Who is this amazing group? Women. Turns out, we wield wallets and we’re not afraid to use them.
Women buy or influence the buying of 80% of all consumer goods. And we’re not just buying ho-hum stuff like groceries and household items, but big-ticket items in every category: homes, stocks, cars, computers, travel and so on.
There’s more. We start up businesses at 3 times the rate of men. If you earn our loyalty, we’re a 2-for-1 customer: Research shows the services and products we purchase for our personal lives, we also purchase for our businesses.
Clearly, crafting messages in a way that appeals to women is smart marketing. Yet does “marketing to women” mean merely swapping “she” for “he” on your website, blog or email campaigns?
No way. The key to tapping into this market is knowing who your individual female customer really is and what motivates her to buy. Here’s how.
Identify her specific needs
Women have one common trait: gender.
Other than that, we’re as diverse as they come. “Stereotypes are the single biggest reason why so many marketing-to-women efforts fail,” writes Holly Buchanan on Copyblogger.com.
You’ve seen the most common stereotype on TV: the thirty-something minivan-driving mom. Yet consider the needs of
- A 23-year-old college graduate who just landed her first corporate job
- A 30-year-old law-firm partner, pregnant with her second child.
- A 52-year-old recently divorced woman whose last child recently left home
- A 60-year-old retiree who has sold her house and belongings to travel to Africa
Ensure your marketing success by understanding your female customer. Speak to her in a way that says you know her and care about her concerns and needs.
Value her as a peer
We all know the illustration of climbing the ladder to get ahead. But often, competing with others–stepping on toes and knuckles on the way up—only alienates us.
Marti Barletta, author of Marketing to Women, writes on MarketingProfs.com, “Men aspire to be at the top of the heap, the King of the Road. Psychologists have found, however, that women generally don’t want to be looked up to, any more than they want to be looked down on. Female gender culture operates within the worldview of a peer group, and women like to look across, to feel a sense of bonds among equals.”
I saw an ad for a condo recently that showed a woman in a cozy home. “Free ego boost with purchase,” it said. Perfect messaging for men but not women.
Better? State Farm’s “We live where you live” campaign, which stresses a neighborly connection and peer relationships.
Respect her connections
In the last week, I asked a neighbor if she’d eaten at a nearby Thai restaurant, my vegetarian sister-in-law where to buy groceries for my daughter, who wants to be meat-free, and a friend if she liked the movie “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.”
Just casual conversation, right? Sure–but also classic female purchasing behavior: In general, we ask the opinions of others before showing the money.
“Word-of-mouth marketing is a perfect fit for marketing to women,” write Michele Miller and Holly Buchanan in The Soccer Mom Myth. “Why do women tell one another about products of services? Look at their deeper motivations. They want to enhance their relationships… they love to help their friends and turn them on to wonderful new companies, services and products.”
Offer a fantastic product or service and carefully build your brand. Then, when you earn woman’s loyalty, she’ll likely tell a friend–or ten.
[...] wrote elsewhere that marketing to women is doomed when we paint “female consumers” with a broad stroke, one big [...]