Home Based Business Success

There’s a trend in sales and marketing that any business owner should be aware of. Failure to address this trend will result in lost sales, and repeat customers. The trend of which I speak is the increasing power of women as prime decision makers and consumers of once male dominated markets.

As a business owner, weather you exist primarily in the online or off line space, you absolutely must appeal to all your potential customers in order to maximize sales, profit, and efficiency. Yet many business owners, especially in formerly male dominated industries, completely or substantially ignore women in their marketing efforts.

This mistake can have devastating results to your bottom line. Think about this for a second. 80% of all checks signed in the U.S. are now signed by women. Women also purchase 80% of all consumer goods and own half of all U.S. businesses. They are the most rapidly growing segment of new business owners. That doesn’t sound like a market you’d want to turn your back on.

You may think because you sell auto accessories, consumer electronics or sporting goods you can ignore women as customers. Don’t; that would be a stupid and possibly fatal mistake for your business, because women actually buy, or are key decision makers in the majority of such purchases.

According to the Consumer Electronics Association, since 2003 women have bought more consumer electronics products than have men, so that worm turned a long time ago. In 2005 women purchased $65 billion wroth of consumer electronics, and influenced billions more. According to a survey in Sporting Goods Business, women influence 95% of all sporting goods purchases.

That means that if you have a home business that sells things, and there’s any chance that women are among your customers, you need to be making every effort to cater to their needs and wants, even if you feel that your business is more focused towards men.

How do you make sure your business is meeting the needs of your female customers? Women and men shop differently. They tend to process information differently than do men. When women are making purchasing decisions, they are more likely to ask questions until they feel they have a good grasp on a product, it’s features and benefits (you are selling features and benefits, aren’t you?). Men, on the other hand shop more like they drive. They won’t ask for nearly as much help as they may need to find what they’re really after.

Be sure you design your web site to give your women customers the answers they’re looking for. They’ll reward you by buying something from you. Women tend to be more brand loyal than men, a great thing for your business if you cater to their needs. Women have less tolerance for websites that are difficult to navigate and aren’t well designed and laid out than do men. If they can’t get their questions answered easily, they’ll shop at your competitor’s web site.

You should also tailor your product mix to be sure that your women customers can find what they may be looking for. Do a bit of research if you must, check with you vendors, offer surveys to your visitors and sift through your site logs to determine what products were the most popular to browse and buy.

If you sell aftermarket auto and truck parts, you may think that your business is the last place you’d find women shopping, but aghain, you’d be wrong. A woman is just as likely to be shopping for a Greddy turbo kit or a Dana 60 front axle with an ARB air locker as are men. Well maybe not quite as much, but you get the point.

In fact women buy quite a bit of aftermarket auto parts and accessories. According to the Specialty Equipment Manufacturers Association (SEMA), the industry association concerned with making sure every kid with a Honda also has a muffler the size of a coffee can, nice rims, and a pair of 12” subwoofers, women actually buy less hard core performance parts. What they do buy is alarm systems, floor mats, fog lights, window tinting, audio / video systems. 21% of women in a survey done by trade journal Aftermarket Business reported that they installed all their own aftermarket parts.

The point is that you not only have to meet the needs of your women customers if you’re selling weight loss products, cosmetics, and designer clothes. You have to make the same effort to meet their needs if you’re selling fishing supplies, basket ball shoes, aftermarket automotive accessories, and home theater gear. If you don’t, you’re leaving money on the table.