Marketing to Women
Bring Facebook shopping with you.
I stared at two pairs of wedges for about twenty minutes unable to decide which to buy until a woman came up behind me and said, “Definitely go with the yellow.” That’s exactly what I needed and what most women want while shopping - a reassurance that they are making the right decision.
Surprisingly, Facebook is here to help. According to Mashable, in Brazil, the social media powerhouse is unleashing a program that puts Facebook likes on the top of hangers in the fashion retail store, C&A. Every time someone likes a product in C&A’s online store, the number on the physical hanger goes up.
This is a win for all types of shoppers. If you want what’s popular, you can pick up a hanger with a ton of likes. If you like to be different, you can go for something with less online prevalence. You no longer have to feel anxious shopping on your own.
You can see social media being integrated into the real world all over the place now. There have been plenty of online campaigns where people vote online for a new clothing design and the winners are produced and sold. One of our favorite examples is Bobbi Brown bringing back lipstick shades on Facebook.
What do you think about social media entering your everyday world outside of the internet? Do you think this is an effective way to market to women or is Facebook out of place?
Innovative healthcare marketing example #12.
Memorial Hermann will be doing more than putting pins in patients today. They will be pinning a live brain tumor resection. Brain surgery on Pinterest? Yep. I'm not sure if it's the right social platform - it's not where I'd go to get up to speed on leading brain surgery centers - but it's certainly innovative. As is the hospital's social media machine. This Texas hospital performed the world's first live-tweeted open heart surgery a few weeks back. When this reaped 125 million views via Twitter, Storify and media coverage, they decided to go for it again. Adding in Pinterest.
Today's brain surgery will be performed by Dr. Dong Kim, the surgeon who operated on former congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords. While surgeries have been tweeted in the past, this will be the first to share the feed from the surgeon's fiber optic microscope. Real time pics and videos will be posted on Twitter, YouTube and Storify.
According to Nielson @Plan, homemakers index 204 on Pinterest, meaning they are 104 times more likely to be on this site. So Pinterest definitely reaches the female healthcare decisionmaker. But will she want to look at photos of brain surgery while hunting for recipes and fashion tips?
(Image from IdeaStream.com)
Time will tell. I think one thing's for sure. Memorial Hermann is living up to its themeline of "100 Years of Patient-Centered Care and Innovation." Not only with its team of expert docs, but its team of social media experts.
What do you think of surgeries on Pinterest? Is it over the top? Or is this hospital ahead of the curve?
Target does it again with The Shops.
You can probably tell that we’re big Target fans here at Brogan & Partners. Forgive me for visiting the subject once again, but Target keeps stepping up its game, especially when it comes to marketing to women. I just can’t ignore it.
Their latest bit of brilliance? The Shops at Target. These are five actual “Main Street” type of shops—from a Boston dog bakery to an Aspen cosmetics boutique—that will be reproduced in Target stores.
I can’t tell you yet if I love the shops themselves. They don’t debut until Sunday, May 6th, but I already know the online marketing is breaking new ground for the store.
While we’re accustomed to Target partnering with cool designers like Missoni and Dwell Studio, these lines’ online presence blends right into the rest of the Big Red Dog website.
The Shops part of the website, on the other hand, looks completely different.
It starts with a chic storefront window that you really want to peek through. Then the page for each shop features the brick-and-mortar version’s colors, fonts, and vibe. The page for the Miami clothing boutique, The Webster, for instance, is sexy and lit up in neon. Privet House’s page evokes the cozy Connecticut housewares store with a fresh, green color and a romantic tree.
Here’s the best part: there’s a short documentary film about each shop. The videos are sweet, slickly produced, accompanied by jaunty xylophone music, and narrated completely by the shops’ owners, with whom we’re on a first-name-only basis.
“When people walk into Target and see our collection,” says Diane, co-owner of The Candy Store, “you’re going to feel like you’ve walked into our small store in this little neighborhood in San Francisco.”
Her other half, Brian, adds, “We want to bring a little piece of the boutique experience to Target.”
In other words, Target is letting us know: We know you’d rather shop local. We know you’d rather have unique, boutique goods, rather than Big Box ones. We also know that’s hard to do if you live in a distant suburb or you don’t have the time or money for boutique browsing. So we’re giving you with the next best thing.
With their adorable online presentation at least, I think Target is doing a pretty good job of it.
What do you think of Target’s new marketing approach?
The changing face of Point-of-Purchase.
When I take my five-year-old to the local mall, he immediately starts begging to see the “pictures that move.” This technology, in which an image is projected onto the mall floor and changes as a user touches, jumps, or steps on it (imagine bubbles popping or butterflies flying away), has captivated a future shopper and given him a reward for joining mom at the mall.
Now, it looks like that technology (or similar) has entered the ranks of point-of-purchase. In a Mashable post by Lauren Indvik, we get a glimpse of how a retail signage company, Perch Interactive, is working to change the shopper’s experience at retail. Simply by picking up a product, a user will activate marketing messages and visuals that will help him imagine how the product will fit into his life. It’s gotten me thinking about how this experience might become personalized – could it sync up to social media, so you can “like” something from the sales floor (great way to build a Christmas list)? Or could it become a loyalty tactic – driving rewards for shoppers who spend time with products?
