By 2025, one in every five people will be over 60 years old.
China will enter the stage of moderate aging, which means that "aging" is not a vague concept, but something that is practically and closely related to the life of every family.
A large population base means potential future market possibilities, and policy support The addition of social forces is also accelerating the development and turnover of the silver-haired economy. In this case, a series of educational, social, and consumer internet products have emerged around the topic of senior interest.
In January of this year, Red Pine, a community of interest for the middle-aged and elderly, received a 100 million yuan A+ round of financing led by BAI Capital and followed by Matrix Partners, Genesis Partners CCV, and Blue Chip Venture Partners, which pushed the topic of the interest of the middle-aged and elderly to the forefront once again.
As the post-70s gradually enter into retirement, having more time, spending money on themselves, and having their own hobbies and pursuits have gradually become the group portrait of the new generation of seniors who grew up in the reform and opening up.
As early as around 2015, a number of Internet applications highlighting square dancing came out intensively in an attempt to further explore the possibilities behind the interests of middle-aged and elderly people. Among them, Sugar Bean is representative of the early entry from the square dance online services, offline scenes, through the square dance "leader" in the formation of spontaneous dissemination among users. Later on, they began to remove the square dance label, trying to expand more middle-aged and elderly people's interest in content, while adding elements such as e-commerce consumption, seeking commercialization of cash.
But the exploration of the middle-aged and elderly market is not smooth sailing. Two years later, in 2017, square dance track "Star Dance" founder Qin Xiaoxia mentioned in an interview with Nanfang Daily, "In the area of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai, there are more than a dozen peers have withdrawn, and most of those who are still alive have received financing, and the peers are tripped up in the realization. From the profitability point of view, there is no winner in the whole industry, and there is no head and bottom, because all companies are not profitable." Sugar bean's C round of financing is still in 2019, the investors include the absolute head player in the social field Tencent, then less to the outside world to reveal more dynamic.
Nevertheless, based on the huge size of the elderly population, and the implied market size behind it, the middle-aged and old-aged track is still full of imagination.
According to the seventh census data, China's silver-haired group aged 60 and above accounted for 18.7% of the population, amounting to 264 million people, and is expected to reach a peak of 487 million in 2053. At the same time, according to the National Social Science Foundation, "the study of elderly consumption and the development of the elderly industry" group estimates that by 2050, China's elderly market size will reach 48.52 trillion yuan, the elderly consumption market will reach 60 trillion yuan.
Into the Internet era, according to QuestMobile 2021 data, the silver-haired people use the Internet more than 4 hours a day on average. On this track, there are short video platforms like Jitterbug and Shutterbug, which take the lead in occupying a place in the interest socialization of the elderly; and there are also Internet communities focusing on the elderly market, such as Sugar Bean and Xiao Nian Gao.
In the field of silver economy, education is a central topic that cannot be bypassed. Since the 1980s, to retired cadres as the object of education, the birth of the University of the elderly, China's elderly education for a long time to the government-led, "public universities for the elderly + community senior activity centers" is a common model.
In the context of lifelong learning, education has become the entry point for middle-aged and elderly people's interest in life. 2021, Qi Xiuping, vice president of Gautama and head of Gautama College, the adult business segment of Gautama, openly introduced that, in the paid users of Gautama College, 25% of the users are people over 50 years old. Ming Chun Society, a middle-aged and old-aged interest learning brand under the banner of Open Class Bar, has also recently harvested tens of millions of yuan in independent financing. The KTV-based Singing Bar has also noticed the active demand of middle-aged and elderly people, and has launched an online platform called "Peanut Classroom" to provide vocal music courses.
Whoever captures the interest of the silver-haired crowd first may be able to gain a head start in the next 500 million people market.
Elderly education centered on social life
At present, the main content of elderly education is still focused on the social life of the elderly.
In terms of curriculum, traditional programs such as dance, vocal music, calligraphy and painting are still the mainstream programs of online and offline geriatric education. Compared with the educational function, the current stage of the "University of the Elderly" is more like an interest as an entry point for the silver-haired people to provide a social place and *** with the same topic, to meet the needs of the elderly life of the spirit of communication.
From the consumer goods into the elderly track, Wang Huainan, founder of the Mi Cha Commune, told Mustard Heap that from "old age" to "recognize old age" often occurs after retirement, the silver-haired people have to face a weaker connection with society, the radius of life is narrowed, and there is a lack of entry points for interaction between people. The first time I saw this was when I was a kid, and it was the first time I'd ever seen a kid in my life.
