4. What is the demographic profile of the public?

Demographic information is data about who a public is. For example, besides telling us how many members a public has, a demographic profile of a public might include information about age, gender, income, education, and number of children per family. Demographic information can help understand who a public is, how important that public might be to the organization, and what its values might be.

The demographic makeup of countries continues to change dramatically, three major target audiences have emerged that deserve special attention. One is senior citizens, or seniors. This group frequently is defined as men and women 65 years or older, although some sociologists, marketing experts, and organizations include everyone over age 50. A comparable group is the so-called tween market consisting of youths age 7 to 12, in addition to the well-defined teenage demographic group. The third group consists of racial, ethnic and other minorities.

Older citizens form an important opinion group and a consumer market with special interests. As with other demographic groups, they are not a monolithic audience, but display many differences in personality, interest, financial status, health concerns, and lifestyles. Nevertheless, public relations professionals should not overlook the following general characteristics of the senior audiences:

• They vote in greater numbers than their juniors and are more intense readers of newspapers and magazines. Retirees also watch television heavily.

• With the perspective of long experience, they often are less easily convinced than young adults, demand value in the things they buy, and pay little attention to fads.

• Seniors over the age of 65 were the fastest growing segment of the population using the Internet in 2003, increasing at 25 percent.

• They are extremely health-conscious, out of self-interest, and want to know about medical developments.

• They are financially better off than the stereotype suggests.

• Although they are poor customers for household goods, they eat out frequently and do a lot of gift buying. They also travel frequently. In fact, seniors account for about 80 percent of commercial vacation travel.

Children and teenagers represent an important demographic to marketers because they influence their parents’ buying decisions, have their own purchasing power, and will mature into adult consumers. Smaller families, dual incomes, and postponing having children until later in life have led to greater disposable income. According to consumer market research company “Packaged Facts,” today’s youth market (15- to 24-year olds) has over $350 billion of purchasing power. The youth market has been labeled as Generation Y, a term used for those born between 1976 and 2003. Because they are such voracious consumers of electronic media, they are also called e-generation. The Fortino Group (Pittsburgh) projects that Generation Y will spend 23 years online. Spending one-third of their lives online will have interesting impacts: