Chris Simmonds, now CEO of JG Travel Group, wrote this excellent piece about the Silver Marketing Summit for LinkedIn, which we are reproducing here. Save the date now for the 2023 Summit which will be held on Tuesday June 27th.
Really insightful day at the Silver Marketing Summit. Thank you to the Silver Marketing team for a great programme.
An important summit, about an important and diverse market, at an important time as we emerge from the pandemic. A time of opportunity but also reflection as we face further uncertainty with the new headwinds.
Adam Hetherington started the session with a thought-provoking talk on the search and buying patterns on Google and growing digital confidence of older people. The squiggly exploration and evaluation nature of search was revelatory.
I particularly liked the unconscious bias slice of Jasman Ahmad from Accord’s talk; Louise Robinson, Editorial Director at Saga Magazine was brilliant as always; the growing trend of Podcasts for older people from Tony McAllister and Iain Dale from Global got me thinking; Michael King from Senior Response delivered the perfect ‘bleedin’ obvious’ pitch on the importance of older workers serving the older market.
Next up, Eleanor Mills brought the house down with her brilliant and rousing overview of the rise of the ‘Queenager’, forged by fire!
As always, these events are just as important for the people you meet over coffee or lunch and I had enjoyable chats with branding expert Jane Silk; Cathy Bartrop from Travel Guru TV and Deniz Inceer and Aideen Clarke from Rest Less.
The afternoon was just as informative with a discussion involving Felicity Ive from Channel 4; Meta Redstedt from Essity and Laura Hazell from BBDO on the inspiring campaign on the importance of talking about menopause.
It was a non-stop agenda with further insight from Karen Barrett of Unbiased; Rachel Pease from Pure Retirement; Jess Kuehne from the Centre for Ageing Better and Sam Harrington-Lowe of Silver Magazine.
I was starting to wane by then to be honest – but got a second wind at the end of the day with the panel discussion on Lifestyle & Travel involving Jon Worsnop from Weekend Magazine; Cat Jordan from Travelzoo; Stuart Lewis from Rest Less and the always inspiring Lisa McAuley from Silver Travel Advisor. Superbly moderated by Sally Winfield of Accord Marketing.
The day reaffirmed the importance of insight and reaffirmed the mantra ‘always follow the data’.
Chris also provided us with a soundbite overview of the summit