“I am not a big believer in ‘women join brands,” said M2W® presenter Marti Barletta, founder of The Trendsight Group. “Women stay with brands that meet their needs and exceed their expectations.” So began Day 2 of M2W® where Marti Barletta, the woman who literally wrote the book Marketing to Women, took the stage as a keynote presenter and showed the audience of brand leaders and marketing executives how to succeed in business during tough economic times. Her advice is to focus marketing efforts on current customers. Says Marti, “Customer service is the new sales. Sales has evolved from a transactional to a relational role.”
And choosing to target women is always a winning strategy. “It often takes longer to win over a woman, but when they decide to buy they are committed to their choice,” says Marti. “They place more weight on the relationship component—there is a ‘psychological cost’ to walking away.”
Here are some of the top takeaway quotes from Day 2 of M2W®:
Jason Klarman, General Manager, Oxygen Media
“The ‘new 20’s’ have moved from being empowered to entitled.”
Mike Swenson, President, Barkley Public Relations
“Every idea has an expiration date.”
“When you stand for something greater than your bottom line, you will succeed.”
Betsy Rella, Vice President, Research, Lifetime Networks
“Women are living fully loaded hectic lives—there are fewer tradeoffs in how they balance and blend their lives to get everything done.”
“They view “busyness” as a result of doing a good job.”
Jonni Hegenderfer, CVO, President & Founder, JSH&A & Laura Dihel, Senior Vice President, JSH&A
“There is a migrating media landscape—making it difficult for us to know who to contact to get our information out there [to reach female consumers].”
Tony Cardinale, SVP, Research & Strategic Insights, Bravo & Oxygen Media
“If someone tells you women want this right now you should respond by saying “which women?” There are all different kinds of women that want different things.”
Barret Roberts, Lead Communications Manager, Unilever
“How do consumers want to feel with our brand? It’s about inspiring the customer experience.”
Julie Krueger, Vice President, Marketing & Advertising, OfficeMax
“Once we talked about Fashion Week being a ‘working event’, everyone understood our need to be there.”
Julie Gilbert, former SVP, Best Buy, CEO/Founder WOLF Means Business
“You can’t PowerPoint people into understanding—they have to experience it.”
Becky Frankiewicz, Vice President, Women’s Portfolio, Frito-Lay, Inc.
“We weren’t looking to speak to her, we wanted to speak with her.”
“Men use the internet to transact, women use it to connect.”
I heard from several people in the audience that this conference was exactly what they needed. It was an opportunity to take a break from the stress of business as usual and not only gain valuable insight, but feel confident that we are all moving in the right direction. While the media landscape has changed and our economic difficulties have grown, women are still buying and brands need to connect with them on a very personal level.
Here’s to another inspiring and invigorating M2W®. See you next year!