Maybe that is a lot to ask from some lights and projectors (forgive the understatement), but who knows what is possible? We’d love to hear what you think.
Sisterhood of the magical pants.
There are clothes I’ll keep forever for sentimental reasons, like my old sorority sweatshirt and the shoes I wore at my wedding.
And then, there are the clothes that seem to be a permanent possession because they just won’t wear out. I’m referring, of course, to my Lululemon yoga pants.
Those of you who’ve splurged on a pair of super-comfy Lululemons know what I’m talking about. You stretch and sweat in them, you wash them a gazillion times, and they continue to hold their shape (not to mention flatter your shape) and look brand new.
So I was fascinated—as both a marketing expert and a consumer—by this Wall Street Journal article about “Lululemon’s secret sauce.”
With some brands, the high quality of the clothes alone is enough to draw a loyal following. When Lulu added some savvy marketing to the mix, it turned their loyal following into a cult one, giving the company a market value of $10.4 billion last year.
A couple interesting bits of Lululemon wisdom:
- Don’t try to gloss over high prices with sales. Own the fact that high quality clothes are expensive and make that part of your caché. Lulu never discounts the prices on its staple items and rarely holds sales. According to the article, 95 percent of Lulu togs are sold at full price.
- Leave ’em wanting more: When Lulu introduces new styles or colors, they’re released in limited quantities. Customers know they’ve got to grab their goods quick before they’re gone. According to the WSJ piece, “a hot-pink color named ‘Paris Pink’ that launched in December was supposed to have a two-month life cycle but sold out its first week.”
- Pay close attention to consumer feedback and don’t be afraid to act on it. Lulu doesn’t punch focus-grouped data into a computer to make business decisions. Instead, they design the stores so that salespeople fold clothes right outside the dressing rooms—the better to eavesdrop on customers and learned what they really think. Sometimes it’s Lulu’s CEO, Christine Day, who’s listening in. Another great quote from the WSJ: “Ms. Day spends hours each week in Lulu stores observing how customers shop, listening to their complaints, and then using the feedback to tweak product and stores. ‘Big data gives you a false sense of security,’ says Ms. Day.”
I like the straightforward approach of Lulu’s marketing. It’s not right for every business or every product, but in the age of search engine optimization and algorithmic everything, it’s refreshing to see a business become hugely successful by kickin’ it old school.
What about you? Do you have more examples of successful companies who’ve ignored current marketing trends to do things their own way?
Women with marketing muscle.
Here are three things I’ve noticed lately:
- When I got my summer Athleta catalog in the mail, the swimsuit models were buff! We’re talking some seriously strapping beauties. Even the models who didn’t have obviously defined leg muscles or eight-pack abs looked strong and healthy, not to mention happy! There wasn’t a broody waif among them.
- While watching a recorded episode of The Good Wife the other night, I opted not to fast-forward through three Kohl’s commercials. Each featured Olympic athletes talking about the “sport of shopping.” Mia Hamm, Lindsey Vonn, and Dara Torres looked awesome as they riffed about the thrill of the score (of a fabulous leopard print bag) but they did not look like glamorous, otherworldly models. They looked strong, sporty, beautiful—and real.
- Jennifer Lawrence. Well, how can you not notice The Hunger Games star? Her image is everywhere to promote the blockbuster flick, which I loved seeing recently. The casting of Lawrence has gotten some criticism. Is she too robust and healthy-looking to play a character in a deprived dystopia? In my opinion, the answer is no, and not just because Lawrence is great in the film. It’s also because I love seeing a strong, muscular character played by a strong, muscular actress. If it was one of Hollywood’s many delicate, twiggy starlets saving the world from the evil Capitol, would you believe it? I’m not sure I would. Beyond the movie, I’m excited to see Lawrence—with her curvy figure and pretty, round face—on so many magazine covers. It shows women and girls that you don’t have to have razor-sharp cheekbones, bony arms, and a jutting jawline to be gorgeous.
In journalism, they say “three makes a trend.” If that’s the case, then using athletic, powerful women in marketing is officially a new trend. Let’s hope it sticks around. Not only do I love seeing these inspiring looks in the marketplace, I want my twelve-year-old daughter to take note, too.
Have you seen any marketing featuring strong women lately? Share in comments!
Dads gain bragging rights – on and off Facebook.
Dad’s around the U.S. aren’t just stepping up to the plate when it comes to grocery shopping and diaper changing, they’re showing off their new family role on Facebook too. According to Mashable, 40% of U.S. dads with kids under age 2 write family statuses on a daily basis and 56% post family photos at least a few times a week. This social media finding is a huge indicator of how times are changing and how parents are now sharing the home responsibilities.
The article states that dads are no longer just providers; they’re now part of a household partnership with their wives. This is a trend that marketers need to take note of as they try to reach family men. As marketers, we need to consider this new father role and how these men are impacting household choices and purchases.
