(A broadband enabled, WOM driven Boomer, via Greg Gulliford)

With 70 million Baby Boomers about to retire and spend their hard earned nest egg, all marketers are seeking new ways to reach them.

Despite some decent traffic on social networks like Eons and TeeBeeDee, a new ThirdAge/JWT Boom survey finds that seniors are using computers heavily but aren't in to the culture of oversharing. Compared to the spooning of Emily Gould and Julia Allison, most Boomers are clearly the fork.

However, PR people equipped with both media relations and social media skills can reach them. Check out this stat about the influence of the MSM:

Ninety-three percent of respondents who have read an article about a Web site in print (newspaper or magazine) have later visited the site online, reminding marketers that media coverage, as part of an integrated marketing strategy, remains an important element of boomer marketing.

Boomers rely heavily on trusted sources and word of mouth to make purchasing decisions. They're emailing those reviews around faster than you can friendfeed. And who do they ask when they need to buy an IPod or need help buying discount airline tickets? Yes, their social-networking addicted adult children.

[via bitemarks]