Grey market ignored by online marketers

Despite the ‘grey market’ – aka consumers over the age of 55 – spending around £14.45 billion online and set to account for 66% of total retail spending by the year 2025, less than a quarter (22%) of marketers directly target them as a demographic, Warc reports.

Research from Greenlight questioned 1,000 consumers from the grey market and discovered that the majority of these individuals are very active online across a wide range of devices; 66% of the respondents said they regularly use laptops, 59% use desktop computers and 52% use tablets. Over three quarters (76%) said they make a purchase online more than once a week.

In terms of the money spent by this demographic, the monthly average spent online totals £65.09 compared to £73.52 spent in-store. Men tend to spend more in physical stores per month than women, suggesting that females aged over 55 may be more open to using technology to help with their shopping than their male counterparts.

With figures such as these, it seems that marketers could be missing out on benefiting from this significant target market. The different purchases made range from online books and magazines (bought by 76% of respondents); clothing and accessories (74%); CDs and DVDs (66%); small appliances and household goods (61%); and consumer electronics (60%).

It seems that the popularity of online shopping is growing within the grey market as these consumers begin to appreciate the flexibility, ease of product delivery and ability to compare prices online more. As well as this, online reviews resonate with the older market more – meaning tight marketing practices in the online space when targeting these consumers is very important.

Andreas Pouros, the chief operating office at Greenlight, concluded: “Here lies an audience with more disposable cash, which is totally suited to ecommerce”; they should therefore not be ignored.