Dads want to feel like brands and their advertising understand this integrated work and family play lifestyle. They want marketers to recognize that there aren’t defined roles in the family unit anymore. Social media can be a great avenue for reaching these Facebook using dads. Mashable suggests using social media as a mosaic – a way to communicate that your brand enables this dad’s new lifestyle.
Do you think that the dad role is more family centered in most homes? What is the best way to connect with these family friendly fathers?
A secondhand smoke YouTube singing sensation.
Never underestimate the power of a good idea. It will stick in your head for years. It will push itself to the forefront among other ideas. And when the right people see it and believe in its potential, they will jump on your bandwagon. I came up with the idea for “Secondhand Smoke, Secondhand Rose”, 17 years ago working on the Michigan Department of Community Health account at Brogan. At the time, we were doing some TV spots, so radio wasn’t in the budget and YouTube did not exist. But the tune, “Secondhand Rose,” (which is in public domain) and my rewrite of the words had a sticking factor. And the tune stuck in my head for years. So recently when I heard MDCH needed a radio spot about secondhand smoke for parents of young children, I remembered that idea from long ago. Of course, the original script was gone, considering it was written on one of the first Macs! But I recreated it. And I couldn’t have scripted what happened next better. Our wonderful clients at MDCH, Kelly Niebel and Jason Holben, let us produce it as both a radio spot and a YouTube video (the latter has over 4,000 hits just after a couple weeks). Serendipitously, we found the perfect talent shooting another spot for STEM awareness. We called in favors to make it amazing and stay in budget. But the icing on the cake: powerful results. The calls to the Michigan Tobacco Quit Line were so dramatic, one of our clients exclaimed she “almost fell out of my chair.” So that great idea you have, it can happen. It just may need a little longer incubation period. What do you think of our “Secondhand Smoke, Secondhand Rose” spot for the Michigan Department of Community Health? I'm glad it stuck in my head all those years!
Celebrating Michigan Stem Awareness Week.
Did you know that March 25th is the kickoff date for Michigan STEM Awareness Week? You’re probably wondering what is STEM and what does it have to do with me? Well, STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. It turns out that STEM occupations are the highest paying, fastest growing, most influential jobs of the future to drive economic growth and innovation. Which we all know is important for the State of Michigan. Michigan STEM Awareness Week is being sponsored by the STEM Alliance of Michigan (SAM). I had the pleasure of working with these forward thinking folks on a TV spot to promote STEM education awareness. Working with the kids featured in the spot was too much fun, they were spontaneous, charming and hilarious. It’s times like this that I love my job. A job I couldn’t do without my MAC and technology. So learn more about the good stuff going on during Michigan STEM Awareness Week, March 25-31. How will you build STEM awareness? Start by sharing the spot with your family, friends and social networks. I did.
Sara Blakely, Saving the World One Booty at a Time.
Not so long ago, if you wore a girdle, you didn’t want anybody to know it. Now girlfriends (including the Grand Girlfriend of them all, Oprah) love to dish about smoothing their muffin tops or rounding out their booties with sexy, slimming shapewear.
And it’s all because of Spanx.
Founded 12 years ago, Spanx sells (and sells and sells) not just because it works wonders on women’s bods, but also because it does it with winning sass, from the naughty name to the cute cartoons on the packaging.
And that’s all because of Spanx founder, Sara Blakely. Her force of nature personality, relentless work ethic, and most of all, true understanding of women, have made her a newly minted billionaire at age 41. She’s the youngest self-made woman on Forbes magazine’s “Rich List.”
She’s also my latest girl crush. (For other strong, entrepreneurial women I admire, see my blog post on Sheryl Sandberg and check out my mentor and founder of Brogan & Partners, Marcie Brogan.)
I love Blakely’s back story. She started Spanx with $5000 of her own money. She had an idea to improve upon control top pantyhose and had to practically storm a hosiery mill to get them to make her prototype. She wrote her own patent to save legal fees. She hand-sold Spanx at a folding table at Neiman Marcus using picture of her own disappearing panty lines and stayed up all night filling her own mail orders.
Now that her company—which is debt-free and privately owned—has hit it huge, Blakely’s personality still charmingly infuses everything Spanx does, especially its savvy marketing. The company’s staff is dominated by women who put themselves out there as much as Blakely does. On the Spanx blog, “The Rear View”, for instance, staffers pose for before and after photos in Spanx nipping and tucking swimsuits.
And in a section called “Spanx-Giving,” we hear about charitable work staffers have done for organizations like the Foster Care Support Foundation’s Prom-A-Palooza.
Blakely also gives back with motivational speaking, largely aimed at women, and impulsive gifts of joy, like treating everyone in her favorite restaurant to dinner.
A cute cartoon of Blakely herself, wearing a long blond ponytail, is perched at the top of the every page on the Spanx website. It’s clear that, while her ragtag underwear company has changed immensely, Blakely has remained true to her very feminine self. And that’s the best recipe for success I can think of.
