It's a great day for America everybody, and I'll tell you why. Effective immediately, WonderBranding has a new home and a brand new look!
This will be the last post on this site (thank you for your years of service, Typepad). All new posts from here on out can be found at WonderBranding.com.
You'll find a home page with easier navigation, and categories that help you get what you want, when you want it. Whether it's the latest news, reports, videos, or my feature posts, the info you want and need should be easier to find. I've even put a "welcome" video on the home page just for you.
RSS subscription to the new blog is easy - in the upper right hand corner of the home page. Email subscriptions are available, too. For those of you who have subscribed over the years using FeedBlitz, you might want to consider re-subscribing on the new site, since it may be awhile until we can transfer your email address into the new system. Better safe than sorry, I always say.
Have fun with the new site - hope you'll join in the conversation! And, as always, thanks for reading WonderBranding.
Oh dear. Sometimes I feel like I forgot to buckle up for a ride on George Orwell’s time machine.
The Mars corporation has just introduced the Fling, a chocolate and hazelnut candy bar aimed at the female market. NPR says:
"Wrapped in a shiny pink and sliver package, this
delicate “chocolate finger” is intended for women. The word “finger” is
an industry term for a long, slim confection, Mars spokesman Ryan
Bowling says, but with ads that invite you to “Pleasure yourself” in
pink lettering, consumers might come to other conclusions.”
With promotional postcards like the one above and a TV spot that starts out with the assumption that strangers are having sex in a store’s dressing room, it sure sounds like Mars is pushing the “I’m too sexy for my candy bar” button.
Word is that the confection is only 85 calories. Is that for the whole bar, or just one finger? No matter how good the candy bar tastes, the taste of the Fling campaign may end up getting the middle finger from female consumers.
Last time, we talked about the first of the four neighborhoods of women, the Regal Queen. Spontaneous, trendy, and fun-loving, it was easy to see the importance of communicating in a way that catches her in a “spur of the moment” buying mode.
Moseying on over a few blocks to a new neighborhood, we find the Sorceress. What’s she all about and how does it affect her buying process?
Neighborhood #2: The Sorceress
Energy: Internal
Time Horizon: In the Moment
Like her sister the Regal Queen, the Sorceress lives “in the moment,” which means she is quicker to react to incoming signals. But she gets her energy internally, preferring to rely on her inner self for contemplation and decision making. To say she is competitive is an understatement; even her leisure activities often involve some kind of self-improvement or competition, even if it’s just with herself.
The Sorceress is looking for the absolute best – “cutting edge,” “certified,” and “state-of-the-art” are phrases that get her buying mojo going. But take care in using phrases like that – you need to be able to deliver on your promise. Her big question will be, “So you’re ‘all that.’ PROVE IT.” If you can’t, she’ll leave you in the dust (and tell her friends about how much you suck like a Hoover). But deliver superiority on a consistent basis, and she’ll be your biggest champion. Her biggest fear? Missing out on something top-notch.
How would you write copy for the Sorceress? Let’s return to our fictitious business, “On-the-Go Gourmet:”
“The award-winning staff of On-The-Go Gourmet has a combined 40 years of food experience with some of the finest restaurants in the region. As certified master chefs and teachers, your “gourmet sherpas” will guide you through an efficient, state-of-the-art cooking process that creates gastronomical masterpieces in record time. It’s not just cooking – it’s a gourmet meal that will have your family and friends saying, ‘How did you do that?’”
Oooooooo… certified master chefs. More than 40 years of award-winning experience. Gastronomical masterpieces. This copy is like a love song to a Sorceress. Deliver the message about your business within the “state of the art” framework, and she’ll be at your door in no time, wallet in hand.
Here’s another Fairview Garden Center example, too – this time for the Sorceress. The first line is an attention getter for our type of listener:
Lots of people ask me what kinds of things we do during the WonderBranding workshops that I teach at Wizard Academy in Austin.
Since we’re talking about the Regal Queen (Spontaneous) customer type right now, I thought Patrick Sullivan’s homework would be an ideal example.
Go here to read Patrick’s story about his experience, which includes the first draft (and a produced example) of a radio ad he wrote, and then the revised, edited version that came about after the WonderBranding class took a stab at helping him make it more resonant with the Regal Queen type. It’s great to see how the copy improves from Round One to Round Two, and how much more effective the final, produced ad sounds.
Patrick created these ads in one day. He even designed this landing page for his Jigsaw Health website which would be great for driving Internet traffic from a radio ad. And somewhere in the midst of all that work, he was Twittering about the class. Whatever those Jigsaw Health supplements are, I think they are working for Patrick!
Dividing the vast universe of women into “4 Neighborhoods” will help you to better understand the different needs and wants that female customers may have for your product or service. Focusing on each neighborhood’s intersection of energy and time horizon makes it easier to predict the questions a customer might be having about your business and answer those questions in the language, or “dialect,” of that neighborhood.
Neighborhood #1: The Regal Queen
Energy: External
Time Horizon: In the Moment
Relying on outside forces and friends for energy and with a “seize the day” mentality, the Regal Queen is the most Spontaneous of the four customer types. She is on the lookout for trends and new things to try when it catches her mind’s eye. She is the most flamboyant and outgoing of the four types, and likes to think of herself as being “unconventional.” She’s going to be the customer who loves last-minute bargains, as well as in-store displays featuring “new and cool” items that have just arrived. Her greatest fear? Being bored.
How would you write copy for the Regal Queen?
Check out this example from a fictitious business I created. I call it “On-The-Go Gourmet,” a mix-cook-no clean-up type of kitchen for busy women. This copy could be used on a brochure, a website, and advertising. I’ve highlighted keywords a Regal Queen would be drawn to, to give you a better idea of the “language” she speaks:
“On-The-Go Gourmet is the exciting new way to try unique, delicious dishes from around the world. Choose your recipe beforehand, or pick one to try on a whim when you arrive. On-The-Go Gourmet always has everything you need for every dish in our recipe book. Stop losing sleep over what to feed the family – spend your time creating instead!”
In one short paragraph, you capture her interest through imaging and language that not only sounds familiar, but also piques her curiosity. It sounds inviting (no planning necessary) and a bit exotic (recipes from around the world). It’s persuasive language that speaks directly to the heart of the Regal Queen and encourages her to give it a try. And once you match her actual experience with what you promised in the copy, she’ll return again and again, and tell all her friends about you.
For another example of an ad written for the Regal Queen, give a listen to this radio ad for Fairview Garden Center in Raleigh, NC. After being on the air for just a few days, it attracted a whole new crowd to Fairview – people who had never before thought of themselves as gardeners but now wanted to give it a try. And most of them were women.
Tomorrow, I’ll share yet another example of communicating with the Regal Queen customer type – one that was created by a student smack-dab in the middle of my most recent WonderBranding workshop at Wizard Academy in Austin, TX.
Pitney Bowes has been working hard to help its customers make the highest and most efficient use of their marketing and postage dollars. This is an informal, informative video that shows some of the things you can do (and avoid!) with your next direct mail campaign.
Marketing Charts reports that a new groundbreaking study shows that 86% of African-American women feel that companies have no clue when it comes to understanding who they are or what they need.
Conducted by Lattimer Communications and The Bantam Group, the study reveals that the largest communication gap falls in the industries of automotive, banking/financial, fast food, and health care.
The report also details six psychographic profiles of African-American women to help marketers get a better handle on the individual, internal needs of this important segment of female consumers.
This report is great news on the marketing-to-women front, showing that consumer researchers are finally expanding beyond the "average white female" perception in the marketing world.
For all of you who keep asking, I am now teaching courses on marketing to women at both Wizard Academy and online.
Here's the current schedule of events:
April 15-16: WonderBranding - Marketing to Women Workshop Two days jam-packed with info, research and applications on capturing the heart of the REAL female customer. Tuition cost covers room and board (that's the courtyard of Englebrecht House in the picture), and if you're a Wizard Academy alum, your tuition is 50% off! Learn more and register at the Wizard Academy website.
June 2nd: Intro to Marketing to Women - the Six-Week Online Course This is a six-week webinar for a small group of committed learners and entrepreneurs just like you. We meet once a week online to learn some nuts-and-bolts basics about the female customer. But don't let the title of the course fool you - the basics I teach are nothing like you've seen before, and you will walk away each week with new ideas to try in your own business. This is marketing to women from a new angle of approach.
[I wrote the following post about three months ago and it got such an excellent response that I've decided to re-publish it. If you haven't read it yet, give it a look; if you have read it, you might want a refresher. Starting next week, we'll explore the individual "neighborhoods" of female customers, what makes them tick, and ways to capture their heart.]
I don’t know about you, but the thought of a world full of female consumers scares the livin’ bejeezus out of me.
It’s just too big for me to wrap my brain around.
But a neighborhood of female consumers? That’s a little less intimidating. It’s an easier concept for your noggin to manage. It makes the whole idea of female purchasing power seem less like an alien invasion and more like a block party with really great beer and a kick-ass band.
Let’s say you were moving to New York City. Just the thought of trying to cope in one of the busiest, largest, most aggressive metropolises in the world could easily overwhelm you.
But it doesn’t have to.
Here’s the secret to living in New York: the neighborhood concept.
A New York neighborhood is just a few square blocks in size, each with its own culture and behavior. Focusing on that neighborhood that surrounds you at any given moment helps you to understand and enjoy one microcosm of a much larger society. You get to know the real New York one neighborhood at a time. You begin to appreciate the diverse cultures that are woven together to create a mind-blowing tapestry of humanity. And eventually, you fall in love with a city that initially seemed foreign and out of reach.
What if you applied the neighborhood concept to the world of female consumers?
What if you could break the consumer world down into manageable microcosms of women, each with a specific culture and pattern of consumer behavior?
You can.
In fact, you already have the knowledge you need to draw the defining boundaries. Neighborhoods of female consumers are created through the principles of energy and time horizon.
A neighborhood of female customers, each with its own specific culture and behavior, is determined by the point at which energy and time horizon intersect.
Alice lives at the intersection of Internal Energy & Leave a Legacy.
Janice lives at the intersection of External Energy & In the Moment.
Different intersections. Different neighborhoods. Different behavioral patterns.
Different purchasing processes.
Get it?
Learning that women draw upon different energy sources to charge up and get through the day is the first step to understanding that not all women make purchasing decisions in the same way.
Overlaying the two factors brings the world of female customers into focus.
It reveals a collection of neighborhoods that are based not on age, zip code or income, but individual value systems.
It gives you a longitude and latitude to help you get your bearings. It allows you to not only pinpoint the behavioral locations of your customers, but uncovers a map of the territory so you know how to get where she is, and where you need to be.
Suddenly, the world of female customers just got a tiny bit smaller.
And more inviting.
And easier to maneuver.
With tremendous profit potential.
How about exploring the neighborhoods of female customers with me? It’s guaranteed to be an eye opener.
And who knows? You just might end up falling in love with a world that’s really not all that scary.
Beauty, it seems, isn’t just in the eye of the beholder – it’s also in the brain.
A new research study has been published in the electronic edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science with evidence that male and female brains perceive “beauty” by utilizing different regions of the brain. Same final solution, but each gender uses a very different process for getting there.
While men concentrate on the spatial aspects of an object (right-brain dominant), women look at an object and link it to language (using both hemispheres of the brain at once).
It’s something to keep in mind, especially given the way the eyes of a female customer are structured and the things she subconsciously registers when approaching your place of business.
It means she’s linking the visual aspects of your retail store or office with actual words. In essence, she’s literally talking herself into – or out of – doing business with you.
Have you checked your store or office on the “beauty meter” lately? What are her eyes – and her brain – telling her about you? Are you the Mona Lisa or Elvis-On-Velvet?
Things have been a little quiet here on WonderBranding lately – I’m in the middle of “chaos” season and about to leave on yet another business trip – but behind the scenes, things are rockin’ and rollin’.
In about two months, this blog will experience a re-launch – an evolution into a site designed to become your central source on all things “marketing to women.” I can’t give away too much here, but it’s my aim to serve you, the reader, at a much higher level. And while comments from readers help me to understand what direction to go in, I’ve been searching for a tool that would give me exact answers on what to “tweak” in order to make it a better site for you. Sort of a “virtual assistant” in the website world.
My prayers have been answered. And yours might be, too, if you’re looking for an affordable “guide” to tell you exactly what needs to be done to your site for maximum effectiveness.
The team over at Future Now is now offering an amazingly affordable subscription software called OnTarget which, as the website says, “monitors your website 24/7, uncovers the reasons your visitors fail to buy or register or become a lead, and then provides specific recommendations from our real experts that you can implement to keep your revenue goals on target.”
All you need to do is complete the list of simple tasks that OnTarget gives you each month, and watch your conversion rate grow. Think about it – if your small changes increased conversion by as little as 3% per month, that adds up to an increase in revenue by at least 36% in one year. (Probably more, ‘cuz I think it works like compound interest!)
I plan to use OnTarget to help me create a better site for you – and no, I won’t be getting it for free. I’ll be paying full price, just like you.
Watch this short video and see if you don’t get as jazzed up as I am.
The next Wizards on the Road event is just a couple of weeks away and Dennis Collins, Wizard Academy alum, has generously offered to pay for the tuition of four participants at the Denver workshop.
Have you been hit hard by the current economic downturn? Interested in learning how to master the marketing performance equation to propel your business forward? You may qualify for a scholarship.
But hurry - the deadline for application is TOMORROW, February 3rd.
Wizard of Ads partner Dave Young and I had the distinct pleasure of spending two days this week in Cheyenne, WY, presenting and meeting with folks from Wyoming Travel and Tourism and their hospitality vendors from across the state.
One of the highlights of the governor's conference was getting a sneak preview of Wyoming Travel and Tourism's new website, which will officially launch February 20th. Both Dave and I were blown away by the sophistication of the site, and the commitment to visitor usability. The entire team has created a website that rocks, including options for searching by season, by the kind of traveling a web visitor is interested in, and a "My Trips" section, a drag-and-drop "wish list" like you've never seen. There's also been plenty of planning for social media, with a "Share It" button and plans in the near future for blogs, Twittering, etc.
The team has given me permission to sneak you in for a preview. Give it a look - it launches the tourism industry into the 21st century.
Dave conducted a terrific interview with the team (including the developers at CRG), which you can watch here. You're going want to hire them when you finish - I guarantee it.
Old Way of Handling a Product Recall: Let customers find out through local and national news reports, then assume it's the customer's responsibility to remember if they purchased said product from you.
New Way of Handling a Product Recall: Work your customer database like nobody's business, and reach out to individual customers from a "we're in this together" perspective.
"Jon Lowder usually disdains computer-generated
telephone calls — “robo-calls,” he grumbles — but when he got two this
week from Costco Wholesale Corp., the Winston-Salem, N.C., man didn’t
mind.
The giant
warehouse retailer was dialing Lowder to warn him that two brands of
peanut butter sports bars he bought for his kids had been recalled as
part of a growing salmonella food poisoning scare.
“They’d
scoured their database and found any members who had purchased Clif
Bars from them and then called them to let them know that they should
dump those Clif Bars,” said Lowder, a 45-year-old marketing consultant,
who bought those snacks and some Zone Perfect Bars as well. 'Did I
mention I love Costco?'"
All it cost was the price of setting up a customer filter and a robo-call system. I can guarantee you that for every penny spent, it will be returned hundredfold in future customer loyalty dollars.
How thorough is your database? How are you using it not to sell to your customer, but to help them? It's a strong way to build an iron-clad marketing strategy on a shoestring budget.
Sure, Hillary and Janet get a lot of attention as the newest members of the Obama administration but according to today's Business Week Insider, Karen Gordon Mills is also a woman to watch.
The new head of the Small Business Administration has extensive background with businesses of all sizes, and recognizes the need for an agency that is flexible enough to meet the needs of different entrepreneurs and companies. According to the article:
"Observers see Mills' experience co-founding Solera with two women
partners as an indication that she will be an advocate for the nation's
women-owned small businesses. Among the investments the fund has made
are women-owned small businesses such as Latina Media Ventures and natural food producer Annie's."
Read more about Mills and her vision in the new edition of Insider. Maybe she'll have you chanting, "Yes We Can!"
Sometimes, the littlest things can fortify a brand in the customer's mind.
Take this card, which arrived with my J. Crew mail order a few days ago:
(Click on the image for a full-size version)
Polishes away a little of the corporate stigma and lends the personal touch. Granted, the card is printed, not handwritten, but it's thoughtful just the same. And smart marketing. All for pennies on the dollar.
What's keeping you from sending a note like this to your customers? If you want to connect with the female consumer, this is the kind of no-brainer marketing you need to be thinking about. Anyone can do it - why not you?
My name is Bill Chase. I own a Home Improvement company in Haverhill, MA (approx 35 miles north of Boston).
Thanks for your notes on marketing. I really enjoy reading them. Also, enjoyed reading your book and look forward to the next one.
