The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain

In January NostraChuckus predicted that this would be:

The Year of The Baby Boomer Brain
Not that the last few years haven’t had plenty of neurons bouncing about and flashing all sorts of surprising info about middle-aged noggins …

And he mentioned an upcoming book:

The Secret Life of the Grown-up Brain
The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind
Barbara Strauch – Author
For many years, scientists thought that the human brain simply decayed over time and its dying cells led to memory slips, fuzzy logic, negative thinking, and even depression. But new research from neuroscien­tists and psychologists suggests that, in fact, the brain reorganizes, improves in important functions, and even helps us adopt a more optimistic outlook in middle age.

I haven’t read it yet (it’s on its way) – but I did sit transfixed by Barbara Strauch on Fresh Air. 

For advertisers, everything she says is important.  Ms. Strauch talks about “creating a disorienting dilemma” and “shaking up the cognitive egg” to get our attention – not something usually done when advertising to Baby Boomers. Most ads pander and lull us to sleep. 

The last question asked and answered is really what it’s all about.  

Carve out 30 minutes sometime soon and listen to it all:

Selling To Seniors

I had a good chat today with Libbye Morris.  She’s writing a piece for the Selling To Seniors web site.

Forget about what I said (we’ll find out in May).  I asked Libbye if she was offended by advertisements targeting Baby Boomers.  She replied: No, I’m not offended. I feel ignored.

That sounds about right.

Designing for Older Consumers

As usual, Dick Stroud beat me to it because he gets up eight hours earlier. (At least that’s as good an excuse as any.)

Dr. Joseph Coughlin (I’ve blogged about him a bunch of times) has a post on his Disruptive Demographics blog that should be read by everybody involved in advertising and marketing to Baby Boomers:

Personalization: The New Language of Design for Older Consumers
Researchers and industry have spent considerable time and resources on improving the usability of new technologies. Despite these efforts, the capability and functionality of most new devices still outstrips their usability. Greater capability is often coupled with greater complexity packaged in an ever-smaller device … The cell phone provides a good example. Many phones enable users to play music, take photos, film videos, and now many mobile platforms are being designed to monitor chronic disease. However, this high level of functionality is not matched with an equal level of usability.

Entrepreneurs often approach me with products and say, “I’ve dumbed it down for Baby Boomers.”  One product had a dumbed-down GUI – but even worse: the text was reverse white on blue, the most difficult to read color contrast for older eyes.  The designer hadn’t a clue.

Dumbing-down is what you don’t want to do. You want to make the product easier to see, to hold, to operate.  That’s not ‘dumbing down’.  You can apply Universal Design principles to complex products. 

From my book (© 2005, 2007):

Apply the above to smart phones and apps, and just about any technology product.  Baby Boomers do want and demand choices, features.  They just won’t be interested in or use them all.   

Read the Disruptive Demographics blog post. (Although we’ll forgive Dr. Coughlin for his ‘Me Generation’ quotes.)

ennu – the multimedia magazine

I saw it a few weeks ago, knew it was something exciting - but was otherwise occupied and simply bookmarked it.  Since then, colleagues Brent Green and Dick Stroud have jumped all over it:

Arjan in't Veld, a young Dutch man, and the Future of Boomer Magazines
Sometimes it takes getting out of our own country to encounter new ways of experiencing being Boomer through media, as has this new online journal taken some very creative steps toward envisioning a 50+ magazine for the future.

This is worth 10 mins of your life
The magazine is in Dutch, not surprisingly, but you can still appreciate its excellence. Real ground breaking stuff.

What they’re talking about:

www.ennumagazine.nl

 

I’ve always wanted to publish an edgy, dense, contemporary magazine for Baby Boomers – eschewing the typical fodder:  grinning pod-people on beaches, empty self-help silliness, stories about how to look younger but you really won’t, medical breakthroughs that really aren’t, etc.*  Arjan has done that and more. I never envisioned the multimedia possibilities. Kudos, Mr. in't Veld.

And I’ve never been a fan of the software used to transform print mags into online PDFs or whatever they are – with phony ‘page turning’ widgets and silly sounds.  Arjan and his crew did it right.  There is a small page-turning gizmo on the front cover so you know it’s a magazine and will be presented as such (linear, horizontal) – but after that you get beautifully designed single-page layouts specifically for the web and/or the iPad and Kindle.  Ennu would also look pristine on a flat screen TV.

Criticisms? Pure nitpicking: Maybe I’d bump up the fonts a bit, not overuse italics, and think a little about text over busy backgrounds. 

So scamper through ennu.  It’s amazing how you can enjoy something without understanding any of it. 

Then imagine if you could …
_____

* There are a few beaches and whatnot in ennu – but I think they’re mostly advertisements.

The Nothing Much New To Report Report

Good stuff, but if you’ve paid attention you’ve seen it all before.

News Flash #1

In social dealings, being older is being wiser
… Researchers led by Richard E. Nisbett of the University of Michigan found that older people were more likely …  to recognize that values differ, to acknowledge uncertainties, to accept that things change over time and to acknowledge others' points of view.

Moldy posts of mine:

Baby boomers are smarter than you think

We have seen the future, and it is old and cool and wise.

People generally get better.

Q: Do you find you’ve become more creative as you’ve gotten older?
Oh, yes. I’m much, much better with creative things—people generally get better. They just know more.

Q: Your mind certainly seems to have stayed fertile.
Yes, but what’s really important is humor—the way you see through things. And I don’t mean just “Ho, ho, ho!” but real irony about the diabolical nature of things. If you don’t have that, you just collapse.

What Kind of Genius Are You?

2010: The Year of The Baby Boomer Brain

Aging Brain Less Quick, More Shrewd

News Flash #2

Annoyed With Retail Service, Women Are Buying Their Clothes Online
by Stephen Reily
Thirteen percent buy clothes ONLY online, while 2 out of 3 do at least some of their clothes shopping there.

Crumbling, musty posts (the first from 2005):

The Very Secretive Forth & Towne
There are so many ladies I know around my age who've stopped going to malls, stopped physically shopping for clothing (they pour over catalogs and/or order online) because there isn't much out there for them.

Forth and Towne R.I.P. Redux
There is the persistent rumor afoot that the last thing a women of a certain age wants to be is "ghettoized." 
– Carol Orsborn

Demand for older models grows
In September, J.Crew will introduce an online section within its Web catalog that features 58-year-old Los Angeles model Pia Gronning ... The sundresses will be the same, but the styling will be more age-appropriate and sophisticated.

Chico’s and Younger Women
Spotlight blames Mr. Edmonds for the retailer's missteps, including turning off Chico's core baby boomer customers by trying to reach younger women…

The Forgotten Market Online
All of this would be OK if it were not for the facts. 45-54 year olds spend twice as much online as their daughters. Not surprisingly the average age of an online customer at Saks.com … is 42.

News Flash #3

Boomers: Smartphone’s Next Mass Audience
Approximately 80 million Baby Boomers, with nearly $4.6 trillion in buying power by 2015, will be the tipping point for the smartphone market.

It never had a dust jacket – but that’s OK.  Now all the copies are turning to dust.

The pull quote on the cover (Published 2005):

“It will be the Baby Boomers who will be the first to pick and choose, to ignore or be seduced by leading-edge technology marketing. There’s a simple reason for this. We have the money to buy this stuff. Experts say we’ll continue to have the money for at least the next twenty years. Write us off at your own peril.”