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Business Week’s online Innovation section reported on a new cell phone designed and marketed to the 100+ million baby boomers and seniors in this country. A Cell Phone for Baby Boomers is a great case study and clearly demonstrates what business can do to capture the technophobic segment of our society by completely rethinking a basic item: the cell phone.
Arlene Harris, a mobile phone industry veteran, helped launch a new company dubbed Jitterbug last October. Ms. Harris understood that to meet the needs of older users, she would have to develop both product design and service design into the Jitterbug cell phones. She was able to sell Samsung on her ideas and they manufactured the kinds of phones she knew would appeal to older consumers. The goal: to deliver “a seamless, innovative cross-channel experience.”
The Jitterbug mobile phones offer unique features that elderly consumers can really identify with and appreciate:
• When opened the Jitterbug phones emit a dial tone. How’s that for familiarity for older consumers? No dial tone, no cell phone signal strength, so the user can’t make a call. Easy to grasp, right?
• Jitterbug phone earpieces have soft rubber cups that are comfortable and actually cover the user’s ear, blocking out ambient noise; a feature elderly or hearing-impaired consumers can get into.
• The phone’s mouthpiece comes down near the user’s mouth, not high on the cheekbone, adding another familiar phone feature.
• Jitterbug phones do not present users with icons or menus; the phones ask a series of basic questions which the users answer by depressing a bold YES or NO button on the handset.
• Since Jitterbug phones employ Web interface, users have the option to disable any features they don’t wish to use permanently. Harris: ”We don’t want them (the consumers) to see a screen that they don’t want. If all the consumer wants is the phone list—no call history, no voicemail—that’s all they see.”
For two years, Jitterbug and Samsung’s industrial designers collaborated before bringing the new phones to market. Samsung understood immediately that there was a potentially large market for this new concept in mobile phones, but they had to be sold on doing more than creating a novel handset: they had to be willing to design the product in tandem with Jitterbug’s service system.
Harris: “For them (Samsung) it was a handset. For us, it was a system. The handset was just one element.”
Result: The Jitterbug phone design is simplified due to the fact it is managed remotely through a Web-based interface. “It’s not just the design of the handset, or what the call centers do, it’s all about the entire experience,” Harris reiterated.
While cell phones are getting smaller and smaller, and packed with more and more features at the same time, Harris knew that for her demographic: “We need to think this whole thing through, and sort of erase everything that we’ve done so far. Let’s redefine what we should be doing, based on research and based on good old common sense.”
This case study is very revealing. Again: are our companies putting R&D capabilities behind what we think consumers will want, or are we willing to go back to the drawing board, back to basics, and yes, to ‘good old common sense’ to give specific consumers products they will already feel a familiarity and comfort with, simplicity of design and the features they really want and need? Nothing more and nothing less. . .
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Comments
Ted, interesting post. I think the proof will be in the pudding. The concept sounds good, but this might be a niche market for the luddites--which could be a very large niche market indeed.
That said, I like the whole idea of tearing up preconceptions and going back to the drawing board to build something unique. Good stuff.
Posted by: Paul Barsch | 07.10.07
Ted - I've been seeing the commercial for the Jitterbug over the past few days, and they caused me to wonder about the demand for them and the success at meeting it.
Thank you for covering the topic here, as your analysis has been very informative to my curiosity. :)
Posted by: Cam Beck | 07.10.07
Ted,
Thank you for sharing. As a marketer and a Baby Boomer whose name is on lots of boomer mailing lists, how come until today I have not heard of the Jitterbug phone? Is marketing sleeping?
Posted by: Lewis Green | 07.10.07
Thanks Paul, Cam and Lewis for your insights. Agreed: I'm going to be interested in seeing how this unique concept in cell phones generates actual interest and sales. This is a huge untapped market and it really should be addressed.
As always, Lewis, you raise a great point. In order to be successful, Jitterbug's marketers and partners will have to work to raise the visibility of their unique product and service. For those of us who are boomers, myself included, we really ought to be hearing and reading a lot more about this than we are. And let's face it: we're all involved in marketing and try to become aware of cutting edge new ideas and products. What about all the mainstream consumers out there?
Posted by: Ted Mininni | 07.10.07
'. . .100+ million baby boomers and seniors in this country'.
This has to make us wonder how many other products and services ought to be positioned for this important demographic. Sometimes it seems as though all of our new product innovations are aimed at a young audience. . .but fully 1/3 of the U.S. population is baby boomer or older, so I applaud Ms.Harris for her willingness to rethink a popular mainstream product design and its base service, so it could be made relevant to older consumers. Bravo! I wish her and her Jitterbug every success.
Posted by: Claire Ratushny | 07.10.07
Good point, Claire. And since boomers and seniors are "technophobic" in many instances, how many other products could be redesigned to become user friendly for these segments? If major corporations got behind the idea of starting from scratch for older consumers, ie, invested in R&D and marketing for these kinds of products, one would think they would have some real hits in the process. . .
Posted by: Ted Mininni | 07.10.07
RE: "Is Marketing sleeping?"
I have seen Jitterbug ads for some time, appearing in magazines that share the product's target demographic (e.g., Saturday Evening Post, Guideposts). I'm guessing this is NOT a product that will do well with a PPC campaign. [grin]
Posted by: Claire F. Kuhl | 07.10.07
Hi Claire,
I agree: pay-per-click advertising won't work for this demographic! While this product may have been advertised to some degree, some additional press coverage would be nice to help spread the word on the Jitterbug phone.
Thanks for confirming this unique product/service is being advertised in some targeted publications. We'll have to see how the product moves after a few months. This hasn't been launched with the publicity surrounding the iPhone, so it may take awhile to get Jitterbug off the ground.
Posted by: Ted Mininni | 07.10.07
it can be a success if well communicated. it cant be "the cellphone for the elderly" but maybe "the perfect cell phone for your parents" would be a better approach
Posted by: antonio | 07.10.07
Good point, Antonio. The way the Jitterbug is positioned and marketed is going to be very critical to its success. Sensitivity and respect for this demographic is important. Thanks for weighing in.
Posted by: Ted Mininni | 07.11.07
I can only imagine that Jitterbug will need to heavily adapt their business model if they intend to stick around for many years.
It's all very well making handsets for the elderly without menus, with a dial tone (features of traditional telephony etc that are familiar to them all) now - but the elderly of tomorrow are going to want what's familiar to them, and what they grew up with.. ie. the phones of today!
It seems a shame that they will lose so much differentiation as the youth of today become the customers of tomorrow, but I'm sure that the initial push will be worth it.
Posted by: Anne Rogers | 07.13.07
Hi Anne,
You've pointed out an important element for all consumer products companies: the need to adapt to changing markets. With 100 million boomers and seniors in the U.S. alone, the current Jitterbug model works for them. As the next generation ages, phones and other consumer products will have to be adapted to what is comfortable and familiar for them. Obviously, taking the phone example, features that will have to be built in will be different for the next population demographic. Thanks for adding an important dimension to this conversation, Anne.
Posted by: Ted Mininni | 07.17.07
My Mom is 60 and is not open for change. How do we market to the Baby Boomers or should we? Ck out dailycents.com at http://blogs.dailycents.com/?p=804
Posted by: mel | 01.11.08