The reason for my email is I wanted to share with you a recent experience that related to one of your last email topics, Connection vs. Control. My experience is an example on giving her control and if you are honest with her and reveal transparency she will become a loyal customer and evangelist for your brand.
A few years ago I did a large project for a single mom we will call Amelia. Amelia is independent and owns her own business. Her life is hectic as she cares for her 8 year old son and runs her business. She has no time for delays in her life. When I presented the samples on my original visit she knew what she wanted and went ahead with the project that same day.
The project was going well until the town stopped us for remodeling her front porch. This was due to a special variance needed that my company failed to obtain. After dealing with the town and having to go before a variance board this delayed the job for almost 3 months! Her house wasn’t in shambles but didn’t look the best. She was very upset with us to say the least.
How did I handle this situation?
I did not blame my staff for the mistake or anyone else. I took full responsibility for not getting the correct permits to begin with. I simply told her I messed up and had made a terrible judgment. I also gave her my cell number so she could be in constant contact with me if she wanted to. I also took the time and went to the variance meeting with her as she plead her case before the board.
Ultimately, we got the correct permit and completed the job. I must admit I had to bite my tongue a few times throughout this process but never lost track of the goal of making Amelia happy and completing the project. Fast forward 2 years later:
Last week, I got a phone call from Amelia.
Her neighbor recently stopped her and commented on how nice her house looked. The neighbor wanted the company’s name who did the work for her. Amelia not only gave her my card but called me (on my cell phone)to give me the potential clients information. I guarantee you she would have not reached out the way she did if her problem was not handled the way it was a few years back.
Problems occur in business. Nobody is perfect. This example shows if you are honest and up front despite bumps along the road (some bigger than others) most customers will understand and if handled correctly will be champions for your brand.
The first Wizard of Ads partner event in Nashville was such a huge sold-out success
that we’ve just scheduled another two-day workshop for February 19 & 20 at
the beautiful Qwest Learning & Conference Center in Denver.
The topic for this workshop is the “The Marketing
Performance Equation.”As our
website explains:
There is an equation
that describes how all of the elements in your advertising, marketing,
merchandising and in-store experiences relate directly to your top-line sales
revenue.
You'll learn what kind of results to expect from changes to
your:
Ad budget
Copywriting
Media mix
Your online presence
Your customer's experience
The smiles on the faces of your employees
Each incremental change (whether good or bad) has an impact
on your gross sales.
When you understand the equation, your eyes will be opened
to the impact of each element and how they all relate to each other.
Denver's Qwest Learning and Conference Center
We've chosen a top-notch venue for this seminar! The Qwest
Learning and Conference Center auditorium seats just 70 attendees in the type
of comfort that business owners deserve.
Won't it be great to enjoy a 2-day seminar in a comfortable,
swiveling office chair (not the usual hotel seminar chairs), with ample room
and outlets for your laptop?
*If you are in the advertising business (either sales or
consulting) we must insist that you pay our full price of $500. Your clients
will thank you for attending this seminar. You will gain insights that can
reward you and your clients many times over the cost of tuition. So, why do we
give a discount to retail or service businesses? Frankly, because we would like
them to become our clients. We love to teach this material. We're even better
at executing it.
There are only 70 seats available for this workshop, and
they’re going fast.Why not register today?
I don’t know about you, but the thought of a world full of female consumers scares the livin’ bejeezus out of me.
It’s just too big for me to wrap my brain around.
But a neighborhood of female consumers? That’s a little less intimidating. It’s an easier concept for your noggin to manage. It makes the whole idea of female purchasing power seem less like an alien invasion and more like a block party with really great beer and a kick-ass band.
Let’s say you were moving to New York City. Just the thought of trying to cope in one of the busiest, largest, most aggressive metropolises in the world could easily overwhelm you.
But it doesn’t have to.
Here’s the secret to living in New York: the neighborhood concept.
A New York neighborhood is just a few square blocks in size, each with its own culture and behavior. Focusing on that neighborhood that surrounds you at any given moment helps you to understand and enjoy one microcosm of a much larger society. You get to know the real New York one neighborhood at a time. You begin to appreciate the diverse cultures that are woven together to create a mind-blowing tapestry of humanity. And eventually, you fall in love with a city that initially seemed foreign and out of reach.
What if you applied the neighborhood concept to the world of female consumers?
What if you could break the consumer world down into manageable microcosms of women, each with a specific culture and pattern of consumer behavior?
You can.
In fact, you already have the knowledge you need to draw the defining boundaries. Neighborhoods of female consumers are created through the principles of energy and time horizon.
A neighborhood of female customers, each with its own specific culture and behavior, is determined by the point at which energy and time horizon intersect.
Alice lives at the intersection of Internal Energy & Leave a Legacy.
Janice lives at the intersection of External Energy & In the Moment.
Different intersections. Different neighborhoods. Different behavioral patterns.
Different purchasing processes.
Get it?
Learning that women draw upon different energy sources to charge up and get through the day is the first step to understanding that not all women make purchasing decisions in the same way.
Overlaying the two factors brings the world of female customers into focus.
It reveals a collection of neighborhoods that are based not on age, zip code or income, but individual value systems.
It gives you a longitude and latitude to help you get your bearings. It allows you to not only pinpoint the behavioral locations of your customers, but uncovers a map of the territory so you know how to get where she is, and where you need to be.
Suddenly, the world of female customers just got a tiny bit smaller.
And more inviting.
And easier to maneuver.
With tremendous profit potential.
How about exploring the neighborhoods of female customers with me? It’s guaranteed to be an eye opener.
And who knows? You just might end up falling in love with a world that’s really not all that scary.
The
real, core truth of a concept is concealed beneath layers that most people
ignore or neglect.
You
can always go deeper.You can
always peel away one more layer.
Maybe
you’re afraid, because the very layer you caress between your fingers is the
one that everyone else believes to be the essential truth.It’s the layer that everyone else
focuses on - the layer upon which everyone else’s marketing strategies,
advertising campaigns, and mission statements are based.
But
you’re not like everyone else, are you?
When
it comes to capturing the heart of the female customer, the overriding mantra
being chanted by marketers today is:
Connect
with her and all is well.
Connect
with her and all is well.
Connect
with her and all is well...
Too
many marketing-to-women strategies and campaigns have failed on the concept of
“connecting” with the female consumer.
It’s
not about connection.It’s about
CONTROL.
Connection
is a process.Control is
ownership.
A
business can’t create connection.It can only give its customer the information and experience she desires
so that SHE can connect your brand with all that is good and right in the
world.
Giving
her control means:
1. Information
is not withheld.You provide all
of the answers to her questions, before she even has a chance to ask them.
2. You
strive for transparency.There’s
no fine print, no shell game.Phone calls are returned, mistakes owned up to.
3. You
give her the peace of mind to know that you are taking care of everything that
can and should be done.Peace of
mind means that when inevitable mistakes do occur on your part, it’s very easy
for her to forgive you.
4. She
feels like she’s having an honest dialogue with you.She has a voice in your relationship, and feels valued.
It’s
up to you to give her the control she needs.Total control provides every possible opportunity to let the
customer decide where you fit into her world of connection.
What
do you want your customer to feel - out of control, or in control?
What
are you doing to ensure that she feels in control?Do you have a system in place for information, transparency,
and dialogue?
That
system could be the key to the fanatical customer loyalty you dream of.
Go
ahead.Peel down to control, then
let her do the connecting.
It happens to the best of us - literally, as it’s only the good copywriters who try to move past schlocky “we-we” copy and who sometimes fall into what I call the “over-presumptuous use of You” trap.
Here’s an example:
“You don't need to sort through another pile of "qualified" resumes. You need three, maybe five strong Candidates. You don't just want talent. You need people who share your vision and will help you realize it.
You don't want a lot of "viable" options. You need people who will blend with your culture and add energy and value. You need people who routinely outperform their job descriptions. You need to find people who aren't looking for you.
You need professionals, not professional interviewers.”
This copy, taken from the home page of a magnetagency.net, was written by the Grok’s brilliant former editor, Robert Gorell. And overall, I like how it immediately addresses the “why do business with us” question; there’s no question that Robert is a good writer. But the consistent use of “you” bugs me.
I don’t like being told what I want, or think, or need. And it’s not just me, Most people don’t like web copy that presumes to “know” or “speak” for them. All of which is triggered by the repeated “You” statements.
See how much cleaner the copy reads with the “you” eliminated:
Stop sorting through piles of "qualified" resumes and the merely "viable" options.
Spend your time on the 3-5 strong candidates that matter; the people who will blend with your culture and routinely outperform their job descriptions.
We can help you find these people – the ones who aren't looking for you and who won’t show up in your pile of “usual suspects.”
