As Media Buyers, we help advertisers strategically reach their target customers. We refer to target customers as “Demographics” in the marketing world. Our job as Media Buyers exists to help business owners and marketers create strategic advertising plans designed to reach people that are most important to them; many times, that is an affluent demographic.
We’re known for successfully reaching a demographic of affluence. We’re excellent at creating marketing plans that reach wealthy households. These households typically have high incomes and high net worth. Professionally, people in this demographic are doctors, lawyers, business owners, corporate executives, tech professionals, successful salespeople, and the likes.
Reaching an Affluent Demographic through Advertising
Our company, Thrive Advertising, has developed a reputation based on our skills at crafting advertising plans that successfully reach millionaires and households with high incomes, typically defined as having an income higher than $250,000 annually.
While we can’t give away the farm in a blog post, we will share a few tips for marketing to an audience who can afford luxury. The first thing to know about marketing to an affluent demographic is that there are many different subgroups within the general demographic of affluent people.
Lesson #1: Notice above we said, “can afford luxury,” not “lives luxury.”
Many wealthy people we target with our advertising plans don’t live luxuriously as Hollywood’s definition would lead many to believe. A lot of affluent families can afford a luxury lifestyle, but they chose not to spend their wealth in a fashion that would be deemed “luxury” by the typical media-fabricated sense of the word.
While it sounds glamorous to imagine all wealthy people live the lives of the ‘Super Rich’ like on TV, many millionaires, which our advertisers want to reach, worked so hard for their money that they happily shop at Costco, and wouldn’t dream of spending $600 on shoes or owning eight cars.
Appealing to these ‘Costco-shopping Millionaires’ is a skill well-honed by our team.
Lesson #2: Costco Millionaires Seek Value and ROI.
Millionaires who shop at Costco seek value and ROI when they make purchase decisions. Will they buy a luxury SUV, sure! But more than likely that luxury SUV is a late model Certified Pre-owned vehicle as opposed to brand new.
And it’s important to note that this particular breed of “rich people” don’t lease Escalades! They shop carefully and make informed decisions about their vehicle purchase. They’re savvy at making purchases, and they don’t waste money. Many wealthy people didn’t get that way by being wasteful.
Therefore, to appeal to this affluent demographic of Costco Millionaires, advertisers need to consider where this demographic spends their time. Do they read the Dupont Registry and the Robb Report? A few might, but most don’t. Most of this demographic are Millionaires Next Door. They use normal media, and they can be strategically targeted through digital and traditional advertising channels without obscure luxury publications targeting billionaires.
Read more about them in our blog about advertising to The Millionaire Next Door here.
Lesson #3: Some rich people do love glittering badges of wealth. And who are we to judge?!
Bring on the bling; they can afford it!
The opposite of a Millionaire Next Door is a flashier demographic that we also know how to reach well. It’s a wealthy demographic that loves luxury and all that glitters — vacation homes, fancy cars, new boats, jewelry, champagne, and all the things. They’ve earned it or at least afforded it so why not buy the absolute best? Range Rover Autobiography, sure! Two million-dollar vacation home, why not? YOLO.
Do you think this affluent demographic has different media habits than the Costco Millionaires? You better believe it!! So our advertising plans are tailored to reach this demographic quite differently because they have different media habits than the Costco Millionaires.
Lesson #4: Reaching families with high-incomes who don’t consider themselves “rich.”
Interested in reaching upper-middle-class folks? Maybe your demographic wouldn’t even consider themselves elite or super-wealthy. But they have significantly higher household-incomes compared to the average person. Think dual-income households with Microsoft or Google executives in them who earn over $300,000 per year.
We create advertising plans to reach this affluent tech demographic every day. This wealthy tech group is a demographic specialty of ours. We’re known for reaching Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook and Expedia professionals because they’re in our backyard. Our kids go to school with these families, and they’re our personal friends, we’re on philanthropic committees together. This demographic is one we understand well.
In the Seattle – Bellevue area, these folks might have a sky-high mortgage, and the cost of daycare for a couple with young kids is even higher than that jumbo loan! After taxes, this demographic does well, but are they buying a new boat? Not right now. Not while they’re raising kids.
Marketing to Affluent Millennials
The younger end of this affluent demographic is more focused on decisions related to raising families. They’re looking at whether or not to keep paying exorbitantly high property taxes so their kids can attend an excellent public school or whether they should move to a more affordable suburb and apply the property tax savings to the private school down the street.
They’re saving for college; 529s, Coverdells, GET programs, etc. While they may have a lot of money coming in, they’ve got a lot going out. Therefore, these upper-middle-class earners are a completely different demographic than the Glittering Badges of Wealth Demo above.
These families shop at Nordstrom Rack and Nordstrom equally and love a proper clearance buy at Target. Some of these affluent moms think of a quiet Target run without kids, with a latte in-hand, as actual Heaven on Earth. They could afford to go into debt to appear wealthier than they are, and some do, but not all. Some live below their means, and despite their clearance purchases, they’ve got a stockpile of savings that you’d shock you!
So, how do you reach these three very different wealthy demographics with your marketing message?
Call us. This is our jam. We create advertising plans that work. We’re talented Media Buyers dedicated to empowering marketers and business owners to invest their advertising budgets better, increasing their return on ad spend (ROAS), and we do this at no added cost to you!
We’ve got a track record to share and customer praise that’ll make you wish you’d called us five years ago. Call us today!
Bonus fun fact: “The total number of millionaires in the world increased by 1.1 million from the middle of 2018 to the middle of 2019. The world’s 46.8 million millionaires are now worth a combined $158.3 trillion- or 44% of the world’s total wealth.”-CNBC, October 24, 2019