Pity the poor marketer, nose pressed against the virtual glass, peering inside the Social Media toyshop.

“Why won’t they let me in to play?” he wonders.

TMW, a British integrated marketing agency, wondered the same thing. As TMW’s Darran Snatchfold noted in an interview with Brand Republic:

The failure of a sizeable chunk of campaigns to gain any traction in Social Media highlights our continuing struggle in this (formerly) new frontier.  Our biggest challenge – how to ingratiate brands to audiences in a media where the risk of being an unwelcomed intruder looms large. The answer lies not in what we can build in terms of techno-wizardry, but in what we should build according to good old fashioned user mindsets and needs in this space.

Already, much is known about what people do in social media and what roles they play. Much less is known of the underlying reasons why.  If we know the answer to that, we can understand how we can introduce enduring value and make the contact with our brand far more rewarding.

To answer this question TMW identified 16 reasons why people might use the various Social Media channels (from networks to online gaming) grouped into 6 key themes:

• DISCOVERY – for self-development or to learn from others
• ALTRUISM – to help others make the right decision or become involved in the brand’s product decision
• SOCIAL – to connect to the like minded, reinforce tribal identity or gain a sense of belonging
• FAME – for personal notoriety or to challenge their ability against others
• ESCAPISM – for entertainment and an escape from the daily routine
• EXPRESSION – as an outlet for their imagination or expression of personal identity

They then asked an omnibus research panel why they used Social Media. Darran reported back:

The study suggests the strongest motivator to spend time in Social Media comes from DISCOVERY and in particular the ability to learn other people’s point of view (true for 70% of active users).  However the ego-centric FAME drivers cannot be ignored, with 31% admitting a degree of enjoyment from being seen to be doing well in life by others – explaining the breed of aggressive network builders on Facebook.

Perhaps the most encouraging finding for brands is that 60% enjoy the opportunity to input into companies about their products or services. This is an open invite from nearly two-thirds of users to involve them in your brand decisions through the likes of community forums and FAQs.

The least surprising finding was that men think differently from women.  For women the strongest value seems to come from SOCIAL factors (especially staying in touch with existing friends). For men it’s more about DISCOVERY.  FAME and the ability to get their opinion heard by a wider audience is a greater motivator for men, EXPRESSION and having an outlet for their imagination more so for women.

Does age play a part?

Those who have grown up with Social Media (18-24 year olds) gain greater pleasure from expressing their individuality and building their notoriety (FAME) than their older peers.  Brands should therefore look to provide the platform for them to be heard and to compete, just as Adidas achieved with their 2007 Predator and Tunit Myspace campaign.

Whereas, for 35-44 year olds ALTRUISM and DISCOVERY motivations are particularly strong.  The clearest opportunity for brands is therefore to provide the tools to help them learn and allow them to help others make the right choice.

What are your recommendations for brands?

Firstly, understanding what drives your particular audience to create, contribute or spectate should inspire every strategy and is the key to unlocking the value exchange in Social Media.  Ask the question of your customers or target audience and build a solution around the answer.

Secondly, explore the full spectrum of ways to deliver value according to identified user needs.  It seems all brands are looking to either entertain or to connect audiences in Social Media.  If everyone is doing the same it becomes very difficult for any single brand to be heard amongst the noise.

Thirdly, get in touch dsnatchfold@tmw.co.uk This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to find out more about the findings and their implications for today’s marketers.

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76% of US shoppers place more trust in brands that offer customer ratings and reviews (Bazaarvoice 2007).

Forrester Research says (2008) 71 percent of online shoppers seek out product reviews written by other customers before they buy.

Google’s retail industry director John McAteer says (2009) that the volume of reviews is crucial for increasing conversions, with 20 the magic number, at which point the product becomes more attractive and inspires further reviews.

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A typical city in ancient Greece had a large open area (the agora) where local merchants could set up displays and sell their products. Merchants of similar goods had shops together in a specific area in the agora, not unlike today’s shopping districts in major cities around the world.

As you might imagine, such clustering, while convenient for the customer, made life extremely competitive for the retailer. When a new shipment of ivory arrived from North Africa the ivory merchants would cry out loudly to passersby, proclaiming the merits of their particular offerings. Bustling, noisy and chaotic.

Inevitably, those merchants who understood and developed a long-term relationship with their customers – so that they could minimize having to shout out all the time to gain attention – were the most likely to prosper. Which households needed and could afford new linens from Egypt or spices from Syria? Which Athenians had just bought new slaves and needed extra stores? Send a runner to connect with the customer. Call it the earliest beginnings of the CRM process.

