Ruth Mortimer is Marketing Week’s associate editor and a prolific blogger. She won a PPA Award for her forthright and insightful columns on marketing.
Can brands stop treating women like fluffy, pink-loving, delicate flowers?
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I hate female-focused marketing. Yes, despite being a woman myself, I dread the appearance in my inbox of yet another press release for a ladies-friendly campaign. It would cheer me up substantially if all brands could sign up to a charter banning them from ever undertaking excruciating gender-specific marketing ever again. (Use of the colour pink on anything female would also be punishable by death.)
Take the “It’s Girls’ Time” initiative from ice cream brand Haagen-Dazs - you can see some images below. Now, ice cream is obviously popular with women, among other human beings. So the brand is running a “Boudoir” pop-up space to replicate the idea of a girls’ night in. The boudoir can be specially reserved for groups of friends, with extras including a fashionable wardrobe and cooking masterclasses available on-site.
Good god. I am obviously weird because my friends and I have never sat around spooning luxury ice cream into each others’ mouths and crying about boys. Yes, ok, we probably have cried about boys, but that is usually on the way back from the pub. If we have a night in, we are there to save money. If we are on a night out, we don’t want to replicate staying in.
I’m probably being harsh about Haagen-Dazs. I’ve asked around and it appears that the teenagers I know think it is a “pretty cool” idea. They can’t go to the pub yet and actually, they thought this was pretty glamorous and something a bit different. So if the ice cream brand is targeting 16 year old girls and their mates, not women, this is right on point.
I think it is just that having seen Molson Coors launching special beers for women this week (click here for our story about it), I’m sensitive about the gender marketing issue. Why wouldn’t women want the same things from beer as men? The women I know who don’t like beer are not fans for exactly the same reasons as the men who don’t like beer - the taste. They do not have more specific feminine foibles surrounding what they drink.
Am I alone in hating women-focused marketing? I completely understand targeting but perhaps I feel that in non-clothing or non-beauty issues such as food, my gender is not the most important thing about me. I wish there were more brands that felt the same.
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Readers' comments (11)
Tiffany Jonas | Thu, 21 Jul 2011 10:32 pm
Ha! I agree with your post wholeheartedly... and my firm specializes in marketing to affluent women. (One of the points we constantly make, though, is that women are individuals and appreciate marketing that treat them as such, just as boomers appreciate being acknowledged as individuals and other groups feel the same.)
I certainly agree that from the images above, this particular campaign does look like it's targeted to the (much) younger set.
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Neil Hopkins | Fri, 22 Jul 2011 2:10 pm
Hi Ruth
On the flip side, I like Haagen-Dazs and, as a bloke, I have to put up with lots of (please excuse me) girl marketing...
Perhaps it's not so much about marketing products to women as recognising that women seem to be the most influential online. I was reading this today - http://wallblog.co.uk/2011/07/22/influencer-marketing-know-your-networks/ - so it's timely to spot your pieces!
So maybe it's a pursuit of influence - and not gender - that the brands are going for?
Or maybe it's just lazy.
Neil
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Anonymous | Fri, 22 Jul 2011 2:25 pm
I would go as far as to say that this is offensive. So the only thing that women want to do is dress up like dolls and talk about men? Cooking lessons? Do they want to send us all to finishing school as well?
And where are the men in this scenario? Their wives and girlfriends are all talking about their feelings in this Haagen-Daz world and they are in the pub having a good time?
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Rebecca | Fri, 22 Jul 2011 4:08 pm
This post took the words right out my mouth!
'I would go as far as to say that this is offensive. So the only thing that women want to do is dress up like dolls and talk about men? Cooking lessons? Do they want to send us all to finishing school as well?
And where are the men in this scenario? Their wives and girlfriends are all talking about their feelings in this Haagen-Daz world and they are in the pub having a good time?'
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Cherry White Design | Fri, 22 Jul 2011 4:52 pm
These campaigns often miss the first rule in positioning, opting for what appears to be an "easy win" often requires more thought than what meets the eye. I for example eat ice cream after the gym because it makes me feel rewarded (strange I know)!
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Samantha Markham | Fri, 22 Jul 2011 5:29 pm
Hi Ruth,
I agree a lot with your opinion on the examples that you mentioned, although there are some really good female focused campaigns that work well (I've always enjoyed the Diet Coke ads aimed at women, for example). I think the point is that you can't just generalise 'women' as one target audience - these marketing strategies should be about identifying with the right sort of female demographic in order for your campaign to work (age range, preferences, career/financial status etc). Just because I'm a girl it doesn't mean I want adverts for laser hair removal, ice cream and fake tan every 5 minutes. And don't even get me started on the worst of them - Always: Have a happy period - has got to be one of the most ridiculous straplines of any female focused campaign!
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Robert | Mon, 25 Jul 2011 3:48 pm
I think this is a pretty tricky subject to approach because on the flip side of female focused campaigning is obviously male focused, and we as men aren't too fussed about a change.
Put another pod next to Hargen Daz's with lads mags, games and toastie makers and the campaign would be a huge success. Men are just easier to market to because we are pretty simple beasts to please. Change the face of female marketing by incorporating some of the check list on the male campaign or adding some of the female campaign to the male side.
People are basicly the same but gender specific marketing wants to put us all in to one of 2 boxes. Tip them onto the floor and muddle it all up and we'll all be happier for it.
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Bastien Eymery | Mon, 25 Jul 2011 5:34 pm
This opinion piece and most commentators below it seem to suggest that such large scale marketing initiatives are baseless, and assume they are not the result of careful multivariate testing, market research, past experience with large audience samples.
'I would go as far as to say that this is offensive. So the only thing that women want to do is dress up like dolls and talk about men? Cooking lessons? Do they want to send us all to finishing school as well?"
Hum, sorry? This campaign doesn't suggest that the only thing women would want to do is dress up like dolls. It suggest that an experience such as the one described in the campaign might appeal to many women.
A quick trip to their facebook page will tell you what their target audience thinks of this initiative.
All in all, I am not saying that this particular campaign is well executed, I am merely pointing out that the reasons cited for dismissing it as a poor one on this article and subsequent comments are, in my view, rather weak.
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Ruth Mortimer | Wed, 27 Jul 2011 11:45 am
Thanks everyone for getting involved in the debate. You can read more of my crotchety thoughts on this area in my column next week in Marketing Week's print edition......
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Anonymous | Wed, 27 Jul 2011 12:05 pm
This touches a raw nerve and I totally agree, as a man.
I hate all this overly-gender-specific marketing. Becuase often it alienates the gender they are not targetting.
As a man I was really peeved off when Skinny Cow ice creams offered me a birthday "gift" saying how i can get a new handbag. And the gift was actually something where you had to receive marketing from another company. This is not a way to make customers feel happy!
Special K has made it very clear I'm not welcome in their cereal aisle. I also get tired of the generic "men must like action DVDs and power tools, and women must like chick flicks and chocolates" style of putting you in a box.
Fine you may have a target market - but don't say I'm not welcome at all.
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