MARKETING MATTERS
Strong Processes
Reach Millennials
Marketing reflects
stock market trends
J
ust the other May my Edward Jones
agent explained the cycles of the stock
market to me. Now, I would like to as-
sure you, I am certainly not about to
give advice on the stock market. But the cy-
cles that she highlighted really rang true,
because they are the same trends I see in
marketing.
She explained that there are four phases
of spending in everybody’s lives:
1. People up to age 25 are in the
dependent phase where other
people provide for them.
2. People between age 26 and 45
are in the heavy spending phase.
This is the time of life, when they
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are buying cars, houses, paying
for daycare, raising kids. Money is
flooding out the door.
3. And then, age 46-65, is the sav-
ing phase when they focus their
money on saving for retirement,
and put it away.
4. 65+ marks the retirement phase
where the spend the money they
saved.
The Effect of Boomers
Each generation has gone through these
phases. The one we have felt most acutely
are the Baby Boomers because they were the
first big generation.
The market grew in the 80s as Boomers,
[20]
moved through the heavy spending phase.
Interest rates were high, matching the high
demand for properties as Boomers made
their first big purchases.
Post recession our interest rates stay low
because Boomers have entered the savings
phase and are making more conservative in-
vestments.
In 2019 there were 72 million Boomers,
there was nearly 79 million at their peak in
1999. Then came Generation X with 66
million. Now the Millennial population of-
ficially outnumbers boomers at 73 million.
Prepping for the Millennial Shift
Now, the average age of millennials is 26,
they are moving into the heavy spending
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