Compared to young people who play on the Internet, the silver-haired people's threshold of trust is obviously higher, and they rely more on the social scene built on acquaintance networks and KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders).
On the one hand, some senior interest communities are built on top of the WeChat social chain, and appear in the form of small programs in the acquaintance groups of middle-aged and elderly people. The first time I saw this was when I was a student at the University of California, Berkeley, and I was a student at the University of California, Berkeley.
Compared to downloading Apps, the lightweight, easy-to-use WeChat apps seem to be more likely to reap the favor of middle-aged and older people. According to WeChat's official data, in 2021, more than 450 million people are using small programs every day. In the logic of "connecting everything", small programs may be able to give the elderly more social possibilities.
On the other hand, like Sugar Bean, looking for a "leader" in square dance and creating KOLs in the middle-aged and elderly groups are also in the consideration of many senior interest communities. The popularity of middle-aged and elderly Jitterbug anchors such as "Grandma Wang" and "Grandma Tian" has also allowed the public to reacquaint themselves with the ability of silver-haired "leaders" to bring goods.
In Hong Song Xue Tang, users are connected through a small station. Similar to Douban, users join different stations according to their own interests, such as voice, calligraphy, painting, photography, etc., and communicate with friends who share the same interests. The station manager is often the one who initiates the topic, which may be in the form of a graphic or a live session that lasts for a longer period of time. At the same time the webmaster will also have income from bounties and bandwagons from sharing on the station.
In addition, the offline scene is also an indispensable part of the socialization of the middle-aged and elderly. In recent years, there have also been a number of commercialized offline senior universities. For example, the Good Life University, which provides offline education for middle-aged and elderly people aged 55 to 70, has opened more than 10 "Good Life Universities", mainly in Guangzhou, and supplemented them with offline activities such as study tours, local food and drink, and community activities. According to a report by Ta Kung Pao in 2020, there are more than 10,000 paid subscribers, with each subscriber spending around 6,000 yuan a year, and 80% of the students come from "old with new".
One ****ing realization about the middle-aged and elderly is that they are more price-sensitive. Around the elderly group born of the Internet platform how to realize the flow of conversion, is a long-term problem.
According to a previous report by Interface News, Sugar Bean, which enters the middle-aged and old-aged interest track with square dance as an entry point, has tried to realize cash through the e-commerce model and knowledge payment, but the results are limited. When the course unit price at 9.9 yuan, sugar beans attracted 50,000 to 60,000 paying users, and rose to 49 yuan, lost more than 80% of the paying users.
For Red Pine Academy, commercialization is not a priority at this stage. "Middle-aged and elderly people's consumer decision-making is conservative and socially cautious, it is difficult to have impulsive consumption like young people, more for the trust to pay, for the emotions to pay, for the spiritual world to pay. Therefore, to do business with middle-aged and old people, we need to do high average LTV (Life Time Value), instead of pursuing ROI and GMV; if LT (user life cycle) is long, V (total value) will be high." said Li Qiao, founder of Red Pine. Li Qiao, founder of Red Pine, said.
In the long run, under the favorable policy, the silver hair economy still has great potential. "Actively cultivate the silver economy," "the elderly education into the lifelong education system," "to support the social forces to organize senior university" and other expressions in the relevant policy documents repeatedly mentioned.
It is worth noting that in the context of population aging and delayed retirement, the silver-haired people's demand for career planning and continuing education has also arisen. "Provide job introduction, vocational skills training and innovation and entrepreneurship guidance services for older people who have the will to work." The Opinions of the Central Committee of the State Council on Strengthening the Work of the Elderly in the New Era mentions that the elderly are encouraged to continue to play their roles.
Taking Japan, where aging is a serious problem, as an example, it is mentioned in IT Orange's "China Elderly Education Market Research Report 2020" that Hiroshima University, Meiji University and other colleges and universities have opened academic education for groups over 50 years old, including specialized courses in economics, management, psychology, etc., and issued certificates of qualification after graduation. On the one hand, it provides a channel for the middle-aged and elderly to further their education, and on the other hand, it also supports their re-employment.
How to seize the point of interest of the middle-aged and the elderly, and how to realize the long-term value of the silver hair track, a battle for the middle-aged and the elderly has long been opened.
#Elderly # #Silver hair economy #