Women’s online behaviour is slightly different to that of men, and as they are due to represent the majority of online consumers in the near future, it is in your interests as an online company to take notice of female habits and online buying methods. The European Interactive Advertising Association recently published their ‘Digital Women 2006 Report’ in which it stated that the amount of time women spent online has increased by 63%, compared to the 54% growth for men over the same period. This comparative growth is set to continue, and by 2007 females are set to overtake males in internet usage time. It seems to me that e-marketing must move towards fe-marketing to fully reap the benefits of this fast-growing female market.

The universal question is How Can This Be Done? An issue perhaps that is just as perplexing as What Women Want. However, I have attempted to delve into the female psyche to give a few essential tips to help you reap the benefits of your biggest potential group of customers on the internet- women.

Google is not our King

A recent PEW internet study claimed that the boys were far more likely to use Google than any other search engine. Whilst Google is also the girls’ number one choice, for the ladies’ it is only marginally more popular than others such as MSN and Yahoo! Women, especially those using the internet at home, are also more likely than men to use the search engine of their internet provider. Thus if you are currently putting all your eggs (and money) in one basket by concentrating your resources on advertising on Google, you may be missing a trick or two. To target the female market you should also advertise in other search engines, such as MSN and Yahoo!

Pay Per Click Is Good For Branding

Industry research carried out by Hitwise has shown that women tend to favour paid for searches more than men do. The big advantage that Pay Per Click brings your product is branding. It is acknowledged by industry professionals that a woman tends to form closer bonds with brands than men. A strong brand to her shouts ‘reliability’! Good brands tend to buy prime advertising space and for this reason, a woman is more likely to buy a brand that she has seen advertised in the pages of Vogue. In the world of online marketing good brands tend to use sponsored links programs in the most-used search engines. For this reason, if you want to attract female shoppers to your site it is important that your business is featured in various sponsored links systems and for your campaign to be bid in good positions.

Pay Per Click Brings Your Name To Her Attention

Despite what you may think, women are very targeted shoppers. Women never go shopping without knowing exactly what they want to buy- and the same rule applies in the online marketing world.

The beauty of Pay Per Click is that your brand lands right in front of her face when she is looking for your product. Research by Fasthosts found that two thirds of internet users never look beyond the first two pages of a search engine, so the last thing she wants to be doing is trawling through hundreds of websites to get to you – she has much better things to do!

Women Display Search Engine Loyalty

It was once the case that if the internet user did not find what they were looking for, they would be most likely to try the same keyphrases on another search engine. The new trend is that people are more likely to stay with the same search engine, but instead try different keywords. This is true for both sexes; but women tend to be more loyal to specific search engines than men.

For this reason, when considering or targeting the female market online it is quite important to increase the number of keywords in your campaigns to make sure that your business is featured for as many different keywords and keyphrases as possible. Good campaigns should comprise hundreds and even thousands of keywords. (We know this as ‘the long tail’.)

Women love immediacy, look for a good reputation and are loyal. Armed with this knowledge, you should create campaigns that are clear, well branded (think sponsored links) and targeted, and that succeed in bringing women to your website. Next month I’ll be looking at what to do with women once they’re actually on your site.