In a report published by the Center For Media Research and reprinted here, surveys through 2008 by the Pew Internet and American Life Project show that a larger percentages of older generations are online now than in the past, and they are doing more activities online. Generation X (not Y) is the most likely group to bank, shop, and look for health information online. Boomers are just as likely as Generation Y to make travel reservations online. And even Silent Generation internet users are competitive when it comes to email.
The biggest increase in internet use since 2005 is the 70-75 year-old age group. While just over one-fourth (26%) of 70-75 year olds were online in 2005, 45% of that age group is currently online, and doing more activities online.

Instant messaging, social networking, and blogging have gained ground as communications tools, but email remains the most popular online activity, particularly among older internet users, writes Sydney Jones and Susannah Fox in the report. 74% of internet users age 64 and older send and receive email, making email the most popular online activity for this age group. 89% of teens claimed to use email in 2004. Now, just 73% currently say they use email.

Teens and Generation Y (age 18-32) are more likely than their older counterparts to seek entertainment through online videos, online games, and virtual worlds, and they are also more likely to download music to listen to later.

78% of 12-17 year-old internet users play games online
73% of online teens email, the second most popular activity for this age group
50% of Generation Y play online games

The report says that health questions drive internet users age 73 and older to the internet just as frequently as they drive Generation Y. Researching health information is the third most popular online activity with the most senior age group, after email and online search.

Generation X (ages 33-44) continues to lead in online shopping:

80% of Generation X internet users buy products online
71% of internet users ages 18- 32 buy products online
38% of online teens buy products online
56% of internet users ages 64-72 do
47% of internet users age 73 and older buy online

67% of Generation X internet users lead in online banking, while

57% of Generation Y to do their banking online, up from 38% in 2005. There has been no significant growth among older generations when it comes to banking online

Downloading videos is now being done more equally across all generations under 73 years old.

31% of Generation X claim to download videos as of 2007
38% of Generation Y downloaded videos
13% of G.I. Generation internet users (age 73+) reported downloading videos, up from 1% in 2005
13% of the online Silent Generation (ages 64-72) say they download videos, up from 8% in 2005
Who are these people…

Internet Generations Explained

The writers note, in summary, that “…contrary to the image of Generation Y as the ‘Net Generation,’ internet users in their 20s do not dominate every aspect of online life.”

While establishing and managing Facebook pages for our clients, we discovered the advertising side of this social media that allows us to present messages for our clients to a very targeted group of people. What separates most social media advertising from traditional online advertising (such as banners on newspaper websites) is that you pay per click versus per impression. Facebook is a pay per click.

Those of you with vocal CFOs know the value of having hard data to support your advertising decisions. This is one easy way. Each ad on Facebook can be targeted by age, marital status, hobbies, interests and location to name a few so your ad will be seen by mostly those who fit your target market. So if 2,000 people see your ad, it’s a good chance that many of them are in your market and that exposure is good for your brand. What’s even better is that you only pay for those who click on your ad and get driven to your site (preferably a landing page, but that will be a later post).

Think of this as if you have a retail store in a large mall. If you place an ad in the mall directory, you pay for it based on how many people will see it regardless of how many people are led to your store. But if your ad were on a Facebook page in the mall, you’d only pay for it if the viewer of the ad actually came into your store. Makes sense, huh? And to keep your budgets in line, you can establish daily or monthly advertising spending limits so you’re not caught off guard by a large response.

The key to this type of marketing is what you make the viewer do once they get to your site. If you’re like most advertisers, your site is like a retail store open 24/7 without any salespeople allowing any visitor to look around, compare, and do whatever they want anonymously. But since you’re paying money through Facebook to get those people to your site, you must put more emphasis on capturing some information from that visitor.

Nowadays, a basic “contact us” form means nothing. It’s likely that most people don’t want to contact you either because they found what they want or because they don’t want to be bothered. So instead, we like to add other links for the viewer to “subscribe” or “stay informed” or “receive valuable web only offers”. Those links go to a basic email signup form which, when completed by the viewer, allows us to communicate with him or her on various subjects via eblasts and blogs in order to build a relationship toward a future sale.

With the sales cycle in most industries getting longer, building relationships and maintaining communication with prospective clients is critical. So while we recommend Facebook advertising for all its positive attributes, we also stress that the results will be weak if your website doesn’t work hard to capture contact information from those who click through the ads to your site.