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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

I just learned some things that have me really excited about turning 50 – and more excited than ever that this 50on50 series may help bury the 18-49 audience demo worshipers in time for my big birthday in December. I learned these things from one of the leading jury consultants in America.

Pick a Juror, Not Any Juror

Doug Green knows a leader when he sees one. Trial lawyers pay him good money to identify the potential leaders in a jury pool, men and women who will have the influence, the stature, the respect, the inclination, to persuade the other members of the jury to vote one way. And, Green has found, there is a correlation between age and influence.

I’ll share one of Green’s many stories from the courtroom to illustrate the point. It involved an intellectual property case in Texas.

“A juror comes into court in a coat and tie. He’s wearing a tie chain. Well turned out for a country setting. He’s about 60. Retired. Does some farming and ranching. He had been a foreman on a jury before. If we lose him, we know we’re in deep trouble. If we win him we may not necessarily be ok. But if we lose him, he’ll take the rest of the jury with him.”

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

I bumped into a trial lawyer acquaintance of mine at Starbucks in the CNN Center the other day. Somehow we got into talking about what litigators look for when choosing a jury. That’s when it hit me. How to select a jury can help people in my business choose a target audience. And the lesson from jury selection is: the 18-49 age demo seems to make little sense. Its days are numbered as I approach my 50th birthday.

THE ONE

The name of the trial lawyer who sparked my eureka moment is Stefan Turkheimer. He used to be with the DA’s office prosecuting felonies, including “a lot of meth trafficking.” Now he represents plaintiffs in personal injury and other cases.

Turkheimer explained that, because it’s so hard to get 12 members of a jury to agree on a verdict, attorneys can’t possibly try to pick the right 12.

Instead, they try to pick the right ONE. The ONE who has the potential to – and here’s the key word - INFLUENCE the other 11 jurors. The ONE who can “marshal the troops in the jury room.“ That ONE, you hope, you’ll be able to persuade.

How old does that someone tend to be, I asked Turkheimer. “It’s someone who has reached a certain age,” was his answer.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

I must interrupt my 50th birthday campaign – my campaign to bury the worshipers of the18-49 audience “demo” – so that I can tend to company business. The deadline has arrived for me to write the confidential self-evaluation portion of my job performance review. For efficiency’s sake, I’ll post it right here.

I’m in a zone as I approach 50. Not a zone defense. A creative zone. I can’t remember precisely when it began. But if it stretches on much longer, in the 50on50 AC360.com series I’ve been doing to fight my imminent expulsion from the 18-49 demo, I believe CNN stands to make incalculable gains (or, better yet, calculable.)

Would I rather be turning 40? Sure I would. Provided I was in this zone. I’ve spent various periods of my life in the zone. But never a zone like this. And never for so long in a single stretch. So if 50 is the price of admission to this zone, I’ll pay it.

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'Michael Jackson on set at one of his final rehearsals.

Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

I was hoping to post a story this morning called: “What Selecting a Jury Teaches Us About Targeting the Ideal Audience.” But I decided to take Michael Jackson’s advice instead. The story has to wait. Here’s why.

The story I was racing to write was triggered by a chance discussion I had yesterday with a smart, young trial lawyer I know. This 30-something litigator told me how he goes about sizing up which jurors will have the maximum impact for his client.

If I could translate his insights on choosing a jury into choosing a target audience, I could help knock the wind out of the worshipers of the 18-49 audience demo. But Michael Jackson’s advice slowed me down.

I can’t remember what song Jackson was singing at the moment in the captivating new documentary “This is It” (somebody out there who has seen it please refresh my memory.)

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

It’s going to be hard to keep your eyes off the photo in this piece. But the story of a construction worker’s thumb impaled by an 8 inch serrated blade provides me with a weapon in my final 50 days before turning 50. The weapon might be valuable as I battle those who plan to kick me out of the 18-49 year old audience demographic. Don’t worry, I won’t use the blade.

What Would You Do?

The story of the saw in the thumb was shared at a CNN editorial meeting by one of the most popular leaders in the field of internet social networking. His name is Chris Brogan.

Brogan has more than 106-THOUSAND followers on Twitter (you’re all invited to lunch at his place.)

He was at CNN to explain how companies like ours can enlarge our audience and build trust through social networking.

I had one question for Brogan. So many of us on Facebook, Twitter, and similar networks, find ourselves swamped with inane thoughts, often from very bright people. We’re losing faith in social networking. We’re tempted to tune out.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

Let me begin with my Facebook status update: I JUST PUT ON MY PANTS. THEY FIT WELL.

There are two silent reactions my friends on Facebook might have. Which one do you think is more likely:

a) I really trust Michael's opinion. I wonder what brand of pants he's wearing today, where he bought them, and how much they cost. Does he have a recommendation for a good dry cleaners?
b) Has Facebook stolen my friend Michael's brain?

The more likely answer is b.