The drive to understand the customer continues. In April 2007 the Economist Intelligence Unit conducted an online survey of 180 senior global executives from the retail industry, querying respondents on their current and planned strategies to understand and anticipate customer needs. The resulting data has been captured in a special report sponsored by SAP, “Intelligent Merchandising: Creating a Unique Shopping Experience”.

To customers bombarded with so many products and experiences, it’s the brave retailer who can claim to offer anything unique by way of merchandising or customer service. So just how do retailers try to hook customers with fresh, unusual and relevant shopping experiences?

The Economist Intelligence Unit started with customer loyalty, asking about the single technique most used by retailers to identify and understand their best customers. The most-cited results:

• 40% Tracking of purchasing records through loyalty cards (recency, frequency, monetary value)
• 26% Formal use of surveys/questionnaires at point-of-sale (POS)
• 15% Analysis of participation in incentive contests and programmes (eg, promotions)
• 9% Analysis of dispute resolution (eg, returns, pricing errors)

To all intents and purposes, though the labels may be different and the technology a little more advanced, these are the same CRM techniques used instinctively by those long-departed Greek merchants to identify their most-favoured households.

There’s nothing much new in the “encouraging customer loyalty” toolkit either. Loyalty-enhancing strategies used by more than half the respondents were introducing new products (63%), local store activities (56%) and targeted discounts for specific customers (52%).

Other popular loyalty-focused initiatives included:

• 48% Incentive programmes for repeat purchases at the POS (eg, cards, clubs)
• 37% Off-site incentive programmes for repeat purchasers (eg, rewards, discounts)
• 29% Follow-up phone calls to customers after significant purchases
• 41% Customised promotions based on past purchases
• 42% “Special customer only” events and promotions
• 46% Targeted advance notification for sales and promotions
• 19% Special e-mail discount codes for best customers

Once again, the methodology may have changed but the customer service principles remain eternal.

Measurement
Communicating is one thing, but measuring the success of that communication is another. The Economist Intelligence Unit asked respondents what measures they use to track the success of promotions. The top two responses were somewhat intuitive indicators—customer satisfaction (55%) and customer retention (52%)—while the eminently measurable sales per square meter of retail space/week (40%) offered a strong statistical counterpoint.

In-store traffic (31%) and customer opinions (31%) are still perceived as important indicators, emphasising the heavy reliance that executives place on sales staff. This dependence on the lowest-paid member of the retail organisation as a reliable observer of customer behaviour is a conundrum of contemporary retailing.

Despite the number of advanced data collection technologies available, the sales associate is still the retail organisation’s number-one ambassador and data collector, so the acquisition, training and retention of appropriate help is a critical element in the strategy of any successful merchant. Just can’t get good slaves.

Winners & Losers
The Intelligent Merchandising report even goes beyond the numbers, drawing on the cumulative statistics to create fascinating profiles of retailing winners and losers.

Merchandising Leaders:

• Create trends
• Lead their customers
• Push the envelope in product development
• Cold heartedly kill the dogs
• Encourage responsible risk
• Expect a great deal
• Strive relentlessly
• Have swagger and bravado

Tired merchandisers, on the other hand:

• Wait for customers to accept trends
• Merchandise based on history
• Rely on line extensions
• Are risk averse in product development
• Focus on the fact that most products fail
• Make excuses for the dogs
• Carry too many unproductive SKUs

If you want to find out more about CRM techniques in Ancient Greece, may we recommend a visit to your local library. More up-to-date customer service insights, however, can be found in the Intelligent Merchandising report, which we share with subscribers to MARKETING RAG.

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Jay Conrad Levinson, author of a whole host of Guerilla Marketing books, reveals that consumers really buy …

• Benefits and not features.
• Promises you make – so make them with care.
• The promises they want personally fulfilled.
• Your credibility – or don’t buy if you ain’t got it.
• Solutions to their problems.
• You, your employees, your service department.
• Wealth, success, security, love, acceptance.
• Your guarantee, reputation and good name.
• Other people’s opinions of your business.
• Expectations based on your marketing.
• Believable claims, not simply honest claims.
• Hope for their own and their company’s future.
• Brand names rather than unknown names.
• The consistency they’ve seen you exhibit.
• The stature of the media in which you market.
• Value – which is not the same as price.
• Selection – and often the best of your selection.
• Freedom from risk – guaranteed by your warranty.
• Acceptance by others of your goods and services.
• Convenience in buying, paying and lots more.
• Respect for their own ideas and personality.
• Your identity as conveyed by your marketing.
• Clarity – if they don’t understand, they don’t buy.
• Style – the kind that fits their own style.
• Honesty – one dishonest word means theere’s no sale.
• Comfort – offerings that fit their comfort zone.
• Success – your success, which can lead to theirs.
• Good taste – and they know it from bad taste.

