Marketing today is hampered by generational perception gaps that arise when people widely separated by age see the same thing but assign different meanings to it.
The age differences between those who dominate the creation of marketing executions and the "average" consumer is growing, probably costing companies billions of dollars annually because of generational perception gaps that lead to marketing executions that fail to do their expected jobs.
Companies spend more than $200 billion annually in advertising and billions more in research, consulting, and other services to support marketing. How many of those dollars are wasted because marketing executions do not connect with customers due to generational perception gaps?
Various reports peg the average age of ad agency account representatives between 28 and 30—about the same it has been for years. This means the typical account executive is 14 to 16 years younger than the current adult median age of 44, and 20 to 22 years younger than adults 50 and older, who represent 44 percent of all adults.
Why Marketing Stopped Working: Doing Less with More documented the sharp decline in marketing productivity since the New Customer Majority began emerging in 1989. I think it is more than just coincidence that as the median age of adults has risen without a corresponding increase in the average age of product message creators, marketing productivity has fallen. Yes, other factors, such as the Internet, have impacted advertising, but I still think much of the problem arises from generational perception gaps.
Some people may feel these remarks are condescending toward young marketers. They are not. They simply reflect the empirically validated fact (as well as common sense) that people see things differently at different ages.
Think about how a typical 16-year-old sees a 30-year-old. The 30-year-old is too old to remember being a teen. In the 1960s, youth memorialized this idea by repeatedly warning each other "Don’t trust anyone over 30."
To a 28-year-old ad account executive, age 50 seems as remote generationwise as age 30 appears to a 16-year-old. That means a 28-year-old marketer working in 50-plus markets is likely operating beyond the boundaries of his or her natural ability to perceive many things the same way a 50-year-old sees them. Education and training can help remedy the problem, which is why I italicized natural ability. But few young marketing professionals have been trained for working in second-half markets. As a consequence, messages for second-half customers more often than not reflect reality as seen through the lens of young adulthood.