Why do only wrinkle creams try to reach Boomer women online?

I recently heard a story by NPR veteran Margot Adler about her experiences as a Facebook user tired of seeing age-targeted ads that held no interest for her. Adler observed that her Facebook homepage was full of ads for wrinkle creams, presumably because she had identified her own age (63) on the site.

When she was invited to join a Facebook group called “Women Who Have Removed their Birth Years from Facebook,” she sought out its organizers to learn more. She found a large number of women tired of Facebook’s (and the Internet’s) decision to target them based on their age alone (well, age and gender).

But Adler herself felt reluctant to join this group. As she said:

“I am 63, and I have always believed in being honest about my age. I love the fact that I am old enough to have done civil rights work in Mississippi and to have covered the Pentagon Papers trial. I’m married; I am not looking for a job, so why hide my age?” 

Advertisers had failed to recognize anything else about Adler that might make her a targetable consumer. Why wasn’t she getting ads for books, products and services that related to her obvious areas of interest (some of them identified in her Facebook profile) like science fiction or birding?

So she didn’t erase her age from her Facebook profile, but the ads started going away nevertheless. The reason why? A little bit of technological democracy that should have advertisers both worried and excited.

Adler guesses that the ads lessened because Facebook lets users vote ads up or down, and Facebook users like her (and women 55+ have been Facebook’s fastest growing demographic) started making their voices heard.

If this is the reason, consumers should be happy…but so should thoughtful and creative advertisers. Targeting online ads are the wave of the future, but they will require more careful work than crude stereotyping based on age alone.

Facebook alone offers advertisers almost limitless information for creative advertising. Is the woman a reader? What are her self-described interests? Has she joined any causes? Does she have a lot of Facebook friends or just a few? I know of no other market research tools whereby consumers publicly advertise their own interests and passions. Marketers who want to do business with these women will do well to read these women’s own ads and then show how well they listen.