Marketing works when it reassures prospects into becoming customers.

Does yours?

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You know, and we know, that none of us can stay in business without customers. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, can’t live without ‘em. Unless your business is really, really small – and wants to stay that way – you’ll have to figure out some way of winning and retaining customers.

Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) has become a vital function of modern business, enabling us to reach out en masse to our customers, interact effectively with them and manage our relationships with expertise and finesse.

Or at least that’s the theory.

In practice, things don’t always work so smoothly. So we were quick to grab the latest white paper from salesforce.com, proudly entitled “Eight CRM Essentials: An Executive Guide to the Eight Must-Have Elements of Every Successful CRM Initiative.”

According to the sales bumpf, the guide “distills best practices, lessons learned, and collective insights from salesforce.com’s 32,000+ customers—as well as industry experts—across various company sizes, geographies, and vertical markets.”

So what did we learn? Well, understand that this is a white paper that’s been put together to highlight salesforce.com’s particular offerings (on-demand CRM), so the problems and solutions highlighted do tend to reflect their capabilities. Nevertheless, the paper does provide useful insights. Keep its self-interested origins in mind, however, as we take you through a quick summary of the Eight CRM Essentials, with our accompanying commentary where appropriate:

CRM Essential #1: Rapid Time to Value
(our translation: how to get earning, fast)

Instant messaging, 24/7 customer service, shorter development cycles… today, businesses and their customers move at a rapid clip. Buy decisions are made quickly, and in fact entire businesses can succeed or fail in a matter of weeks. No-one has the luxury of waiting months or even years to install a traditional, expensive, client/server CRM application. The competitive advantage today is on-demand CRM.

On-demand CRM solutions are better suited to today’s fast-moving businesses. You can be up-and-running with on-demand CRM in a matter of weeks, so you can focus on delivering greater value to customers, rather than worrying about installing and maintaining hardware and software.

[This is a fair summation of the benefits of born-on-the-web softwaresolutions, whether in CRM or elsewhere; just understand that it’s a not-quite-objective evaluation.]

CRM Essential #2: Point-and-Click Customization

No CRM solution is going to fit like a glove right out of the box, because the reality is that no two companies’ customer relationships and processes are exactly alike. However, because many traditional CRM solutions are difficult and expensive to customize, some organizations are forced to alter their business processes to fit the capabilities of their CRM technology. The key to success is a highly flexible CRM solution that allows you to keep pace with changing customer needs and your evolving business environment.

[This hits at the heart of the debate between “software written speciallyfor you” and “out of the box, for anyone” remotely-hosted solutions. If you’re going to use an on-demand product, satisfy yourself that its customization capabilities match with your needs before you buy.]

CRM Essential #3: A 360-Degree Customer View

The quality of the customer experience makes and breaks companies. Customers are becoming increasingly demanding and sophisticated, and they’ll take their business elsewhere if you don’t deliver the superior service they feel they deserve. Companies today are challenged to integrate and manage the complete customer lifecycle—seamlessly and effectively—to win and retain those highly desirable most-profitable customers.

You need a CRM solution where:

1. Leads go directly to the right sales team or individual rep, are well qualified, and include the right information.

2. Marketing gets real-time visibility into the status of every lead, sees which lead sources drive the most revenue, and plans appropriate customer marketing campaigns.

3. Service and support organizations get visibility into which products or services the customer is using and any pending sales opportunities, and can alert the sales team to potential cross-sell and up-sell opportunities.

4. Back in sales, reps get insight into any outstanding customer service issues so that there are no unpleasant surprises when they make their sales calls.

[These are pretty much minimum requirements for any CRM solution worthy of the name.]

CRM Essential #4: Real-Time Visibility

To stay competitive, businesses must “mind their metrics.” Constantly monitoring the health of the business, determining what’s working and what’s not, and making adjustments to improve operations and increase revenue are essential to surviving and thriving in today’s competitive market.