So many of us on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites feel this way. We try to limit our Friending requests to people we know, or have reason to respect. Intelligent people. People with important or funny or original things to say or pass on. And then they go and ruin it by sending out messages that sound like they've been written by a body snatcher.

Now, not all our Facebook Friends and Twitter Followers do this. A number of mine focus primarily on introducing our social network to ideas, places, people and events we would benefit from knowing about.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

I’ve been feeling good about the case I’ve been building to destroy the mythical status of the 18-49 year old audience “demo.” Feeling pretty darn good, until I called Turner Broadcasting’s chief of audience research. His name is Jack Wakshlag.

And if I didn’t have the resilience I’ve built up as I’ve reached these final 50 days before turning 50, Wakshlag’s analysis might have knocked me out cold. But I’m still standing. Here’s why.

The main reason I called Wakshlag was to get help tracing the roots of the 18-49 demo worship. I wanted to know who was responsible for what so many of us consider arbitrary boundaries. Wakshlag had the answer at his fingertips. Here’s the history lesson he gave me.

The Prime Mover

I was just a child. Like so many families at the time, we had one television. There was little choice. CBS, NBC and ABC. Throw in The Star Spangled Banner when the stations went off the air overnight – and you get the picture.

The conventional wisdom back then was that the most valuable programs on which to advertise were the ones that captured the most households. Age was not a factor. It was the number of households that determined the ad rate.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

Forty-seven days before I turn 50, I must interrupt my mission to destroy my industry's worship of the 18-49 audience demo, to bring you urgent health news. Today, we're all part of the same demo. The Halloween demo. And there's valuable advice to spread on how to proceed during this first H1N1 Halloween.

The advice comes from my CNN colleague, senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen. Elizabeth is not a germophobe. She's always struck me as fairly laid back about these matters. Which is why she caught my attention on CNN's Campbell Brown last night with this very graphic advice:

"No grubby little paws in the bucket this Halloween. I'm handing out candy with gloves, and offering sanitizer squirts."

I hope, on this first H1N1 Halloween, that the Elizabeth Cohen method becomes, as they say on the web, viral. You can spread this link and retweet Elizabeth's message here

Elizabeth's advice certainly led my wife and me to start coaching our young children this morning not to eat their holiday candy until they wash their hands. Actually, my analytical wife observed, that's not good enough. What about the germs on all the wrappers they touch. It's gonna be a hard night of enforcement.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

The other day I went to Sports Authority to buy a few ping pong balls for my children. I left with two arms full of high-tech athletic wear. I practically tripped over it: the mother lode of Under Armour. I grabbed everything in sight. Layer after layer. Long sleeve. Short sleeve. Cold gear. Heat gear. I even grabbed a pair of those tight-fitting spandex-type jogging pants. The person wearing them was shocked.

And so, as I checked out, weighed down, I had to ask myself, is this typical behavior of a man 48 days from turning 50? Am I a typical customer of Under Armour and the other popular athletic performance brands? Or, given my age, am I a potential brand killer? If the younger demo sees people my age jogging down the street in "compression wear" will they run the other way? I called Under Armour's chief of marketing to find out.

The author, Michael Schulder, in his new workout shirt.

The Gear

I hoped my spontaneous Under Armour shopping spree was more evidence that the highly prized 18-49 year old audience demo is a myth – that the 49 year old "cutoff" is arbitrary and meaningless given the 2009 lifestyle.

I was shocked – not appalled – but shocked to have the Senior VP of Marketing for Under Armour, Steve Battista, reveal the age range of his company's core consumer. Hint: "We have a definite target that skews young."

18- 49?

Nice try.

How about "8-24." That is not a typo. Under Armour's core demo begins at age 8, and lasts until 24. Based on that assessment, I concluded that I MAY not have behaved like the typical on-the-verge-of-50 year old during my Under Armour shopping spree.

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Michael Schulder
CNN Senior Executive Producer

As I continue my countdown to age 50 (49 days away) and dig into the apparent myth that ages 18 through 49 is the sweet spot audience, my gut, which tells me the 18-49 premise is absurd, is reinforced by today’s Exhibit A. It’s my mother-in-law’s secret arm signal.

My mother-in-law, let’s call her “Marie” (because that’s her name) will not reveal her age for this story. Let’s just say she’s old enough to be …. my mother-in-law. In other words, she’s out of “the demo.” So programmers and advertisers who worship 18-49 may be surprised to learn about her secret arm signal. I had CNN graphic artist Jason Proudler try to capture the image. Some might think it illustrates a person covering her mouth to avoid spreading H1N1. That’s what some young, out of touch, advertisers and programmers might have guessed. But they guessed wrong.

The Signal’s Hidden Meaning

This story began a few weeks ago, when my mother-in-law and I were having a nice conversation in my kitchen. I told her I had to go play a tennis match. That’s when she gave me the signal.

The signal is something she learned by watching my children take tennis lessons with the highly esteemed tennis coach “H” Wetzel.

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