Starts at 60 Founder zeros in on overlooked boomers

08/29/21 • 43 min

“This consumer is 50 per cent of private wealth in Australia. Ninety-four per cent do research online before making significant purchases. Fifty-five per cent of all leisure travel spending is in this category normally. And that's got pent-up demand written all over it.” -Rebecca Wilson, Founder, Starts at 60

Starts at 60 CEO and Founder Rebecca Wilson was watching her parents on their road to retirement when she realised this generation had been largely forgotten within the marketing pie.

From humble beginnings in a bedroom at home, Rebecca has grown Starts at 60 into a powerful voice for Baby Boomers and a platform with almost 1.5 million monthly users.

Targeting boomers and doing more than okay

Today, it’s Australia’s largest digital media brand for the over-sixties and backed by some impressive advertisers and investors, including Channel Seven, which owns a 30 per cent stake in its flagship platform.

According to Rebecca, the power of this generation as content and product consumers is blindingly obvious, even though they were largely being overlooked at the time she was forming her idea for a niche digital media platform.

“Everything that was in the media was Kardashian, Kardashian and Kardashians and ...sitting back from it as a marketer that was working with clients who wanted to talk to this generation and knowing there was nowhere that was consistent or reliable to speak with them through...I had a hypothesis, so I started a little blog,” Rebecca explains. “I started writing for the audience and gathering an audience. I think it started with $5 Facebook spend a day to grow the audience. And they...read the content and they signed up for the site. And really it was the right time to do that.”

Content that funnels with precision

Starts at 60 is part traditional newsroom, part marketing company and part marketplace, but the model is constantly evolving and making waves.

“We in fact know that we play a role in building and driving a voice for over sixties, but that we have to be there for the marketers and the brands that speak to them as well,” Rebecca says. “We have to get the right goals and achievements for those brands. So our job is to sit between the consumers and the brands and curate a conversation.”

This episode is the ultimate masterclass in tailoring content with laser-sharp focus to a specific target audience.

It also demonstrates how storytelling interweaves with digital marketing and even the vertical integration of products, including within the travel industry.

Winning eyeballs online

Dishing up the goods to make your boomer pitches sharper, It’s PR Darlings co-hosts Jo Stone and Greer Quinn are deeply delving into the machinations of this niche media juggernaut.

Rebecca offers all sorts of insights including why stories that work in print form, fail to win eyeballs online.

This episode’s jargon gem is PTC, or "piece to camera". If you’ve never considered PTCs in your pitch to TV journalists, stay tuned until the end of the show to hear Jo and Greer provide suggestions on how you could do this.

If you’ve enjoyed this episode of It’s PR Darlings, please share, subscribe and review.

It’s PR Darlings is produced by Jo Stone from Sticks and Stones PR and Greer Quinn from Forward Communications.

Starts at 60 links:

https://startsat60.com/

The Boomer Guide Rebecca references:

https://mail.startsat60.com/p/6T9R-387/download-the-starts-at-60-boomer-guide-202122

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