Show Notes
Best practices for Medicare and Medicare Advantage marketing and ads continue to evolve as greater numbers of seniors integrate digital activity, such as online news and Facebook, into their daily routines. While the goal of any campaign is to stop-the-scroll and convert, there are marked differences for achieving this across generational cohorts. Current research on Medicare markets tend to be very broad, lumping all senior age brackets into one cohort—meaning someone who's 60 is not differentiated from someone who's 70, 80, or 90+. This practice would be akin to studying the digital activity patterns of a 15 year old and a 45 year old in the same cohort. Medicare Ad expert, Holly Wolniakowski, recognizes the research gap and uses independently curated data to develop, test, and retest ads. "It's a dynamic and iterative process," reports Wolniakowski.
In the past, Medicare markets have been most responsive to text-based ads paired with stock image graphics. However, internal tests at Advantasure have identified an increase in ad performance when a greater emphasis is placed on graphic selection. Currently, stock images that look highly posed do not perform as well as authentic, natural images, and the depiction of active seniors outperforms the ads of seniors in sedentary poses. Additionally, Baby Boomers through age 75 have developed a growing preference for video content, typically viewed on silent with close captioning.
It's important to remember that insights gleaned from ad performance tests are ever-evolving, so what seems to be true today could change tomorrow. The best strategy includes an AI model where target segments are constantly evolving with updates from multiple input streams such as demographic information, claims data, and digital interaction data, followed by analysis from a behavioral scientist to ensure the message is relevant, timely, and maximizes engagement.