Analytics can be addictive, and there are literally hundreds of CRM metrics you can track. Your CRM metrics should track to your organization’s other financial and business objectives. In addition, the CRM metrics you choose will be specific to your company’s size, product lifecycle, and your corporate mission.The key is to get good insight without becoming a slave to the metrics.To avoid that, it’s best to identify the smallest number of performance metrics that can still properly encapsulate the business objective.

For example, a new company with a promising but unknown product will need to invest heavily in marketing campaigns to solicit customers, build product awareness, and establish its brand. The company would want to keep close track of metrics such as new leads per marketing campaign, sales opportunities per campaign, and opportunities closed per campaign.

On the other hand, a company with a well-established brand, a large customer base, and a mature portfolio of products would want to focus on metrics that help identify its most profitable customers and show which programs further increase their customers’ spending and ensure their loyalty. This company would want to track up-sells and cross-sells with metrics such as the number of products or services per customer and average profit per customer.

Even small investments in dashboards and reporting for all your customer-facing employees can have a profound impact on business performance. Metrics motivate.

CRM Essential #5: No More Dirty Data

Almost every company suffers from “dirty data” syndrome, and few have any idea what to do about it.

Consider the findings of the IBM Global Data Management Survey of 600 major enterprises: 75 percent of the respondents reported significant problems as a result of defective data, including violated contract terms, failure to bill or collect for services or products delivered, delays in or abandonment of new systems projects and extra accounting costs.

You can’t be successful with CRM until you find a remedy to the data integrity problem that is prevalent in organizations of all sizes and in every industry. A three-step approach to quality data management can address this issue so that your CRM initiative will be free of dirty data.

1. Capture. If you don’t capture it, you can’t measure it. In order to capture all the data you need to get an accurate analysis of your business, you need everyone in the company to use your CRM system rather than store data inunintegrated or offline sources such as spreadsheets. To get quality data, high system adoption is critical.

2. Clean. Once you have the data in your CRM system, you need to continually weed out bad data by removing duplicates, synchronizing changing data, and updating information.

3. Augment. Merely cleansing your data is not enough. Maintaining high data quality also means filling in the blanks. For example, some of your account records may be missing company information such as revenue, number of employees, key executives, and so on. You can augment your data by leveraging data service providers to help you fill in the gaps.

CRM Essential #6: High Adoption

There’s nothing worse than investing in CRM and having no one show up. Too many CRM projects fail due to poor user adoption. After all, technology is only as good as the people who use it. To ensure that people do use your CRM system, it must be easy to use, accessible, and scalable, and significantly enhance productivity, efficiency, and visibility.

A look at successful CRM initiatives uncovers several best practices for driving user adoption.

· Build support for CRM early on.

· Go top down, bottom up, and sideways.

· Focus on people and processes.

· Make your users’ lives easier.

· Let them take it on the road.

· Keep it simple.

· Train your users in advance.

· Give executives—and everyone—a bird’s-eye view.

· Reinforce adoption with carrots and sticks.

· Give everyone a voice.

[The white paper goes into rather more detail about these best practices – we’ve just captured the essence here].

CRM Essential #7: Extending Your Success

Business is about evolution. Smart and successful companies are flexible enough to adapt as necessary while never letting go of the core mission and values. If your business must be nimble to survive, why should you commit to a rigid,unflexible technology solution for something as important and core to your business as CRM? The ability to tie-in additional best-of-breed applicationsthat address other key business initiatives and processes is essential to the long-term success of your CRM solution.

[This Essential Tip, which goes on to highlight various Add-Ins available to extend the functionality of CRM, makes a worthwhile point about integrating CRM into your other business applications.]

CRM Essential #8: A Broad Community

Community-building Web technologies and sites are some of the most popular and fastest-growing areas on the Internet today. Through blogs, wikis, social and business networking sites, and much more—people are increasingly engaging with each other online. At the same time, companies are realizing that nurturing their customer communities and engaging with customers can yield dramatic results in terms of customer loyalty and brand awareness.

You can facilitate the growth of a strong customer community by providing online forums for a variety of topics of interest to your customers, including:

· Best practices. Encourage customers to share tips, tricks, success stories, and ideas, etc.

· Ideas and voting. You and your customers can share ideas on the future of your products and services. Providing the opportunity for customers to vote on ideas is an excellent way to get feedback, drum up participation, and help customers feel invested in your company’s future.

· User groups. You can set up local user groups and provide an online forum for communication and planning among the local members.