So I replaced the explicit “You” with an implied “you” by using imperative verbs in the first two sentences. But the thing about those imperative verbs is that most people read them as offers rather than commands, so they come off as far more inviting (and less presumptuous) than the explicit you. It’s a trick similar to the one Jay McKinerney used in the first few lines of his novel Bright Lights, Big City:
IT’S SIX A.M. DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOU ARE?
“You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning. But here you are, and you cannot say that the terrain is entirely unfamiliar, although the details are fuzzy. You are at a nightclub talking to a girl with a shaved head. The club is either the Heartbreak or the Lizard Lounge. All might come clear if you could just slip into the bathroom and do a little more Bolivian Marching Powder. Then again, it might not. A small voice inside you insists that this epidemic lack of clarity is a result of too much of that already…” - Jay McInerney, Bright Lights, Big City
And here’s what Colleen Mariah Rae had to say about this brilliant opening in her book Movies in the Mind:
“With the choice of second person, McInerney brings the reader as close into the story as it’s possible to do…We’re not watching this character; we are this character. And notice how McInerney does this. He creates an alter ego for the reader: ‘You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning.’ Instead of triggering the usual “not me” reaction he would have gotten if he’d said, ‘Here you are; the club is either the Heartbreak or the Lizard Lounge,’ he lets the reader enter the story by saying, in essence, ‘In know you would never be here.’ It’s like having diplomatic immunity. You can say, do, think, feel, be anything you want because it’s not really you” [Bolding mine]
Did you get that? The “Not me reaction” that’s triggered by too directly or presumptuously using “You.”
Ms. Rae is right: McInerney softened it just enough to avoid the reaction. And the same can be said for dropping the presumptuous “You” in Robert’s copy in favor of more friendly imperative verbs: it softens the messaging just enough to get around the “Not me” reaction.
I’m concerned that you have yet to fully realize that focusing on the female customer is not a fad.
It’s not going to dissolve into the ether like past eras of marketing buzz, where moving from target to target was the strategy du jour.
You really need to get this through your noggin.
The power of the female customer will not only influence how you market this year and next; it will define your business and marketing strategies for at least the first few decades of the 21st century.
That is, if you want to have a business that not only survives, but thrives.
So smartass, you may say. Who endowed you with the crystal ball to predict the future?
No one. You could come up with the answer as easily as I could, if you only looked closely enough at the patterns drawn by history - patterns that mark our paths and shape our society.
If you look back over the last century, there have been three historic milestones or “waves” for American women, based on the confluence of three critical elements:
The role of women in society at a given time
The banding together of women in a concerted effort to make their voices heard
The emergence of a new form of communication technology
In 1920, women gained the right to vote for the first time after declaring their intent to fight for equal rights. It had taken 54 years of marching, protesting and imprisonment to finally triumph. So what was the tipping point for this First Wave of feminism? Communication to the masses through the power of the press and by means of the newest invention in the home - the telephone.
In 1963 Betty Friedan sent tremors through society with The Feminine Mystique, a scathing analysis of the role of women in 1960s America. Overnight, the country experienced a Second Wave of feminism. The call demanding equal opportunity in education and jobs spread like wildfire, thanks to images of female protestors and bra burners that flickered on nightly television newscasts.
Jump ahead another forty years to current day. A Third Wave rebellion is under way, and today’s female consumer is swinging her purchasing power around like David’s slingshot, aimed directly at the Goliath of traditional advertising and marketing.
Women are calling for recognition in the form of consumer parity. They want to be acknowledged as an individual consumers with individual needs, rather than anonymous members of the female demographic. “I know I’m a woman,” she’s saying. “But I’m not like every other woman. Would you please start speaking to me about what matters to me?”
What’s causing this Third Wave of feminism to spread at an epidemic rate? The emergence of the newest form of communication technology - the Internet.
Women are devoting more and more of their highly valuable time to researching, reaching out, and shopping online. It fits their multitasking lifestyle perfectly, with instant access to products, services, and each other - completing a full circle in the purchasing and influencing process.
Technology has made women the mainstream customer base of today and tomorrow. And it’s not going away.
Get used to it.
The Third Wave is on the rise. Will you watch it roll by, or will you seize the moment, hanging ten on the cutting edge of the future?
While Holly and I have written about how we are not amused
at sitcoms or advertising campaigns that set out to stereotype men as bumbling
dolts who couldn’t put their socks on in the morning if their life depended on
it, once in awhile an ad comes along that rings the bell without being
offensive.
Just in time for holiday shopping, J.C Penney has launched
Beware of the Doghouse, a viral print and web campaign reminding men that diamonds
are a good choice for the woman they love.It’s a tongue-in-cheek look at the gifts than men sometimes buy that end
up landing them in the doghouse.
In other hands, this kind of messaging would be cliché and
holds the potential to be insulting to both genders.But Saatchi and Saatchi has created an effective mini-movie
that is entertaining, relatable, and strong from a viral standpoint.It will be interesting to see how this
campaign works for J.C. Penney.
You can watch it below, but I’d recommend going to the Beware the Doghouse website to watch the hi-def version. It's definitely worth it.
A few days ago, I wrote about the cultural sea change that’s just getting underway – a movement that will give female customers more power than ever.
The two areas I told you to put on your radar – technology and transparency – have already to come back to haunt Johnson & Johnson’s Motrin brand just this past week.
A new ad for Motrin talking directly to moms about the aches and pains of using a baby carrier has been soundly rejected by customers and has led to what amounts to a virtual uprising against the brand. While Motrin has pulled the ad from TV and its website, you can still find it on YouTube:
Whether or not you like the ad is not the point of this post. What IS important is that women around the globe made their voices heard through blogs and a blizzard of conversation on Twitter (you can read the tweets here). They were talking to each other rather than beating their heads against the monolithic wall of the Johnson & Johnson corporation. Social media tools brought the voices of unhappy consumers together at a decibel level that the company could not ignore. Technology is the marketing mouthpiece of the 21st century, and it has to be a two-way conversation.
Which leads me to the second “T” – transparency. Now, Johnson & Johnson is reacting to the situation in traditional, old-fashioned ways. They’re not being transparent or authentic enough in their response to consumers. Seth Godin wrote a great post today on this very newsworthy situation, and he says it better than I can – read his reaction here.
This is the just the first of what I know will be hundreds of examples of the female customer staking her claim in the new era of business. Noted bloggers like Queen of Spain won’t let this drop, and neither will I because in the end, it’s for your own good. To succeed in 21st century business, you’re going to have pony up big time – your reputation and revenue depend on it.
Meet Jeff Sexton, one of the brainiest men I've ever met who also happens to be one of my Wizard of Ads partners. Jeff is today's guest blogger, on a topic that hits home when it comes to what advertising will look like in the coming decade. Read on and you'll see why I'm so lucky to float in his orbit. And for some other mind-blowing posts, check him out at GrokDotCom. Welcome, Jeff!
An Interesting Look at a New Style of Celebrity Ad By Jeff Sexton
Before this, I’d never seen a Celebrity ad that wasn’t either an explicitly stated or implied endorsement.
You know: something along the lines of “Hi, I’m Tiger Woods and I drive a Buick [because **cough*** that’s what I’d naturally pick to drive even if I wasn’t being paid enormous amounts of money to do so ***cough***].”
Or something “lower key” like a picture of Pierce Brosnan wearing an Omega dive watch, and the ad itself utterly without any kind of explicit claims but implying something along the lines of “masculine manly-men like James Bond wear Omega watches, and you can show [or get] your he-man qualities by doing the same.”
This ad was different. Take a look:
This is the first ad I’ve ever seen where the celebrity was nothing more than a reality hook. Sure, one can’t help but seeing Beckham amidst the sea of copy surrounding him. But the ad is for a Sharpie pen, and Beckham is neither using the pen nor explicitly endorsing it.
Placed in a women’s magazine, the ad does nothing more than refer to Beckham as what he obviously is, a male sex symbol. And then it uses that shared reality to poke fun of the reader for reading the ad copy about the Sharpie pen instead of enjoying the picture of Beckham.
That’s it. No endorsement. Just a way to grab the reader's attention while connecting with her (through a humorous reality hook) and to very subtly make the message seem more important than it is – because it has to be pretty important if she’ll ignore Beckham’s picture to read it, right?
Genius.
But more than that, too. This ad talks to you like a friend; it borrows the language of intimacy and uses it brilliantly.
And it does all that while expressing a profound shift in societal values from an Idealist generation to a Civic one. So if you haven’t read Roy Williams explanation of this phenomenon – of how 2003-2008 was a societal tipping point equal that of 1963-1968 - then go read those memos now.
