Today I’m kicking off an occasional series of Why WOWO Radio in Fort Wayne, Indiana is the Best Choice for Advertising Your Business. I am calling it an occasional series because, every few weeks I’ll add another article interspersed with the other articles I share each week on this website and the Genuine ScLoHo Media & Marketing Podcast.

While just this year I was named the General Sales Manager for WOWO radio, and this is my 7th year working for WOWO, I’ve been writing and publishing these stories and insights for over 15 years.  Pretty soon, I’ll have my 20th anniversary of returning to the media and marketing world in Fort Wayne after having worked in radio in Detroit and other places too.

Recently Marketing Charts.com published a story on the “Graying of America” that caught my attention. I’m a young Baby Boomer and for most of my life, I was part of the most sought after demographic for advertisers.  I was part of the Pepsi Generation.  Until I turned 55 that is.

See, in my work in advertising, the desired demographic was either the 18 to 34 year olds when the Baby Boomers were that age, and then more recently 25 to 54 year olds were the hot target market.

When the advertising guru’s followed the Boomers in to middle life with that initial switch, many of them forgot what they were chasing.  As the Boomers got older, the advertising people stayed with the 25-54 year olds which was foolish.

Why?

Because the age 55 and older people in America are not the same as their grandparents were when they were in their 60’s.  We didn’t turn into a bunch of grumpy old men and women sitting around playing checkers and reminiscing about the good old days.  We blew that stereotype sky-high.

Boomers have more money, more free time, more overall freedom and they’re not sitting around waiting to die.

Coupled with the misconception of what Boomer are doing, the advertising people ignored the fact that the younger generations are smaller.  That’s what this story from Marketing Charts dot com points out.

Over the past 10 years, since 2010 the number of pre-teens has been going down, so has the teenage population and college crowd.  There has been 11 percent growth in the 25 to 34 year olds, but less than 2% growth in the 35 to 44 age group.  45 to 54 year old population had a big loss of over 9% in the past decade. So if you are targeting your advertising to 25 to 54 year olds today, there are statistically fewer of them.  That mean less people to buy your stuff than a decade or two ago.

When you compare that with the growth of the older population…

55 to 64 year olds grew in size by over 15%; 65 to 74 year old grew by  almost 45%; and even the 75 and older crowd grew by more than 20% in the past decade.

Clearly the Baby Boomer population is still alive and kicking, and not just dying off.  Some Boomers parents are very active in their 80’s and 90’s.

WOWO Radio has been the most listened to radio station for adults age 25 and older for years and admittedly the biggest chunk of our listenership was age 50 and older.  But we’re not our grandparents.  We’re upgrading our lifestyles, socking it away for retirement one day and living longer, healthier lives than previous 50, 60, and 70 year olds were.

One more statistic I noticed this summer from our most recent ratings survey was that the WOWO Radio audience is becoming more diverse.  We are also getting younger listeners, those between the age of 25 and 50 have grown in the past year.  Another trend is the ratio of men and women listening to WOWO Radio.  We used to be 60% guys and 40% women 10 years ago.  Today it’s nearly 50/50.

Let’s wrap this up with a few more facts and figures from the Marketing Charts report.  Baby Boomers have more than 54% of the nations wealth, and if you add it the money from the next older generation, that’s where 75% of the buying power is in America.  These people are also the least affected by the fall out of COVID-19.   And these are the WOWO Radio listeners.

There you have it, Part One of Why WOWO is the Best Choice for Advertising.  Contact me to get started with a campaign to marketing your business.