By Bill Black, Vice President, Account Director

Everywhere it seems, marketers are targeting younger and younger customers.

Malls are full of ‘Tweener stores. Print media, like Time For Kids, flood grade school classrooms. On line, social networking sites like Club Penguin have huge followings. And multiple TV networks targeting youth like Sprout and Noggin are prevalent. Obviously marketers see opportunity in chasing this young demo. And it appears this target audience is only getting younger.

One place where customers are actually growing older is in financial institutions like banks and credit unions. And it’s not a good thing. For instance, just look at credit unions, where the average age of an account holder is 47!

It makes sense when you consider that the largest generation of our time, Boomers, who now range in age from 45 to 62, represent 78 million people. This group is well past their prime borrowing years of 25-44 and is moving full speed into retirement. So clearly, banks and credit unions face a challenge in trying to re-balance their customer profile in the near future. The 76 million dollar question is where should they be looking to find their next audience?

Start with middle schools and move up.

Generation Y, or Millennials, will be the next big market for financial institutions. This group’s age range is 14-31 and represents 76 million people. It will have a buying power like no other group before them, wielding $500+ billion in annual spending power, more than their Boomer parents had.

Read the rest of this entry »

By Amy Dawson, Senior Vice President/Healthcare Account Director

I read a great article in Advertising Age by Pete Blackshaw, author of “Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3,000.”

You know, he’s right.

How many times have you had a really bad experience at a hotel, restaurant or store and told all of your friends about it?

This is a real challenge for us as marketers - we don’t want to drive people to a bad customer experience because where does that get us? Sometimes the best solution to a marketing challenge starts from the inside out - like Blackshaw says, “do quality checks across all brand touchpoints for disconnects.”

In this age of customer-generated feedback and consumer control, businesses have to focus on creating the best possible customer experience they can. Now there are tools to help measure their brand experience because consumers are telling all on Web sites like TripAdvsor. I’m a big fan of this site because I can see what real people think about their travel experiences, and almost every time I’ve booked a trip, I’ve checked the site first and the feedback is usually right on target.

There are countless ways to check out a company’s service on numerous sites and by word of mouth using Twitter. Even Angie’s List has evolved from providing feedback on dogwalkers and deck builders, now to dentists. A recent Society for New Communications Research study sponsored by Nuance Communications found that consumers are using social media to share their customer experiences and to research the customer service of other companies.

Among the US Internet users surveyed, 59% used social media to ‘vent’ about a customer care experience.

Almost three-quarters (72%) said they sometimes research a company’s customer care online prior to purchasing a product or service; and 84% said the quality of customer care is a factor in their decision to do business with a company. There’s no denying that a customer’s voice can be heard louder and travels further than ever before.

Amazing, isn’t it? My time is too limited to be bothered with bad service or bad products, so I’m relying on other consumers to guide to me the best. I bet you are, too.