In terms of the ad, the Civic outlook approaches Celebrity differently. Celebrities aren’t idolized. They’re not larger than life. And no, their appearance in an ad doesn’t contain magical powers that they can be transferred onto the product.
In a Civic Generation, celebrities just acknowledged for what they are: famous for something. Beckham is famous as a Soccer player, but even more so as a sex symbol. So the ad simply acknowledges that. To do otherwise would be passé, and so NOT ‘keepin’ it real.’
Is your marketing in touch with this societal shift? Are you using the language of intimacy and keepin’ it real?
I do a lot of radio interviews, and I have to say that this one was one of the best by far. I spent 90 rapid-pace minutes with Zane from ZaneSafrit.com, discussing everything from tips on connecting with the female customer to my rants on General Motors' and Revlon's big-time drop of the marketing ball.
Zane is a natural interviewer because he's a great conversationalist. You can listen to the interview here, or check out his channel to download the interview for listening on your player of choice. I had a great time and look forward to our next interview together.
The morning of November 5, 2008 I was in the middle of an email exchange with my publishing think tank about tweaking the editorial direction of my next book, when a remark made by one of my (male) colleagues struck me as very prescient:
“Now that we have an African-American president, maybe America is ready to consider the fact that women are essential to the American economy, both as workers and as consumers, and embrace the different perspective women bring. In short, I believe America can be feminized without becoming ‘feminist.’”
No matter which candidate you voted for, the election of Barack Obama as president signals what future historians will call a massive change in the cultural and societal ideals of the United States. Just as Roy H. Williams predicted back in 2004, the pendulum has begun to swing back toward a “civic” generation mentality.
I would take it one step further – the pendulum is swinging back toward the feminine side of our society. The inclusive ideology of “we the people” is based on connection and a big-picture view of the world – a very right-brained way of thinking that is predominantly feminine.
The presidential election was just the first ripple in a sea change of perspective, and it will impact your business in ways you never dreamed, because now women are more important than ever. In fact, the satisfaction and happiness of your female customers and employees may very well be the deciding factor in whether or not your business survives our current economic crisis.
56% of American women voted for Barack Obama, compared to John McCain’s 43%. Here are just two underlying factors in the Obama campaign’s strategy that not only helped to attract female voters, but also foretell the future of what women will be looking for when determining whether or not to do business with you:
Technology
The Internet became the soapbox of the 21st century in the 2008 election, not just for the candidate, but for supporters as well. For the first time, voters were having multi-faceted conversations with campaign staff and other supporters. The creation of a Facebook-type social network meant that every individual had the opportunity to create a customized “My Obama” page where they could do things like track donations, sign up for phone banks, blog, and create events. It’s estimated than 200,000 campaign events were created by My Obama website users. Millions of supporters connected with each other and created a viral campaign that changed the face of American society.
So, no more sticking your head in the sand – it is imperative that your business utilize technology as a tool for communicating with your customers and employees through dialogue, not monologue. Don’t have a website? Better get one. Have a website? Probably not good enough. Women, through a desire for connection and communication, will be demanding to have conversations with the brands they choose, and will want to customize their experience with you as much as possible. Time for reading newspapers and magazines, and sitting down to watch TV are on the decline; time for research, personalized shopping experiences and conversation through Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter are on the rise. Forward-thinking uses of technology will have to become an important part of your marketing budget.
Transparency
The Obama campaign’s “open conversation” model was successful due in part to a promise made to voters that the campaign would be as transparent as possible. When controversial decisions were made (such as Obama’s decision to decline public campaign financing), the news and reasoning were presented to voters through emails and videos. Action was proactive, not reactive. Whether or not supporters agreed with a decision, they still felt plugged in directly to the central source. And it didn’t take a high-end video with a flag waving in the background; it was not uncommon to receive an email from David Plouffe that he’d just recorded on his web cam, sitting at his computer in shirt and jeans.
Now, president-elect Obama has launched a new website, www.change.gov, which aims for the same level of transparency with all U.S. citizens. While still in its infancy, it has the potential to become a one-stop system of communication with all members of government that until now, voters could only dream about.
With four times as many connections between the left and right hemispheres of the brain, a woman’s BS meter is in hyper-drive, so authenticity and transparency are key to making the connection with another individual, a political campaign, or a brand. The more she can “see you real” as a consumer, the more she’ll love you (warts and all). And the more transparent you are with your female employees, the more confidence they have in their employer, leading to ironclad loyalty.
In the next three to five years, the traditional top-down, hierarchical, whisper-campaign way of doing business will have to change. Those that continue down this road will simply dissolve into the ether; companies that suck it up and embrace truthfulness and humility will experience tremendous profit.
Change is here, and it’s just the beginning. A word to the wise: the very existence of your business depends on whether or not you choose to evolve with the world and that which makes it spin. It’s the business challenge of the 21st century – what an exciting time. The only question that remains, is, how will you make history?
Lisa Hoffman just posted an excellent piece on her blog, News Media Lisa, about how her mother was tricked for giving treats on Halloween, all in the name of Avon.
Note to Readers:Be sure to catch the WonderCast of this blog post by clicking on the video at the bottom of the post!
In our recent post on female energy, we took a look at how different kinds of “fuel” are required to keep a woman’s human operating system hitting on all cylinders. Women draw on energy from different sources, both internal and external, which means that you need to deliver your message from two different perspectives at all times in order to make sure you’re tapping directly into the pipeline of her neurons and planting your brand directly into her brain.
But planting a brand is one thing; having the patience to let the seed bloom is another.
Here’s where the other critical factor of the female purchasing process kicks in – her time horizon.
Where she gets her energy, combined with her outlook on life, gives you the underlying framework you need in order to build an effective, profitable marketing strategy. It will affect every part of your business, from planning to copywriting to customer service.
A woman’s time horizon is the linchpin of life; it’s the lens through which she looks in order to gauge the effectiveness of the decisions she makes.
One woman may lean toward living “in the moment,” making decisions that to some might seem impulsive but to her are based on a philosophy that the road of life is short. Her mantra is “Carpe diem, baby!”
Another woman’s decision may be influenced by an outlook that this world of ours is bigger than we’ll ever comprehend. For her, it’s important to plant seeds of love and hope that may never bloom in her lifetime.
So while our “In the Moment” gal believes that life is an adventure and should be traversed in a red convertible Mustang, our “Leave a Legacy” female desires to make a minute dent in the global warming crisis, so she drives a Prius. Neither choice is right or wrong; it’s simply a preference that highlights another essential difference in the way female customers make purchasing decisions.
Time, like female energy, knows nothing of age, income or lifestyle demographics – but its function is critical when it comes to determining your brand’s importance in her life.
Start thinking about the women in your life and their own time horizons. Is there a way you can fuel the different energy needs of your female customers and position your product or service in ways that match their varying time horizons? Definitely. But we’ll have to leave that for next time.
Stay tuned to WonderBranding.com for future posts on the four strategic profiles of female customers and ways to deliver your brand message for powerful profit.
I don’t blame Sarah Palin for wanting to wear those fancy, go-to-meetin’ duds she’s been sporting on the campaign trail since her VP nomination. Hell, if I had someone who offered to drop $150,000 on me at places like Saks Fifth Avenue, I’d give it serious consideration as well.
But not if I were running for Vice-President of these here United States (even if campaign headquarters insisted), and especially not if my whole persona had been built on the foundation of being “a simple Hockey Mom, toughing it out every day just like you.”
Those female supporters who saw themselves reflected in Palin’s eyes assumed that when she said, “Hockey Mom,” it meant that she ascribed to a particular set of values. Whether or not those values exist in reality doesn’t matter - they exist in the minds of the voters.
Toughing it out. Keeping it together. Making ends meet.
Kind of hard to keep saying that when you’ve been dressed by Neiman Marcus on the donations of GOP voters, many of whom live in rural, wholesome blue-collar regions and lie in bed at night praying that they’ll have a job to go to tomorrow.
Words are powerful motivators. But in the end, it’s the deeds that are the measure of anyone, male or female.
Note to Readers:Be sure to catch the WonderCast of this blog post by clicking on the video at the bottom of the post!
Because a woman has four times the number of connections between the left and right hemispheres of the brain than a man, your female customer’s “human operating system” functions more like a web than a railroad track.
Her brain takes in millions of signals and continuously works to recognize patterns; it then builds networks of those patterns in order to make decisions, strengthen relationships, and devise solutions to everyday challenges. Connection, both human-based and information-based, affects everything in her life, including her purchasing process.
