6 Ways Not to Appeal to Baby Boomers (& What Does Work)

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The baby boomers: the very first “generation” after WWII. The generation that is not always well understood by today’s marketers, but also the generation that can and wants to spend quite a bit. These parents of Gen X and Millennials are healthier than their peers ever were and are still in the prime of life.


Those baby boomers form a huge part of our society, many of them have serious money to burn and know exactly what they want. Yet this large group is sometimes overlooked by companies. Either because of mutual misunderstanding or because of ignorance. That is why I want to give a number of striking examples of how you should definitely not address the baby boomer. But what was it again about this generation? Who are they and what exactly do they stand for?

Tune in, turn on, drop out: the baby boomer characteristics
The baby boomer generation was born between 1945 and 1964. After the end of World War II, people gradually dared to have children again, especially when the prosperity of the western countries grew faster and faster. This trend continued a bit faster in the United States, because the country did not have to be rebuilt after WWII.

Yet, in Europe, an insane number of children were born during this period, 2.4 million between 1945 and 1955 alone . They grew up in the reconstruction, the swinging sixties and the super seventies, which strongly shaped them towards the ideals of these eras, which strongly imbued them with the striking idealism of afghanistan telegram number list these eras. And perhaps precisely because they partly grew up in the free 70s, when marijuana was available on every street corner and self-development went hand in hand with self-determination, they are very keen on their individuality, their own development and surprisingly liberal norms and values.

Lots of firsts
This development was more noticeable in the Randstad than in the provinces, but nevertheless this was also the generation that experienced many “firsts”: the first color TV, the first mobile phone, the first computer. This is also the generation that was the first to actively choose to stay “young” longer, due to all the possibilities in the field of plastic surgery, botox and fillers. It is not without reason that slogans such as “60 is the new 40” have been popular in recent years and most baby boomers seem to be much more active compared to their peers from previous generations. And this generation is now approximately between 50 and 70 years old, is far from being in a retirement home and forms an incredibly large and interesting group of consumers.

6 don'ts towards baby boomers
How this group (if we roughly assume that it is a whole) wants to be addressed is difficult. But I would like to give 6 examples of what you should definitely not do with your content!

1. Continue to advertise only in newspapers and magazines
The idea that the current 50+ generation can't find their way online is very outdated. 55% of the over-65s now have a smartphone and 95.8% of baby boomers between the ages of 45 and 64 use the internet at some point . In recent years, they have started using more search engines, email more often and finally find it easier to find their way to internet calling. I suspect that good old Google plays a major role in this, unless the boomer in question has accidentally installed some annoying toolbar that forces another search engine.