Online-Offline Branding Opportunity	Visited: 1027 Not rated Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Steve Campus June 25, 2009

When you look to the baby boomer market today and follow the research you know why and how the group of people uses the social network environment. They look to the sites to get information about a host of different things.

To understand what boomers want from social networking, one needs to understand more about the mindset of this generation.  

In general, boomers are an active and adventuresome group looking for “peak experiences” that make life worthwhile and to have a productive life that includes meaningful endeavors and interests.     

This generation primarily uses the Internet for information.  They research trips, learn about medical conditions, view real estate listings, find out the weather, read the news, and compare prices on products.  From a marketing point of view, boomers cite the Internet as the most important resource when they make a major purchase. 

Additionally, boomers use the Internet to share information and provide recommendations to other people in their community with similar interests.  Nearly half (45 percent) of all word-of-mouth recommendations among the boomer community are made online, via email, message boards, etc.  

They want to connect with other like-minded people about information, and learn about others’ experiences, whether it is how to grow flowers or how to get involved in philanthropic missions. They want to utilize social networking sites to share their ideas about topics of mutual interest, whether it’s investment strategies or politics. 

Since boomers are socially oriented and accustomed to face-to-face interactions, they can also use social networking sites to form relationships that they can take offline.  Boomers are likely to welcome the opportunity to meet online buddies at offline seminars and events that center around their common interests. 

When you have a generation that has been brought up with face-to-face communications as the norm the marketers need to embrace the offline opportunities with the online immediacy of the social network environment.

Take a product like Wine in both online-offline strategies. Our strategic partner for the Boomster Wine Club   Bottlenotes .com executes on this strategy They offer information online about wines and parings as well online grouping of wine, including video wine tasting. On the Boomster site this fall we will extend the online events with live interactive wine tasting.  Add to this offline events as was conducted last month in Chicago and various offline paid for seat events for fundraising and college reunions based events and you can see the cumulative effects, namely a wider recognition of the featured Wineries and increased sales on line of boutique Wineries