An enormous amount of energy is required in order to keep your female customer’s operating system performing at an optimum level day-in and day-out. Where does that energy come from? The answer will differ depending on which woman you are talking to. There is an important, essential difference in how women make purchasing decisions.
For a system to produce energy, it needs the right kind of fuel. And different women are “fueled” from different sources.
One woman may draw on external sources of energy to feel connected; she relies on stimuli from the outside world (such as interacting with groups of people) to charge herself up and get what she needs to make it through the day.
At the other end of the spectrum, you’ll find a woman who draws on internal sources (like inner thoughts and feelings) for the energy she needs. She looks inward for guidance and generates energy through the time she spends thinking and mulling things over.
Therefore, a group of female customers may all come to the same decision to do business with you using completely different pathways.
Are you delivering your brand message and product information in ways that compel both types of energies to do business with you?
Here are just a couple of examples:
Surfing vs Dialing Did you know that one of the biggest reasons you may be missing out on website revenue is that you don’t provide your phone number on the home page?
There’s a large segment of “external energy” customers who, when they have a question, want to pick up the phone and speak to someone. They need that energy charge that comes from connecting with a human being, which cements the sale. For example, take a look at the home pages for Home Shopping Network and QVC. It’s no surprise that QVC has a much higher rate of converting website visitors to customers – their phone number is on the home page.
Discounting the Ruminator Too often, in-store sales staff write off the customer who says she’s “just looking.” It should actually be a clue that she may rely on internal energy to turn things over in her mind for awhile before deciding to make a purchase.
Are you letting her walk away? Wouldn’t it be better to have a printed piece on your product or service that gives her a little more information and fills some of the gaps her brain will encounter when determining whether you’re the brand for her?
By delivering information to a female customer in the way she needs to see or hear it, you’ll be taking an excellent first step toward creating rock-solid brand loyalty. Remember: she needs premium fuel to charge up enough energy to do business with you. It’s up to you to make sure you’re putting the right kind of tiger in her tank!
Stay tuned to WonderBranding.com for future posts on the other essential difference in female consumers: her time horizon.
Note to Readers:Be sure to catch the WonderCast of this blog post by clicking on the video at the bottom of the post!
I recently received a package from my father stuffed with family mementos that go as far back as the late 1800s. Amongst the memorabilia, tucked in between a sepia portrait of my great-grandfather posing with a pack animal in Colorado and a black-and-white candid of my father in 1950s Paris, were photographs of Madeline and Olive
Madeline was my grandmother and Olive was her older sister. Born around the turn of the 20th century, Madeline and Olive lived near each other for much of their lives, often times in the same zip code. As adults, their incomes were similar – sometimes, they had an adequate bank balance; other times, they were as poor as dirt. They each owned their own homes, raised families, and drove large American cars. But never were two sisters more different.
Madeline was quiet and introspective; a chronic illness since childhood had left her physically frail. She married young and worked on the family farm, taking waitress jobs when her health would allow. She adored her sons, never missed an episode of The Ed Sullivan Show, and enjoyed long car rides in the country most Sunday afternoons after church.
“Moxie” should have been Olive’s middle name. A single mother at the age of 16, Olive was hell-bent on providing for herself at a time when job opportunities for women were scarce. She was a secretary, an organist in silent movie theaters, and a registered nurse. She was married several times (that we know of), including one marriage in the 1920s to a Chicago gangster. She swore like a sailor, sipped tea like a princess, and drove like a maniac. Till the day she died at the age of 89, she was, as she liked to put it, “her own woman, damn it.”
Madeline and Olive were as close as two sisters could be, but polar opposites in personality. The everyday choices they made, so different from each other’s, were based not on where they lived, how much money they made, or which car they drove. Yet advertisers expected Madeline and Olive to both respond exactly the same way to marketing messages based solely on their “demographics.”
When it comes to really understanding female customers, many businesses try to sail an ocean that’s vast and deep by relying on a rickety raft constructed from generalizations. They believe that what I call the Rule of Resemblance – targeting women by age, income, lifestyle category, or zip code –is their mainsail, when more often than not, it’s the anchor that prevents them from getting where they need to go. The Rule of Resemblance strategy usually results in weak response and low (if any) return on investment.
Here’s why the Rule of Resemblance fails:
1. It says that given the same external factors, all women respond equally. Focusing solely on external circumstances like zip code, income, or age ignores a very important factor in the marketing equation – the internal value system of the individual. The Rule of Resemblance creates an inflated sense of overlap between external characteristics, giving you the false assertion that if a woman lives in a targeted zip code, then she also makes a designated income, enjoys a particular lifestyle, and (even more dangerous) lives by a specific code of internal values. Try placing twelve women from the same zip code (even the same city block) in a room and see if their personal values aren’t wildly different from each other’s. Values, or the chosen ideals a woman lives by everyday, are what brand decisions are based on - not address or income.
2. It assumes that every woman has the same time horizon. As a business owner, your goal is to make money today - but that doesn’t mean a woman is ready to buy at the precise moment you’re ready to sell. To her, time is more than a date on the calendar; it’s also the lens through which she views her outlook on life. That view may be short-term (“living in the moment”), long-term (“making a difference for the future”), or somewhere in between. Each decision a woman makes is held up to her personal time horizon to see if it fits, and if so, where. Time knows nothing about age, income, or lifestyle demographics, but its function is critical when it comes to determining your importance in her life.
If you’ve been relying on the Rule of Resemblance, don’t be too hard on yourself. You worked hard with the information you were given. The main reason the Rule of Resemblance doesn’t work is that it has never accounted for the most important part of a woman – what’s inside.
Attracting women, both as loyal customers and motivated employees, gets more difficult with each passing day. It’s up to you to shed the rules of the past and embrace the truth of the future: that the sisterhood of female customers is based not on a world of similarity, but rather a universe of individuality.
What will it take? For starters, exploration into the unknown regions of the female values system. Understanding of how her time horizon affects every purchase she makes. Development of in-depth customer profiles. And creation of various dialects in the language of marketing that will speak directly to the hearts of different female customers.
No one said this business of sisterhood was easy. But stick with me, and we’ll make it more profitable than you can imagine. Stay tuned to WonderBranding.com for future posts on female values, her time horizon, creation of customer profiles, and how to speak her language.
Note to readers:If you like what you read here and want to share this info with someone you know, be sure to check out our new WonderCasts – short video podcasts of some of the posts on WonderBranding.com. WonderCasts are perfect for those who prefer video or want an audio complement to what they read here. The first in the series is below – enjoy!
With a brain that’s structured for massive signal input and a pair of eyes that possess the peripheral vision of Wonder Woman, the female customer can’t help but absorb visual cues that affect how she feels about your business.
These optic bits are automatically catalogued in her brain, directly into a file folder with your name on it. They are the subliminal puzzle pieces that validate her decision about whether or not she wants to be your customer.
What do her eyes register when she encounters your place of business? To name a few:
Signage from the road
Width of parking spaces
Cracks in the sidewalk
Landscaping
Fingerprints on the glass entry door
Stains on the carpet
Color of the walls
Lighting in the store and showcases
Dusty furniture
Signage in the departments
Width of the aisles
Arrangement of product displays
Proximity of sales staff
Her eyes are working overtime, and all of those incoming signals can be pretty steep competition if you’re trying to get her attention. By eliminating as many negative visual cues as you can up front, you will help her mind relax, focus on the task at hand, and be more open to developing an ongoing customer relationship with you.
Just being aware of a woman’s big-picture perspective will make you a more successful business owner.
What kind of visual cues does your business emit? Go to the freebie section of WonderBranding.com and download the FREE “Quick Visual Checklist” to get a head start on rating how well you communicate with your female customers on a visual level. A few improvements could mean a pocket full of profit!
This workshop is two jam-packed days of studying the topic of marketing to women from a perspective you won’t get anywhere else. Forget traditional strategies and demographics – we focus on what goes on inside the female customer’s mind. It’s a highly-interactive workshop, where students help each other as much as I help them.
By the time you leave Austin, you’ll know more about the science and art of persuading female customers to do business with you than any of your competitors. You’ll possess a new methodology for growing your business even in the rockiest of economies.
The cost of tuition includes your own private room in the oh-so-beautiful Englebrecht House and an amazing array of food and drink. Trust me – we know how to take care of our visitors.
Will you join me this Halloween? Do you have what it takes to make your business better?
Last Friday, John McCain anointed Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his running mate for the 2008 presidential election.
Right on schedule, the emails and phone calls started pouring into my office, most of them assuming that I was excited to the point of hysteria because a woman had been named to the ticket.
That made me smile.
