A View thru the Windshield of Life

This is what you get when you attempt to take a cell phone photo while driving (click on photo to enlarge).  Those damned inspection stickers just get in the way.

At first, what intrigued me about this little white VW bug was the bumper sticker that read, "Girls Who Don't Misbehave Rarely Make History."  I sped along to catch up and spied a young woman in her late twenties, dressed in office attire, singing along with the radio.  As she pulled away I just had to know... what kind of flower did she have in the Bug's vase?

No flower at all... it was an American flag.

So... into what kind of stereotypical marketing category would you try to pigeonhole this woman?  Is she a hippy?  Corporate wench?  Young college grad?  New mom?  Conservative... or liberal? 

The marketing world likes to create categories of customers in order to more narrowly define that amorphous group called Women.  But we're entering an age when those categories are beginning to break down, losing their power in the first stages of marketing entropy.  We still hear the term 'soccer mom' bandied about, but motherhood isn't what it was ten years ago.  Women are waiting longer to have children; some have big corporate careers while others work from home.  Motherhood is now an overlap of generations with different value systems... so who exactly is the 'soccer mom?'

Female consumers are beginning to say, "Enough already... time to recognize me as an indvidual, not by demographics but by what I carry around via the inner self." 

Have you taken a long, hard look at your current customer base lately?  Not from the perspective of zip codes and income but rather values and needs? 

Perhaps it's time to start looking for clues of value overlap among generations of women in order to see who your customers really are.  Begin comparing your customers by what they carry inside rather than what you see on the outside. 

It will be simpler to identify what your business offers that resonates with those women... and easier to create customers for life.

Comments

[Yvonne DiVita]

Very true, Michele. The trick is to know your women clients or customers, and to sell to them as if they matter. Not as if getting the sale is the only thing that counts, but as if the individual woman shopping at your place is your only client -- and meeting her needs is the first, best thing you can do.

Blogs are great tools for this. By reading Mommy bloggers and Daddy bloggers (yes, Dads have a say these days) you'll get more insight into women, both collectively and individually, than ever before. And, you'll have an opportunity to engage them in conversation.

So, what's not to like about that?

[Holly Buchanan]

I can just see this girl looking behind her and going - "Who's that crazy chick speeding after me trying to take my picture?"

I once had a friend totally irritated with me because I call myself a Democrat, but I share several beliefs that are traditionally touted by Republicans. He told me I could not be a Democrat.

women especially have skills to hold almost opposing beliefs at the same time. It confounds the hell out of advertisers and others who must label people in order to understand them.

Awesome post.

Holly