[Online communities are hot right now. This is a smart piece of advice, firmly linking CRM with customer engagement].

The “Eight CRM Essentials” white paper provides some worthwhile perspectives on the topic, and is worth a read if you’re considering implementing or upgrading CRM. We do have a copy, of course, but we’re going to encourage you toget yours from salesforce.com, so you can see if their own CRM practices match their advice.

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Why do consumers buy the same brand of coffee and mayonnaise over and over again, but will often purchase different brands of cold cereal and chocolates? It’s hardly happenstance, according to a recent US study by The Nielsen Company. Nielsen’s study of shopper behaviour shows that consumers exhibit distinct shopping modes at the supermarket that dictate what ends up in their grocery bags.

“Shoppers don’t waste energy on everyday decisions,” said Manjima Khandelwal, senior vice president, Nielsen Customized Research. “To simplify their lives, shoppers are often in grab-and-go mode, reaching for the brands they usually buy without reading the label or checking the price.”

The key to reaching shoppers lies in understanding that auto-pilot mode can get disrupted by external stimuli such as advertising, buzz, new offers, price and promotions. When this happens, shoppers re-evaluate their decisions; they look at alternatives and consider new offers. Nielsen calls these disruptions Delta Moments and it is at these times that marketers have a brief window of opportunity.

Auto-pilot and Delta Moment dynamics vary significantly across Categories. A seemingly great strategy in one Category can fail to connect in other Categories. Marketers could be way off the mark by failing to read the ‘body language and mindset’ of shoppers.

Nielsen’s study, which reviewed consumer shopping behavior across 30 food categories, found that consumers adopt one of four different “shopping modes” as they cruise the supermarket aisles. Key characteristics of the shopping modes – auto-pilot, variety-seeking, buzz or bargain hunting – are:

Auto-pilot
In auto-pilot, or grab-and-go mode, shoppers are making everyday, habitual decisions driven by brand choices and they are usually not in the market to try anything new. Items such as coffee, cereal, cheese, margarine and mayonnaise are purchased in auto-pilot mode. For example, Nielsen’s research found that shoppers were quite particular about their coffee, choosing the same caffeine fix, flavor and coffee experience.

“The implication for marketers in auto-pilot categories is that if you are a leader, avoid radical changes to your brand message or packaging,” said Deepak Varma, senior vice president, Nielsen Customized Research. “Otherwise you may risk disrupting habitual behaviour driving brand choice in your favor.”

Variety-Seeking
In the variety-seeking mode, shoppers are browsing shelves actively and on the lookout for new tastes as well as interesting product innovations or products offering “surprise” in their role as household chef.

“Consumers seem to get bored with the same choices in certain categories,” said Varma. “We found shoppers on the lookout for a change of pace when shopping in the frozen food and cold cereal aisles, as well as for biscuits, salad dressings and chewing gum. In this context, customers’ decisions to purchase products were greatly influenced by informative and exciting packaging.”

Buzz
Energy and sports drinks, chocolate, ready-to-drink teas and yogurt drinks fall in the buzz-activated category. “Shoppers are most likely to be influenced by catchy advertising, new product introductions and the original packaging that leaps off the shelves and grabs interest and attention,” said Khandelwal.

Bargain-Hunting
Bargain-hunted categories are driven purely by price comparison and promotions. “Consumers in this shopping mode are on a mission and the mission is savings,” said Varma. Canned Tuna, Canned Tomatoes, Canned Fruit and Pasta Sauce all languish in this category, according to the study.

Beware Over-Promotion
Nielsen’s research revealed that even though some product categories are not bargain-driven, manufacturers continually offer in-store deals and promotions, resulting in some categories to be over-promoted.

“Consumers choosing sports drinks aren’t looking for a bargain,” said Khandelwal. “In-store deals for these products go largely unnoticed. Marketers would be better off redirecting their wasted promo dollars to investing in advertising and new product introductions.”

Omega Rules OK

“I always buy brand X …unless guests are coming!”
“I buy the cheapest brand on special, as long as it’s not X!”
“Brand 2 works for my family, but if Y is on special, I buy that!”

Underlying repetitive purchase patterns are a set of cognitive decision rules – the ‘programme’ behind ‘auto-pilot’ purchasing.  Nielsen (quick to brand such things) call these Omega Rules – the mental check-lists that keep consumers on-track and help them decide between alternatives.