It also happened with Hillary Clinton. People assumed that I supported her campaign and would vote for her in the primaries.
I didn’t.
Last Friday, people believed I would be thrilled that McCain had named a woman to be his vice-presidential candidate. They predicted it would influence my personal choice for president.
It didn’t.
Being a woman, a marketing professional and the co-author of a book on the female customer has very little to do with who I vote for or which candidate I support.
I am not swayed personally by what I view with an objective, professional eye.
I do not vote for someone based on the color of their skin or the structure of their chromosomes. I vote for the candidate who shows the greatest promise of leadership.
I do not vote for a woman because I think she typifies what society calls a good mother. I vote for the candidate who exemplifies the characteristics of a great parent.
Neither my age nor a candidate’s age will dictate my vote. I vote for the platform that best represents the ideals I grew up with and embrace. In 2008, the word 'generation' does not equal 'age.' Today, 'generation' is defined by the flower children of the 1960s and the college students of today who share a vision for future beyond themselves. It is equally defined by the children of both post-World War II and the 1980s who believe in individuality and the power of self-determination. The future knows nothing of age, only the lens through which it is viewed.
I do not vote based on the influence of traditional media. Through the Internet, I am connected with men and women around the world, most of whom I’ll never meet. They have voices and opinions and stories that resonate with me and have an impact on my perspective. My brain is wired for the real, authentic stories of others, not the bits and bites force-fed to me through newspaper reports and television anchors. I am not persuaded by typical polls and surveys that still rely on calling landline phones when many people under the age of 30 will never have one, and that even with a margin of error cannot equal the honesty and anonymity that an Internet survey would provide.
The message of each candidate is valid in its own right. One candidate rallies with “country first.” The other proclaims, “This campaign was never about me; it’s about you.”
I will choose to pour my hope into that message which best connects with my individual needs and desires – that which will not only benefit me, but my family, my friends, and my country. Every other woman in America will do the same; their vote may not be the same as mine, but it definitely won't be based the female stereotypes of yesterday.
To both parties: I think that female voters just may surprise you come November.
Uncle Kevin needs you, Mom! Remember our friend Kevin Burke, who wore the pregnancy suit for a month in order to better understand what moms-to-be go through? His company, Lucid Marketing, is now conducting a survey of moms to see what really reaches them when it comes to marketing. Take the survey and do good at the same time – for every 10 people who take the survey, Lucid will donate $5 to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
Chico’s Hits Marketing Gold with Phelps: Not Michael, but his mother, Debbie. Check out this USA Today article on how Debbie Phelps’ love for Chico’s clothing gained mucho attention for the brand and just may have scored her a celebrity endorsement deal.
Best Buy Cries WoLF: Finally, consumer electronics retailers are waking up when it comes to what women want – more female salespeople. The Boston Herald reports on Best Buy’s Women Leadership Forum (WoLF), a group of employees who are working to make the customer experience better for their majority market – women.
There is one sure-fire way to drive my husband nuts – ask him the following question:
“Do you smell that?”
He is instantly on alert, sniffing and scrambling like a Jack Russell Terrier on the hunt for a rawhide chewy. He goes crazy trying to detect the smell while I describe the particular components of the odor. “It’s like a fried egg with a hint of cinnamon, wrapped in a bouquet of kitchen cleanser.” Inevitably, my husband gives up the chase, convinced that no such smell exists and I’m one cupcake shy of a full dozen.
Actually, I’m not (at least where smell is concerned). Studies like a recent one conducted at Cardiff University report that when it comes to odor detection, women have a much more elaborate sense of smell thanks to elevated levels of estrogen in the body. And not only do women have a heightened sense of smell: MRIs show that women link those smells to emotion, storing those feelings in the right brain of emotional and long-term memory.
What kind of smells does your retail location or office expend?
If it’s moldy, you’re in trouble; likewise, any one of myriad odors can trigger the “don’t feel good about this business” button in a female customer. Realtors have known about the importance of smell for years – just visit any open house on a Sunday afternoon and you’re likely to encounter a warm batch of chocolate chip cookies on the kitchen counter.
Consider taking a group of women through your location and have them tell you what they smell (it won’t work to do it yourself, even if you’re a woman – your nose is too familiar what it encounters everyday). Then, determine what you can do to improve it. But be careful – don’t make things too “sterile.” I once had a pet-store client that was so focused on the cleanliness of the store that it smelled like a medical facility. We had to introduce a new smell (cedar) to subliminally change the customer’s perception.
The nose knows… what would her nose tell her about you?
In the summer heat of Arizona, you live and die by the almighty swimming pool. The blazing desert sun delivers a whallop to outdoor pool equipment systems, so in the greater metropolitan Phoenix Valley (population: a smidge under 4 million), the care and maintenance of pools is a good business to be in.
There’s heavy competition, though – today, literally hundreds of pool care companies (many of them one-man operations) exist in the valley. Anyone with a basic knowledge of water chemistry and pool equipment can make a decent living.
So, how can a company set itself apart? By choosing One Little Thing that will make a big impact. Jason at Evolution Pools realized that early on, and his business is growing by leaps and bounds.
When you call Evolution Pool Repair, you’re assured of talking directly with Jason, the owner. Leave a message, and he’ll call you back within two hours. He sets the appointment, gives you a window of time for the service call, and then calls again to confirm the night before the appointment.
That’s nice and all, but then he unloads his One Little Thing: he narrows the window of time in which he’ll make his appearance.
For example, the first time we hired Jason, he told me he’d be by sometime between 9a.m. and noon. The night before the appointment, he called and informed me it would actually be between 10:30 and noon. And he delivered. He always does.
His One Little Thing is to operate at maximum efficiency; he has developed his own personal system of time tracking so that he can narrow down the appointment time and beat the negative stereotype of “the repair guy who never shows up when he says he will.”
With that One Little Thing, Jason gave me 90 minutes of my life back and strengthened the trust I have in his services. Having originally found him through our home warranty company, we now call him for all of our pool needs, whether the equipment is covered under warranty or not. Jason has made hundreds (or is that thousands?) of dollars from our account alone, simply because of his consideration for the customer’s time. I’ve also referred a number of neighbors.
Jason has made his business boom, without spending a penny on advertising.
You don’t need circus tents and balloons to make an impact on a customer, and if you’re a one-man operation, you can’t always overachieve the way One Hour Heating and Air Conditioning does. But you can still make your mark by choosing One Little Thing, refining your system, and delivering on your promise every time.
What One Little Thing can you do that will have customers telling your story to everyone they know?
It was a subtle rumbling of the earth, a shifting of perspective.
I think it could mean the death of marketing to women.
Not that that’s a bad thing.
In recent weeks, a number of my blogger and professional colleagues have been writing and dialoguing about marketing to women and what it really means. Some feel that the term “marketing to women” is too broad a moniker for such a dynamic demographic; that it demeans an important arena in the marketing industry. Others believe that businesses should focus solely on the female market, since that’s “where the money is.” And still others claim that marketing according to gender is ridiculous; smart marketing is smart marketing and will have broad-based appeal no matter whether you’re a man or a woman.
When these folks talk I listen, because they are very smart, bold, and specialize in the topic at hand.
But just because I listen doesn’t mean I have to agree.
I’ve been chewing on these conversations for a while now, and my conclusions have compelled me to begin making some changes of my own:
1. I believe that the female customer is the most important customer you’ll see in your lifetime. Does smart marketing attract both genders? Yes. But should there be differences in how you approach women? You bet your sweet bippy. Between gender differences in brain wiring, response time of the five senses, and brain-based communication style, there’s no doubt in my mind that your campaign strategy, message, and in-store experience has to be developed specifically with women in mind.
2. I think the reason that “marketing to women” hasn’t been embraced on a wider scale (and why M2W books don’t sell all that well) isn’t because the term is too demographically broad, but because it’s too soft. It’s a feminine-based language style that takes a critically important business idea and softens the edges till they’re melting off the page. There’s lack of definition, which is tough to tackle in a left-brain, gimme-lists-and-bullet-points world. The best books, blogs, and articles on the topic have all been written by women from a right brain, “big picture” perspective that is just too amorphous for the general population. (Yes, I’m one of them.)
I’m currently hard at work on my next book (for Bard Press) and have been conducting some experiments over the last few weeks with writing style, leaning a little more toward left brain, analytical writing (like here and here). Between comments, emails, and syndication of the posts, it’s clear that information delivered in a more concrete, analytical style gets a huge response. You have spoken loud and clear – while I may occasionally falter and fall back into oogly-googly-isn’t-the-universe-grand language, I promise to quickly snap out of it.
