At home in lockdown, what were you looking forward to doing most when restrictions started to ease? For one of the respondents in our survey, it was “Renew my Private Pilot Licence, I miss being able to fly.” Not a typical response, perhaps, and would it surprise you to know that the respondent was over 65? The week when Sir David Attenborough became the fastest Instagram user to reach one million followers seems an opportune time to reflect on what’s happening to longevity right now and what it means for our clients.
I have long been interested in the challenges and opportunities associated with communicating effectively when age is increasingly decoupled from life stage and I have argued that businesses and organisations need to be brave in order to adapt and thrive in the longevity landscape. Looking back on a blog I wrote in May 2018, using the three horizons model to explore how living longer might play out, I stated “There are likely to be catalysts that accelerate our journey to new horizons too; planned or not, welcome or not.” COVID is certainly a catalyst, welcome in a few respects and much less so in others.
As a society we have had to make some radical adjustments. For example:
In April, almost 47% of people in employment did some of their work from home, with most of them stating that this was because of COVID-19
More than seven in 10 online adults in the UK are now making video calls at least weekly, up from 35% pre-lockdown
Our court system has changed significantly – in Scotland, the digital ambitions of the courts and tribunals service were achieved in ‘one fifteenth’ of the time allotted in its five-year strategic plan
The online grocery market is forecast to grow 25.5% in 2020, compared to the 8.5% previously anticipated; eCommerce now accounts for 13% of all UK grocery sales, up from 7.4% in March
I don’t want to suggest that all these changes have been either welcome or desirable; far from it. However, they certainly show us what is possible in a short space of time.
I believe communicators should be thinking about two aspects of the longevity landscape currently:
Decoupling age from stage – We know from our own research that even before COVID, we needed to rethink our assumptions about the extent to which age correlates with stage. The population assumed that 33% of 65-74-year-olds were on Facebook in 2018, but the actual figure was 61%. What’s more, they have moved on – they’re no longer just on Facebook but now regularly on Zoom too; the proportion of online adults aged 65+ who make a least one video-call each week increased from 22% in February 2020 to 61% by May. There are also the amazing achievements of Captain Tom of course, raising over £33m and those of retired nurse Joan Rich, who walked 102 laps of her local park in Felixstowe, Suffolk by her 102nd birthday in early September, raising over £25,000. Such stories encourage us to think again about what it means to be old and unify us across ages and stages. Indeed, 68% of over 65’s felt that the pandemic has brought people together, higher than among any other age group.
More sophisticated segmentation – COVID has been a powerful reminder that there is no such thing as a typical person over 65. Much of the heated discussion about age-based shielding or restrictions comes from this very issue. Yes, a substantive number are being cautious and have been shielding, but 53% of over 65s wanted to see family and friends as the first thing they would do as lockdown lifted (above the average for the population as a whole) and 10% wanted to go on holiday, in line with the population as a whole – challenging the suggestion that they should be treated differently from the rest of the population on everything. Alongside our pilot mentioned earlier, the priority for another in our research was “arrange to fly back to South East Asia and continue the voluntary project I was engaged on” – underscoring the peril of ignoring the opportunities associated with a full understanding of those over 65.
These developments demonstrate that rapid change brings challenges but undoubtedly also opportunities. In that 2018 blog I wrote about the likely impact of longevity on major areas of our lives and described how education, for example, would need re-thinking in terms of “who studies, how and where they do it, along with appropriate funding models.” COVID has forced these questions to the fore (see Boris Johnson’s announcement just this week that adults in England without an A-level or equivalent qualification will be offered a fully funded college course), but they were on the horizon and already needed tackling. Those institutions that were already making changes undoubtedly were able to move in a nimbler fashion when COVID hit. Being brave now can pay dividends for organisations in terms of thriving in the years ahead.
But how does an organisation starting to reappraise its comms considering these rapidly developing longevity shifts? How do you know if your comms are fit for purpose as the longevity economy becomes a closer reality? There are a couple of straightforward steps that I would recommend to our Message House clients; the first is a communications audit, and the second a messaging evaluation.
An audit is an opportunity to take a fresh look at whether your comms truly reflect how people live their lives now. Do your comms recognise the decoupling of age and stage? Message House can quickly and effectively audit your comms and support the development of language and channels that reflect your customers’ true needs and behaviours.
A messaging evaluation is a more detailed analysis of the specific words and phrases in your communications. Do they move the dial with your intended audiences? Language and visual images can unnecessarily limit the audience for products and services if they don’t reflect the multiple and diverse paths through life.
While we don’t know which recent changes in behaviour might stick, we do know that change can happen quicker than we ever anticipated. Now is the time – not just to renew that Pilot’s Licence – but to look through the longevity lens and be prepared for what is to come.
Rachel Lloyd is a Director at Message House, leading their research on longevity to help clients explore its implications.
