Marketing to Women - 5 Emotional Drivers

I just began reading a fascinating book that I recommend to all of you who have female customers. The book is entitled, What She's Not Telling You: Why Women Hide the Whole Truth and What Marketers Can Do About It (affiliate link).

It's written by 3 women, with a tremendous amount of experience between them, who run the marketing agency, Just Ask a Woman. Their clients include Kraft, GlaxoSmithKline, Westin, Ikea and Bloomingdale's, among others. Their findings are based on 10's of 1000's of hours going one-on-one with 1000's of women who have confessed their personal stories to the authors.

I'm not very far into the book, but the premise is that women tell marketers only Half Truths- which is what they are willing to admit. The Whole Truth is what they really believe, do and buy. It's not that they're trying to deceive marketers, but the half truths are shortcuts so they can get on with their busy lives.

"A true but halfway response can be a no-fault way for her to evade a tough question or her best efforts to deal with rhetorical, mundane surveys that don't deserve better. Women will save the Whole Truth for those who respect who she is and what her life is about, who ask smarter questions, and who are honestly intent on hearing her answers."

The authors have identified 5 emotional drivers of these half truths:

Good Intentions- by simply making promises, even with no plan to follow through, women feel more in control of their out-of-control lives. "Marketers fall for this Half Truth because it often matches what they hope to hear, which results in overengineered products and inflated claims."
Approval Seeking- women know what others want to hear and they have a need to be liked, to belong and be accepted, not only by marketers, but by other women. "When many women chime in, all saying good things about your product or ad (and all hoping to fit in), you're tempted to believe their unanimous opinions and feel discouraged from digging for deeper insights."
Martyrdom- because women are oftentimes everyone elses caretaker, they need to let the marketer know in detail about their daily hardships. "Marketers, also stressed, may find themselves in a "stress competition" with women and miss their need to be heard. The result of this stand-off is that women can scare you away from asking them to do anything more, such as buy your product."
Ego Protection- women will protect themselves by putting on a confident front. They'll say they read your fine print and describe themselves as younger, smarter and trendier than they actually are. "And you may believe them because it's more satisfying to market and sell to confident, knowledgeable customers than insecure, uninformed ones. This Half Truth spawns products and services that may overshoot most women's aspirations or be too complicated and then be returned or ignored."
Secret Keeping- women hide information that might invite your disapproval, like sneaking cigarettes or her children's behavior. "You won't discover her Whole Truth because you may feel too embarrassed to ask. And she'll hide some secrets from you that she whispers happily to others as a form of social currency

How do you find out the Whole Truth?

The authors say that the real question to ask yourself is whether or not you're really listening or just half listening? "You have to earn your way to her Whole Truth. That starts with listening differently, with all of your senses, as well as your persistence, curiosity, intuition, and, yes, patience, because a woman saves her Whole Truth for the person she trusts."

To me, the thing to keep in mind is that recent studies have shown that women are responsible for influencing or purchasing 85% of the products sold. That's a huge number and a very persuasive reason for all of us to learn how to better market (communicate) to women.