Will lightning strike twice?

That's the bet that 75 employees and a number of venture capital firms are making on Jeff Taylor's new project, Eons. Although the site actually does have a jobs page, Taylor is prone to describing the project as a portal for the over-50 crowd.

The fledgling company recently announced their partners: Harrah's Entertainment, Hyatt Corp., Humana, Inc., Liberty Mutual Group and Verizon Wireless. Eons plans to work with their partners to create customized products and services for the 50-and-older set such as special insurance packages and travel opportunities. Sounds like a cooler version of AARP. (Luxist)

The site is about the celebration of turning 50 and the reachable goal of being 100," said Jeff Taylor, founder and chief executive officer of Eons Inc., who also founded jobs site Monster.com in 1994. "Our focus is to inspire a generation of baby-boomers and senior citizens to live their biggest life possible. Eons.com has been online in partial form, but on Monday all of its features will go live. The site's information and services will focus on four key areas: health, finances, entertainment and family. It will have a very targeted social-networking component to introduce visitors to others with similar interests, hobbies and life experiences", Taylor said. (WebWereld)

Marketplace (NPR) ran a small piece on the launch of Eons:

SCOTT JAGOW: The social networking site, MySpace, has hooked millions of young people in this country. But what about older folks? They wanna socialize too, and so today the founder of Monster.com launches a new site targeting baby boomers. More now from Amy Scott.

AMY SCOTT: The new site may have a couple things working against it. There's the name: Eons.com.

Marketing consultant Chuck Underwood says boomers don't like to think about age.

CHUCK UNDERWOOD: Eons has that kind of aging overtone to it that is so often a deal-breaker with the baby boomers. Studies also show that boomers use the Internet to shop or do research, but they socialize elsewhere.

On the other hand, Underwood says more boomers are single in their later years than any generation before them. So they may be keen to connect with their peers.

If Eons succeeds in attracting them, marketer Brent Green says advertisers will take note.

BRENT GREEN: If you could go to a Web site and ostensibly reach 10 million people between 50 and 60, to just make up some numbers, wow. Aging boomers have an estimated $2 trillion in the bank and, Green says, they like to spend it.

Taylor and the Eons crew live in a rarified atmosphere. Well insulated from nay-sayers and critics, the team is a partial recreation of the original Monster crowd. Working for Taylor is, in itself, a small industry.

We are sure that they are barking up the right tree. The over fifty demographic, while not really the monolithic gold mine you'd think, is a market changing phenomenon. When Taylor says:

"The 50+ generation has a unique blend of experiences, needs and desires," explains Taylor. "With greater health, more wealth and a mindset that the world is your oyster, this age group has an exceptional opportunity to live life to the fullest. Eons aims to capture this growing momentum and propel boomers and seniors toward achieving their goals by creating customized products and services in tandem with our corporate founding partners. We know these partnerships will create new spirit and innovation around this marketplace."  (Press Release)

He means "we don't exactly have a product yet and we're going to build traffic while figuring out how to monetize it."

We've seen it happen. Salary.com, built well outside of typical venture financing, went for traffic first and monetization second. It can work.

The question is whether or not a successful B2B marketing team can learn to deliver consumer products. We'll keep you posted.

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