By appealing to a diverse range of ages, businesses have a greater range of options.

Age-diverse businesses are placed in an excellent position to reach out to and capitalise on untapped markets - for instance the expanding grey market of retired people with large incomes.  It also helps them identify profitable new products or services. (source: Employers Forum on Age 2002)

Employers Forum on Age
www.efa.org.uk
Telephone (UK): 0845 456 2495

Those aged 55-65 have high disposable incomes, on average their weekly disposable income is 17% higher than the national average. (source: Annual Family Expenditure Survey)

Over-55s are the most affluent age group, 80% of the country’s wealth is held by people aged 50 or over. (source: BBC)

Over 55s are likely to be watching TV for up to 34 hours every week – that’s 8 hours more than the average – 26 hours, they are also heavy radio listeners; they listen to about 24 hours per week – 7% more than average.  In addition more and more over 55s are going online; this represents over 20% of the online population. (source: BBC)

More than a quarter of the population are over 55 (approx 15.5million).  In the future, this group will grow to just over a third of the population. (source: BBC)

It is predicted that by 2014 the UK will have more people over 65 than under 16 years. (source: Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development)

Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
www.cipd.co.uk
Telephone (UK): 020 8612 6200

…. As technology integration advances, with more and more function devices being incorporated into a single hardware device; together with tech-savvy “middle-agers” moving into the “senior citizen” grouping, the elder section of the population will become an increasingly important market sector for all businesses and marketing personnel to focus upon.  As it stands right now, if you’re not already addressing this group, you need to start planning for the short, medium, and long term, incorporating them into your customer profiles - after all, YOU will be one of them, one day.

Ed

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UK Consumer research suggests that the spending habits of women are changing and traditionally male-dominated markets have seen an increase in the number of women customers (for example, the motor industry). (source: Research and Markets, 2004).

Women on average have a disposable monthly income of £228, of which £188 will be spent on ‘luxuries’. (Foundation Financial Planning, Moneyextra 2004)

….. “Something for the weekend ….. Ma’am?”

Ed

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There are approximately 10 million disabled people in the UK, and is a market with potential which is often overlooked.  Inclusiveness in the way services are offered is increasingly being recognised as keys to opening up new markets. (source: Employers Forum on Disability).

Disabled people in the UK have an annual disposable income of £80 billion. (source: Employers Forum on Disability)

People with disabilities are users of the Internet like anyone else.  In some cases, it may be more appropriate for them to use than other forms of service.  There are a number of specialist journals and media e.g. Disability Now (a newspaper with an estimated readership of 70,000) or Disability Times which is on Teletext (Channel 4, p156) providing a 24 hour up-to-the-minute news & information service to an audience of 16 million people.

Around one in six adults has a disability (source: Employers Forum on Disability)

Employers Forum on Disability
www.employers-forum.co.uk
Telephone (UK): 020 7089 2410
….. for all of us, using the Internet as our communication and marketing channel, this group has huge potential as customers - not just for special needs products and services, but also for many everyday items.

Ed

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Findings of the ‘Out Now 2005 Diva and Gay Times Readers Surveys’ reveal that British lesbians and gay men, on average, are very well-employed, well-paid and are out-spending their incomes on a range of lifestyle product categories. In short the gay market is big business.

Britain’s 3.6 million gay people earned over £70billion in 2005.  This income leads to higher gay disposable income an estimated £4,656,500,000.

Stonewall (Equality & Justice for Lesbians, Gay Men & Bisexuals)
www.stonewall.org.uk
Telephone (UK): 020 7881 9440

150,000 read the Pink Paper each week and over 60,000 copies of Gay Times are sold through newsagents each month. Gay people are also most likely to source their product information from the internet (93%), followed by the TV (60%) and radio (26%). The combined internet/radio cross media sell reaches 79% of gay people (source GaytoZ)

Just over 6% of the UK population (around 3.6 million people) is lesbian or gay (source: UK Department of Trade & Industry).

Gay consumers also are immensely brand loyal, with 72% saying once they find a brand they like they stick with it, compared to 65% of straight people (source GaytoZ)
…… and it should be remembered that pretty much every day-to-day product or service is needed, or used, by the gay and lesbian sector, as much as it is in the straight community - you therefore don’t need to adapt what you already do, except to broaden the scope of your advertising and marketing.

Ed

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Statistics show that businesses with good race diversity strategies are seeing their profits increase.

In a recent study of around 100 firms they linked a total of £13bn profits to activities around race. More than 90% said diversity made good business sense for them (source: Race for Opportunity - the UK’s the leading race equality organisation).

Race for Opportunity
www.bitc.org.uk/programmes/programme_directory/race_for_opportunity
Telephone (UK): 020 7566 8707

Consider advertising in key ethnic minority media channels such as ‘The Voice’ newspaper, local newspapers (eg in area of high ethnic minority populations) and outdoor poster sites in key ethnic minority communities.

Almost 5 million people of ethnic minority backgrounds live in the UK. By 2010, ethnic minority people of working age will have grown twenty times faster than their white counterparts. In many urban areas across Britain, ethnic minority groups will make up the majority. (source: Ethnos, Research & Consultancy)

Ed

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