• by Bob Shullman , Columnist, December 7, 2016

When marketers to affluent Americans think about how to reach and potentially communicate their messages to millionaires in ways beyond the traditional and beyond today’s many digital media channels, they need to realize that millionaires are really different from mainstream consumers. Also, not surprisingly, the millionaire generations differ materially from one another.

Millionaires are involved with many sports activities — tennis leads the way — that offer sponsorship opportunities and provide marketers of affluent products and services with up to 27 potential occasions for meeting with their very affluent clients and prospects. When viewed by generations, though, among the Gen X millionaires, golf ranks as the number one sporting activity (49% participate), while jogging/running takes first place with millionaire Millennials (28% rank this as their number one sporting activity), and among millionaire Boomers, fitness workouts are the leading fitness/sporting activity, at a 27% level.

Overall, though, the three generations of millionaires choose tennis (as noted before) and swimming as their current sporting and fitness favorites out of the 27 sports-related activities we measured.

When it comes to millionaires' leisure and cultural pastimes, there are many pursuits that attract them out of the 47 we measured. Movie theaters were ranked the highest, with 25% choosing this activity; and, as further good news for Hollywood, millionaire Millennials also rank movie theaters as their top choice, at the 34% level. Millionaire Boomers, on the other hand, opt for museums as their number one choice, at 42%. Lifestyle differences also come into play among millionaire Gen Xers, as fashion/trunk shows at 36% and auto races at 35% vie for the lead among these very active and wealthy consumers.

Going beyond sporting and cultural activities and looking into millionaires' psychographic profiles, despite the old adage, "Money doesn’t buy happiness," millionaires tend to be happier than the average American adult. As such, they are more engaged in keeping up with business-related news (74%) and consider themselves more physically fit (75%).

That same confident attitude continues as 80% them report that their friends and family come to them for advice, compared with 51% for the average American. Their confidence is further seen in their buying habits, especially among millionaire Millennials, who are the most likely of the three generations to buy designer or luxury brands and to make their purchases based on quality rather than on price (96% of Millennials, 81% of Gen-Xers, and 75% of Boomers buy based on quality and less on price).

The wealthy, a.k.a. millionaires, are indeed a different breed of consumer — different not only from those with far fewer financial resources but also from one another generationally … and marketers to affluent Americans who ignore these differences do so at their own and their company’s peril.