Often these rules are quite mundane (e.g., pack shape) or social (e.g., acceptable to friends) and don’t represent deep emotional commitment to the brand.  Brand leaders need to understand Omega Rules as they provide guidance on key marketing tactics that will reinforce the habits that give them leadership.

Recent advances in cognitive psychology have revealed that although consumers have 10,000 brands in their heads, they waste little time thinking about them.  Instead, they evolve simple rules to navigate through the world of brands.  These rules tend to be simple, few in number and rather hierarchical. They can be rational or emotion based, and once they have been developed the consumer is on ‘auto-pilot’ when placed in a buying situation. Auto-pilot mode remains in force until interrupted by an external stimulus, a Delta Moment.

Delta Moments are different for different segments and at different stages; they’re ‘moments of change’ when habits are most likely to be reviewed, and they vary in their impact depending on the disruptive nature of the causative event.

At Delta Moments, consumers re-evaluate their habitual decisions and either:

• Re-validate their rules
• Change their rules

Omega Rules and Delta Moments apply to online marketing as well. Auto-pilot mode is clearly in evidence when web users head to their regular destinations online, less likely to try out new websites unless disrupted by Delta Moments.

The challenge for emarketers trying to get noticed online:

• Understand how habits are formed in their particular category;
• Identify the key criteria underlying ‘auto-pilot’ habits; and
• Develop a range of Delta Moment triggers and motivators that will lead to change.

Easy, right?

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From the San Diego Transcript - but totally relevant everywhere: At 55, San Diego architect James Robbins isn’t thinking about retiring anytime soon, but he recently made a lifestyle change with those golden years in mind. He sold his home in an outlying suburb and purchased a two-bedroom, two-bath condominium in a luxury high-rise development downtown.

In addition to the panoramic views and first-rate amenities, including pool and fitness centre, Robbins wanted a more urban environment close to cultural and recreational facilities, as well as a “lock and go” residence for when he does reduce his work load and increase his travel and leisure schedule.

Robbins is typical of many aging boomers who are seeking a different kind of housing, one that offers maintenance-free living not far from where they’ve worked and lived.

As the spectre of retirement and empty-nesting looms large for those born between 1946 and 1964, these so-called baby boomers are hardly entering old-age homes or assisted living facilities. From downtown condos to active adult communities to age-targeted apartments, developers are scrambling to find a housing type that fits the needs of this less than stereotypical greying market.

“Don’t call them aging, don’t call them seniors and certainly don’t offer them early-bird specials,” said Peter Dennehy of Sullivan Group Realty Advisors. “They don’t like it.”

For good reasons, he added. After all, this is a generation that expects to work past the traditional retirement age. It’s also a group with active, healthy lifestyles that are in turn helping them have even longer and more productive lives.

According to Dennehy and many in the real estate industry, this is the perfect time for homebuilders and community developers to target the shifting housing needs of baby boomers — the nation’s richest age group — as they enter the slowdown and semi-retirement era. This post-World War II generation is buying property as an investment and often as their “aging-in place” home.

Gopal Ahluwalia, staff vice president of research at the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), said older buyers want a home with all the goodies but none of the maintenance. They are looking for places with less lawn to mow and less floor space to carpet and clean.

“The boomer — who can travel, see the world and play golf or tennis when he so chooses — is seeking to cut down on the amount of time and energy they have to expend on upkeep of their castles,” said Ahluwalia. “This is a step between single-family and senior housing.”

Lifestyle changes are the main reasons people over 55 decide to move into a new home, said Norman Cohen, chairman of the NAHB’s 50+ Housing Council. “Because they are choosing to move based on creature comforts or changing circumstances, the older buyer is often less affected by the ups and downs of the housing market.”

Many boomers expect to “age in place,” given their active and affluent lifestyles. The number of seniors living outside of nursing homes and other assisted-living facilities is projected to more than double by 2030. There’s also a shift of large numbers of older folks living in the suburbs. Previously, most elderly lived in cities.

Wherever they live, aging residents indicate that what they want from their homes and communities is the flexibility to accommodate a range of physical abilities and growing old needs – along with other amenities, including accessibility to services, transportation and wired houses.

More importantly, boomers have an entirely differently mentality than their retiring parents. Today’s 55-plus segment wants to downshift but not necessarily to be shipped out to the outskirts of town into a seniors-only community.

The challenge for planners, designers and builders is to create liveable neighbourhoods, with appropriate and affordable housing, adequate options for mobility and the community features and services that can facilitate personal independence and continued engagement in civic and social life.

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