Lucy XM-54 Knows Me and My Cohorts

I'm an occasional XM radio listener. Talk radio on AM is my mainstay, for the record. I supplement my listening with public radio (NPR and WV Public Radio). When I am XM-ing, the channel that I gravitate toward is number 54, the channel known as "Lucy." The primary factor for me is the music. Lucy plays the music that I love. The format for Lucy is billed as the killer songs of the Alternative Music era. It's the important songs in the history of alternative music from the '90s, with some '80s flashbacks. It works. I like it. But wait ... there's a bit of marketing genius here to explore.

The marketing genius producers at Lucy know how to utilize cohort marketing, or generational marketing theory, to create messages that resonate with me. They really know how to embrace me, or at least my cohort group. Lucy knows the following:

- That my cohorts and I have been out of college for almost 20 years.
- That my cohorts and I are raising families.
- That we are battling expanding waistlines.
- That we have traded in sports cars for mini-vans.
- That I am dealing with the first signs of aging.

That's me and my cohort group, the Trailing-Edge Boomers (or the Jonesers), described to a tee.

Lucy and its creators accomplish this depth of connection with quirky, clever announcements from the DJ. These run about once every 15 minutes, in between songs. Here are a few examples--some of my favorites:

"Lucy - XM 54. We're the music that weird girlfriend of yours from college turned you on to."

"Lucy - XM 54. We've been with you all the way from the days of your 32-inch waistline to 38. Heck, we were even there for you when you made it back down to 36s on the Atkins plan."

Announcements like these resonate with me. They add depth to the station and its programming. It tells me that Lucy XM-54 gets me. And as long as they keep playing the great music that I love, Lucy will keep me.

Is your product or service aligned with a particular cohort group? If so, do you truly understand their psyche and their shared life experiences? If not, perhaps you should explore how cohort marketing might fit into your overall marketing strategy.

By the way, the definitive work on cohort marketing theory is Defining Markets, Defining Moments by Geoffrey Meredith, Charles Schewe PhD and Janice Karlovich. I highly recommend this book to all marketing geniuses.