Do you have what it takes?

It’s time once again for the annual Halloween edition of the two-day WonderBranding: Marketing to Women seminar, set on the beautiful campus of Wizard Academy in Austin, Texas.

Costumes required, of course.

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 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.

I certainly hope you learn from it.

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 used to 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 9 a.m. and noon.  The night before the appointment, he called and informed me it would actually be between 10:30 a.m. and noon.  And he delivered.  He always does.

His One Little Thing is to operate at maximum efficiency; he has developed a 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, all who are women.

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?

Leave it to Melanie Notkin to uncover an untapped market of women – today is the official launch of SavvyAuntie.com, the website for “cool aunts, great aunts, godmothers, and all women who love kids.”

It’s a site devoted to strengthening the relationships women have with all the children in their lives (especially if they don’t have children of their own), and approaches female online interaction in a way that’s fun, colorful, dynamic, and informative. Melanie and her team have thought of just about everything – from activities you can do with your favorite niece or nephew (even long-distance) to cool toys & games available for purchase, and a comprehensive forum for sharing stories and tips.

Be sure to check out SavvyAuntie.com, an outstanding example of world-class websites, and a place that might just fit the bill for all you aunties out there!

Have you registered for the Wizards on the Road seminar in Nashville yet? The seats are being snapped up left and right - don’t miss your chance to witness the brilliance of my partners on August 1st and 2nd. Oh yes… and I’ll be there, too. 

Did you feel that?

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 this website to act as a combination blog and information site for readers.  I hesitate to have you look at it 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."

We’ll miss you, George.

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).