Patti Chavet of Frisco, Texas writes:
“I’m a sales consultant and I want to brand myself as an expert in active adult lifestyle living in Texas.
“My target market is Baby Boomers, age 55 and older, who want to downsize to a maintenance-free home so they’re free explore personal hobbies, interests, public service, education, travel, etc., all in the company of others who share the same lifestyle.
“I work for Del Webb, whose communities traditionally have targeted retirees looking to downsize. I’m new to marketing, and I’d like ideas and advice on how to use traditional and social media to become the go-to person in Texas who can help Baby Boomers move from big houses to easy-to-manage single-family homes in Del Webb communities.
“Where should I begin? I’ve been in this niche market for more than 20 years, so I’m already an expert. My challenge is to now spread the word throughout Texas. I’d love to hear suggestions from your Publicity Hounds.”
To position yourself as an expert, I suggest starting with a blog. Offer information that helps your target audience, finding the intersection between their informational needs/wants and your expertise. Mixing it up a bit and having a video blog posting every now might be a good idea. It would help people identify with you and connect with you better, and the videos can also be posted on YouTube and other video sharing sites for extra exposure. Tweet and Facebook your blog postings, along with other info that will appeal to your audience.
Hi Patti,
You should be writing articles and submitting them on top websites and ezines that your targeted audience (baby boomers looking to retire) goes to every day for solutions you provide. I know you’re looking for a local area — but article marketing works for you too.
I recently wrote a blog article post on how article marketing helps local businesses. Check it out at:
http://tinyurl.com/amforlocalbusinesses
If you need help writing articles — I have instant article writing templates at http://www.startwritingarticlesfaster.com
and I have an article marketing coaching program at: http://www.getarticlemarketingcoaching.com
With my coaching program, I show you how to mix your article marketing efforts with social media marketing.
Several things you can do, Patti, to target the boomers: while their are usually several networking organizations within a large community that target the senior market, their aren’t many that target boomers. I suggest you either find one or two that do hit the boomers, or start your own. Put together a list of the top 30 companies that might target boomers, and can influence them to use you. Then invite these folks to your first networking meeting. Networking really works if your the founder, or the key speaker.
Second, create a boomer event, where you can be the hostess and/or keynote speaker, and use blogs, email (Constant Contact), and other media to invite people to a free forum where you and maybe one other speaker talk about “transitioning for boomers”.
Finally, create a monthly newsletter in both email and print that talks about different boomer subjects. You’ll quickly become the local expert on the subject. Get your articles and info from the net, other marketers, and boomer books. A real good one is “Generational Marketing”, which I’ve used for a few of my own speeches.
Good luck.
Here are my ideas:
–Create relationships with other companies in Texas that also target Boomers, and cross-promote.
–Start a Facebook group of Texas Baby Boomers and encourage them to share tips, etc. about reaching retirement.
–Start blogging about your topic. Find success stories of people within Texas who are living the life you are encouraging others to live, and write about it. Use Texas-specific keywords in the headlines and copy.
–Get onto the speaking circuit in your local community and present a fun program on how to downsize at retirement.