Why you should use it to reach seniors
If your target audience is senior and perhaps less Internet savvy, reaching them with online marketing can seem like a daunting task. However, these users are on social media, and you should be too. In fact, year-over-year, older adults are increasingly logging onto social media sites to keep in touch with friends and family, find people from their past, and partake in online discussions. Recent studies show that users over 50 are the fastest growing demographic for Facebook and other social media. Additionally, usage among those over the age of 65 grew 100 percent since 2009, while usage of Twitter has more than doubled among those 50 and older since 2009.

Getting started
Below are a few tips to help you leverage social media to reach an older demographic:

1. Verify your target demographic: Even if you think you know your target, check the data to be sure. Tools like Compete.com and comScore.com can provide you with details on who is visiting your site, including age demographics.
2. Utilize the right social media: Once you know that older demographics are indeed who you want to target, be sure to look beyond popular social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to those that cater to an older demographic. Eons.com is known as the online community for Boomers, and is an example of older users connecting over interests and online forums, which could relate to your business.
3. Connect frequently and relevantly: Frequent, relevant posts and updates are crucial to social media success. Ideally, you should have a social media administrator to update and monitor this content frequently, using language and offerings catered to your audience.
4. Get involved: When you’re not posting, see what groups or pages you can create; browse online conversations to see what users are discussing, and get involved. Make it clear that your company is a credible resource in the field, and give users a reason to follow you and get to know you better.

Today, social media sites are no longer just for the collegiate set. Older demographics are engaging with these sites more and more, and smart marketers will leverage this channel to reach them.

The pet industry is booming

Looking at online activity of pet owners, there are over 27,000 monthly searches alone on the term “medicine for dogs.”

Bottom line: We care about our pets, and we’re willing to spend money on them.

So why hasn’t the pharmaceutical industry, which is always looking for new markets, taken more notice? There’s crop science, and animal genomics for breeding, but mention of veterinary pharmaceuticals is rare.

Two of the mainstream pharmaceutical companies with a veterinary branch (that I could find online) are Teva Animal Health and Boehringer Ingelheim’s Vet Medica. They have medications dedicated to pet-prevalent problems, such as heartworm or common issues like arthritis. Vet Medica even offers Vetmedin to manage the signs of congestive heart failure in dogs.

But I want to treat my dog the same way I would treat my children. Where’s the Lipitor? Or the Paxil? Googling “Lipitor for dogs” just brings me to Lipitor.com, not helpful for Fido’s high cholesterol treatment.

Looking at the cost of online advertising, it would be far more affordable to bid on “Lipitor for dogs” at $.05 per click on your Google ad versus the $6.43 per click you would have to pay for “Lipitor”.

Some researchers are taking note. There was a study on the effect of Plavix (clopidogrel) on dogs in July 2010, but we have yet to see the medicine approved for official canine use.

The popularity of pets, large number of searches owners are doing online, the lower cost of paid search advertising, and the scarcity of pet meds all indicate to me that the large pharmas should be paying more attention to our furry (or scaled) friends.

What do you think? Do you want more medications for your beloved pet?

Resource: FDA rules and regulations for pet medications

The Jimmy Fund

All of the iProspecters looked great in their gear! Here are some of the people that participated in the event (you can see the favored team in this office):

Left to right: Dane, Erica, Alicia, Jordan, Stephanie, Brendon, Jessica, Mike, Siraj, Tommy

Every month, the Boston office highlights a charity to support through employee-raised financial aid or volunteering efforts, which raises awareness of individual employee’s charities of choice. Stay tuned for more great community service events from the Boston office!

Great job, Boston Office!

We are excited to be the official 2011 search engine marketing partner for TravelCom and humbled to work with such innovative brands including Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Viator, Perfect Escapes, Motel 6, STA Travel, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Leading Hotels of the World, and many more.

Are you attending the show? Give us a shout… We’d love to connect over dinner or cocktails, or just stop by our booth in the official Networking lounge during the show.

Dinner atop the Fantasy Tower at Nove Italiano? Don’t mind if we do. Please join us.. We are hosting an exclusive dinner on Wed, March 30th for our closest industry friends and colleagues along with CheetahMail, exclusively for travel marketers. Space is limited so message us at events@iprospect.com for availability.

Local search is an extremely important channel for travel and hospitality marketers. We have created a unique “Local Search Toolkit” for this show. Previously nothing more than a signpost in the search results, local search now offers marketers a myriad of options. And it continues to evolve – rapidly! In fact, the various ways location-based information is being displayed, ranked, consumed, delivered, and utilized are changing constantly – new breakthroughs happen weekly. On top of that, local search is far from an isolated offering. Today it is at a point of convergence; it has melded with social, mobile, and display.

Stop by our booth for your “Local Search Toolkit” or join us during the official breakfast on Wed, March 31 in the Networking Lounge and we’ll share the top tips to position your brand for growth in the Local space.

Learn more about the conference today.

We hope to see you there!