Last week I talked about the *Confidence Factor*: the second step to take to capture your share of the female market. Today, we’re going to talk about getting paid, the *Closing Factor.*
FACTOR NUMBER 3: THE CLOSE FACTOR
You may have heard the phrase, “The more you count, the more you sell.“Well, with women, the more you SHARE, the more you sell. To close her and make her want to buy from you, a lot of triggers need to be included in your copy and marketing. Here are some devices you can use in your marketing right now to increase your closure rate with women.
Remember, women are primarily interested in community, people, relationships: there is no winner…just one people.
Women base their opinions on personality, while men base their opinions on details. It makes sense when you go back to our instincts of what’s important to a caveman versus a cavewoman. The caveman focuses on a single goal to procreate his DNA. Cavewoman has multiple approaches to keep her children and the safety of the town.
This makes storytelling very powerful for women. The narrative works with women AND men. While it’s been a good marketing device for a while, women seem to NEED it more than men. It deepens the connection because they can relate to you.
Numbers, facts and figures are not as important to women as they are to men. Women would rather hear how a product or service improved someone’s life than by what percentage. Think about making your copy more story-oriented.
Women just don’t care about the mechanical details, so spending a lot of time on a product’s features won’t grab our attention. YALE STUDY: Tested college students’ ability to program a VCR from written instructions. 68% of men did it on the first try. Only 16% of women did. My husband thinks I’m kidding when I can’t remember how to use one of the 5 remotes to operate the TV, DVD, radio, and Tivo. It’s enough to make my head spin.
Women love to comment and give our opinions… quizzes, contests, surveys, essays… we love it! So using interactive media works great to hook women.
Give him advice that he can use without strings attached. So he fills his copy with useful statistics or fascinating facts that he can tell his friends. You want to build a relationship over time. Just like dating. You don’t just want to jump into bed… well, maybe the boy does. But women want to be idealized and trust needs to be built.
Know what your values are. Making a difference in the world is a stronger position than looking younger/better (for a man…get it?) Women’s aspirations according to the Gray Advertising Study. Make the world a better place: 85%; See successful children 83%; More time for me 82%; Travel 72%: Wealth 62%; Attractive 53%; race 48%.
Women, too, like to know that their business is meant to make a difference. I like to know that you are involved in outreach programs beyond just making money. So if you donate to a cause, please let them know.
This is the third part of a five-part series on promoting women. Next week we will talk about the fourth factor in the marketing process for women: THE AFTER FACTOR.