Introduction
Utilities should think harder about the over-50s. This segment contains greater value opportunities, and seniors are beginning to switch. By 2025, the over-50s will make up 40% of the customer base in Western Europe. Utilities cannot ignore this group, but nor can they treat the over-50s as one segment of the population. In fact, this segment is more diverse than any other age group.
Scope of this report
- Segmentation of the 'over-50' lifestage, based on lifestyle and attitude as well as age and income.
- Insight into the lifestyles of senior consumers, providing the basis for segmentation.
- Advice on how to communicate with senior consumers - the channels to use and the marketing myths to avoid.
Research and analysis highlights
Longer lives can mean more profit. Britons are now living to an average age of 80 or more, with similar averages in the rest of Western Europe. So acquiring a 50-year-old customer may be the beginning of a 30-year supply relationship long enough for an attractive lifetime value.
This segment is diverse, utilities need to attract senior customers, but will find it increasingly difficult if they continue to use a mass-market approach. As utilities become more loath to compete on price, they will find that some segments of senior consumers are especially receptive to customer service propositions.
Avoiding the myths using outmoded stereotypes will not make utilities appear relevant. Instead, they should show seniors as a critical part of their customer base.
Key reasons to read this report
- Gain commercial advantage through better understanding of the largest section of the customer base in Western Europe.
- Understand how lifestyle segmentational factors can be introduced into a customer database.
- Design marketing that demonstrates awareness of the lives and needs of senior consumers, thus avoiding alienating them and even losing them to rivals.
CHAPTER 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
- Introduction
- Being over 50
- Segmenting the over-50s
- Communicating with the over-50s
- Key findings
- Action points
CHAPTER 2 INTRODUCTION
- What is this report about?
- Who is the target reader?
- How to use this report
CHAPTER 3 BEING OVER 50
- Introduction
- Key findings
- What does it mean when a consumer turns 50?
- Life changing events after 50
- Being over 50 is changing
CHAPTER 4 SEGMENTING THE OVER-50S
- Introduction
- Key findings
- Size and growth of the entire '50+' segment
- Segmentation by income and wealth
- Segmenting seniors by age
- Segmenting by lifestyle
- Lifestyle drivers: age and period effects
CHAPTER 5 COMMUNICATING WITH THE OVER-50S
- Introduction
- Key findings
- Talk to them in person
- If you cannot speak to them in person, send them a magazine
- A youthful advertising industry does not understand senior consumers
- Avoiding marketing myths
- Showing seniors with pride
- Summary
CHAPTER 6 ACTION POINTS
- Introduction
- What to look out for
- Why utilities need to pay attention
- How to communicate with them
- Developing the home services market
- Design products for them
CHAPTER 7 APPENDIX
- Energy writing team
- How to contact experts in your industry
List of Tables
- Table 1: Proportion of EU population contracting various types of loan in 2000 - the over 55s contract fewer non mortgage loans than any other age category
- Table 2: 50 - 59 year olds - how many millions will be in employment?
- Table 3: 60 - 69 year olds - fewer of them work, but the changes are going to be more dramatic
- Table 4: 70 - 84 year olds - huge increases from a tiny base, except in Italy
- Table 5: The average age of first time mothers - soon it will be 30
- Table 6: Proportion of Europeans living alone - i.e. bill payers
- Table 7: Europeans participating in various activities in a typical week, by age (%), 2002
- Table 8: European life expectancy forecasts by country (5 year averages) - we are going to live longer
- Table 9: Average income for three age groups - 50 - 64 is the richest category, but the over 65s are the poorest
- Table 10: Distribution of population by income group by age and country, (%) 2002
- Table 11: The effectiveness of different channels of communication
- Table 12: An analysis of product categories featuring 50-plus models in advertisements
- Table 13: Reported likely take up rates of electrical wiring insurance - the older people get, the less likely they are to take it
- Table 14: Percentage of each age category saying that they would buy boiler and heating insurance
- Table 15: Plumbing and drainage - the same story
List of Figures
- Figure 1: Mega-lifestage durations - later adulthood is the most protracted lifestage of them all
- Figure 2: Young Adults' financial and residential reliance on parents
- Figure 3: Youthful seniors
- Figure 4: Over-50s as a percentage of total population in Europe - already, nearly 40% of women are over 50, in two decades, nearly 50% will be
- Figure 5: The period effect - attitudes diverge in later life
- Figure 6: The age segments, the formative period and the values they have imbibed
- Figure 7: Distribution of seniors
- Figure 8: Across Europe, people prefer to talk to their utility in person
- Figure 9: The story is little different in the UK
- Figure 10: Self referential creative processes
