry Seinfeld’s Webisodes. It can be fun occasions and special events. And, of course, it can be rewards for consumers’ time and attention in both the home ownership and buying situation. It can be community events that showcase local homes to benefit the needs of the citizens in a time of budge restraint. A very recent case in point: Martha Stewart’s new TV show will emphasize spontaneity and audience participation without the tired signs that say “applause.”
Most of all, reciprocity goes to the heart of what a consumer-driven marketplace is all about, building frenzy or no building frenzy. Consumers aren’t calling for an end to marketing, but they want a better marketing experience that involves them in ways that engage their interest and fulfill their housing dreams.
