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Appealing to the 50+ Market Online - Part 3

Most web sites are still built for the young, by the young. Understanding what mature consumers respond to online is essential to developing effective web brands.

Though web activity is increasing fastest in the 50+ age group, many companies with active online presences are failing to modify their approach. Brand values need to be clearly conveyed on websites, in email newsletters, in online order forms and online checkouts. Tailoring your communications to reach a teenaged or twenty-something target market, you risk squandering the interest of very lucrative consumers in the 50+ range.

When building a web site to gel well with your mature target market, there is a long list of do's and don'ts regarding color, color combinations, images, fonts and font sizes. Many designers don't recognize that mature market consumers necessitate different style choices. But if your company is committed to attracting mature market consumers online, your designers must do more than post photos of smiling couples with grey hair. Every element of design style can be categorized in terms of its suitability for an older target market.

Begin by determining that your web site will be essentially age neutral; make this one of the top one or two aims in building or modifying the site. Unless you make a specific point of achieving age neutrality, it's an issue that will go on being ignored. A good way of testing how well your team understands this issue is to set a few simple questions as guideposts:

Of the people using the web site, how many are 50+?
Is the Web site's copy and iconography age neutral?
Does the site's menu and navigation structure take account of best practice rules for older users?
Is the use animation likely to delight or annoy the older person?
Has the site been tested with an audience of older people?

Most companies, setting out to answer these questions, find they are at sea. Age aware marketing simply hasn't forced its way to the fore of marketing teams' consciousnesses, especially not in regard to website management. But this will surely change soon, since the mature market is the single most lucrative and fast-growing target market around. If you accept arguments about the economic importance of older consumers – which are now quite common and very persuasive – then optimising your web site for their needs should be a no-brainer.

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