3. It’s the female customer, stupid… not the women’s market. Again, I’m guilty as charged. We need to peel some layers off of this behemoth and get down to where we need to be – the individual female customer. Holly and I spent an entire book blowing up the myth of the Soccer Mom and detailing the how-to’s of understanding women from the inside out. It’s time I started talking about the female customer as an individual rather than a member of a grandiose, impossible-to-understand demographic.
That said, I am in the midst of transitioning my old website to act as a combination blog and information site for readers, which you can find here. I hesitate to send you over there just yet because the design isn’t quite finished, but screw it. One of the first changes you’ll see is in the header:
If I do keep the term “marketing to women” on the site from time to time, it will only be for search engine purposes (it’s a very popular search term and I’m not that stupid as to reject it altogether!). But know that my intentions are to focus on the female customer, with a little extra marketing news thrown in from time to time.
Rest in peace, marketing to women. Long live the female customer.
Congratulations to Chris, Megan, Kimberly, and Chuck, who correctly answered yesterday's trivia question. George Carlin, who we lost this past Sunday, was the first host of "Saturday Night Live" in 1975.
I'm giving away FOUR, not three books, since a) these are the folks that followed directions and commented rather than emailing me; and b) Chuck, who was the fourth, left a funny comment that deserved a prize. Please email me your postal addresses and I'll get a copy of The Soccer Mom Myth out to you next week.
George Carlin was a master of the English language and inspired awe in anyone who also loves the language. He could riff with words like Charlie Parker on a saxophone, and often brought me to tears (laughing, not crying) with his takes on politics, religion, and life in general. He was quite often bawdy (to put it mildly) and could poke sore spots in all of us, but always with the goal of reminding us that even the best parts of life can often be ridiculous.
For your viewing pleasure: George Carlin, with his G-rated routine "Baseball vs. Football."
Quick trivia question: Who was the very first host of "Saturday Night Live"... ???
This is an easy one (almost a gimme). First three people who comment here with the right answer will receive a copy of The Soccer Mom Myth (I know, I know... shameless plug).
There are things I love about European advertising, not the least of which is their total lack of prudishness (is that a real word?) when it comes to the human anatomy and joy of sex.
This is Wonderbra's newest TV ad in the UK - a casting call for "real women" (hello, Dove?) to participate in their upcoming campaign. (RSS readers can watch the video here.)
This is refreshing, considering the hoo-hah that ensued in the U.S. over these Dove ads of older women.
Leaning into the open refrigerator, your mother senses you reaching for crumbs of the chocolate chip cookies that are cooling on the kitchen counter and reminds you not to spoil your dinner. Reading a magazine in the family room, she homes in on the moment you are about to deliver a super-sized nuggie attack on your whiny little brother and without turning around, issues the let-go-of-your-brother-this-instant-or-you’ll-hurt-his-neck-and-then-you-can-
tell-your-father-all-about-it-when-he-gets-home command.
Wow. What is this amazing power that gives a mommy eyes in the back of her head?
Is it estrogen?
Was she struck by lightning?
Has she fallen victim to an alien invasion of talking walnuts?
No. It’s simply that vision is in the eye of the beholder. Not only are women’s brains wired in a unique and wonderful way, so are their eyes.
Inside your eye, the retina is the component that allows you to gauge focus, light, and movement. Two important parts of the retina are cones and rods, which are connected.
The main job of the cones is to allow for focus (especially intense focus on one thing at a time), meaning greater depth perception.
The rods of the retina, being extremely sensitive to light, can detect the slightest movement in the visual field, meaning greater peripheral vision.
Guess which women have more of – cones or rods?
That’s right – rods. As a general rule, the female retina has more rods than that of the male, resulting in greater peripheral vision and the ability to see the “whole picture” all at once.
The way she sees has a big impact on the marketing and sales of your business:
1. She sees more than what’s in front of her. With a brain that’s structured on massive signal input and a pair of eyes that possess the peripheral vision of a superhero, she can’t help but absorb visual cues (often unconsciously) that affect how she feels about your business. Paint color, carpet stains, dusty furniture, cluttered back office (why did you leave that door open?) – these signals are registered in her brain, directly into the file drawer marked “Business X” (x = your name here).
2. Lighting can make or break you. Her heightened sensitivity to light means it is strongly connected with the emotional component of the right brain. The mood that lighting evokes can be one of her first evaluation points when trying to decide whether to do business with you. One of the best marketing investments you can make is to hire a lighting design expert to project the “personality” of your business through the right kind of illumination, thus increasing customer confidence.
3. She sees it written all over your face. As a salesperson, whatever you tell her better be honest and authentic because she doesn’t just depend on your words; to her, your facial expression is an open book. The rods in her retina not only detect subtle changes in light, but also in movement. The slightest hint of manipulation sends her BS meter into the red zone, an emotional reaction you don’t want placed in the file her brain is keeping on you.
4. You can help her focus. Just being aware of a woman’s big-picture perspective can make you a better salesperson. Once you have her attention and understand her specific needs, you then have an opportunity to provide momentary relief from the barrage of external noise she carries around by helping her focus on the task at hand.
The magical question for nearly every woman is, “May I explain a couple of details about this camera/automobile/garden hose/financial planning service and why I think it might be right for you?”
Show her that you understand her specific needs, offer her your undivided attention, and give her permission to shut out the rest of the world for a few seconds. She’ll be your customer forever.
Remember: The eyes play a critical role in the consumer decisions a woman makes. It’s up to you to persuade her to see you not only in the right light, but the spotlight.
Looking for a little action? How about two days in Music City, USA with fifteen of the smartest, most dynamic people you’ll ever meet?
Wizards on the Road is the first in a series of seminars presented by Wizard of Ads partners, August 1st and 2nd in Nashville. You’ll spend two full days at the gorgeous Sheraton Music City hotel and experience presentations on marketing and advertising that will help transform your business.
Get a load of this agenda:
Ray Seggern: How to Calculate Your Ad Budget & Buy Word-of-Mouth Mike Dandridge: How to Fight the Big Boys and Win Dave Young: Your Website: The Marketing Tool for the 21st Century Clay Campbell: Get Big Results from Small Ad Dollars Michele Miller: Hitting the Vein of Gold in Marketing to Women Tom Wanek: Signaling Theory: What Are You Really Saying to Your Customers? Chris Maddock: Ad Writing 101 Scott Fraser: The Commodity Revolution Peter Nevland: Thinking Outside the Box Michael Keesee: Marketing in 2008 and Beyond Rex Williams: Building Relationships Online Mike Drew: How to Become an Expert in Your Field Chuck McKay: Explode Your Advertising ROI Paul Boomer: 10 Things You Can Do NOW To Improve Your Website
Can you imagine what a seminar like this would normally set you back? Probably thousands of dollars. Here’s your opportunity to catch the inaugural seminar of the series, for only $199, . And if you need a hotel, rooms have been set aside at the cost of only $129 per night.
Learn more and register for the seminar here. This is going to be a doozy, and I guarantee that registration will sell out very quickly – we are limiting the registration to 200 seats.
While we’ve only scratched the surface of brain study, here’s one fact we do know: a woman’s brain has four times as many connections between the left and right hemispheres as that of a man’s.
Does this make women smarter or more superior than men? No.
Well, some women think it does. Okay a lot of women do, but usually only after a situation involving either a road map, a Christmas tree, or jalapeno peppers.
But I digress.
Here’s how the female brain connection should affect the marketing of your business:
1. The exponential increase in connection means that women take in that many times the number of signals through the brain. Now that’s a challenge for you, because it also means the filter she has in place to reject all of the world’s frippery is mighty ornery, like a curmudgeonly little troll standing between you and her “take action” button. The words you use in your advertising and the experience you create in your store have to be remarkable enough to penetrate that filter and plant themselves in the reward behavior area of her brain.
2. All of those incoming signals are hurtling down the express lane of a superhighway into her right brain - the home of emotional memory, intuition, and experience. She’s not only reading your advertising or web copy; she’s attaching feelings to it. One critical word can make the difference between driving her to flip the page or compelling her to pick up the phone and find out where your store is located.
3. Studies show that because of this brain wiring, women actually have a heightened sense of pain. She’s constantly comparing her current situation to folders in the right-brain file drawer of experience; not only does she pull up a memory, she re-enacts the feelings connected with it. And her emotional memory is so strong, she doesn’t even have to had the experience herself - all she has to do is hear the story from a friend or family member, and she stores it as thought it were her own.
Marketing to women doesn’t mean “color her female” – there’s an actual science to this stuff that should be mighty appealing to all you left-brain logical types out there. Hmmm. I foresee a series of posts on this…
