Our focus today is on gender differences in relation to shopping, online and offline.

Here's a collection of statistics for you, as they relate to grocery shopping - a Men's Health magazine study reports that 65% of men are active weekly shoppers, Yankelovich Monitor reports that 71% of men are shopping at supermarkets one or more times per week, and WSL Strategic Retail reported the number of men doing at least some of the grocery shopping increased from 41% in 2002 to 61% percent in 2004.

So what does this mean for retail marketers and advertisers? How can they target the right demographics - men, women, young, old - whether through advertising or the right product selection? How can you respond to significant changes in the makeup of your customer base so that you can remain relevant, competitive and successful?

The articles below provide some tips:

• Website marketing across genders - Gender-based marketing has to do with knowing whether or not someone visiting a website is male or female and designing information to appeal to one gender primarily or both genders equally. It has more to do with someone's neurology -- how they think, how they make decisions, what pulls them in and pushes them away -- than their physiology.
  
  
• More Men Joining Mr. Mom at Supermarket? - Every so often we run across some data that challenges us to question the "conventional wisdom" that women are sole gatekeepers in shopping and preparing the family meals. Recent studies show that outside of their homes or workplace, the best place to reach or find men is at the supermarket.
  
  
• Men Favor Convenience and Service, Women Price - Almost half of all chief female shoppers said price-related offerings such as lowest everyday prices, best advertised specials, and store coupons were most important to them in deciding where to spend their dollars. It's a different story for most men, for whom price-related offerings are important to only 30% while 41% value convenience more than any other factor.
  
  
• My Mommy’s Online - Being a parent makes going online almost a necessity. Today, more than 40% of all women who go online in the US are mothers who have children under 18 at home.  More than eight out of 10 moms go online at least once a month, compared with 68% of all women. Other studies found that 68% of moms regularly make purchases online and 28% of the moms made an online purchase the month before.
  
  
• What guys want, online - One of today's most coveted demographics for marketers is 18- to 34-year-old men. As coveted as they are, they are increasingly difficult to reach through traditional media channels. For marketers hungering for this demographic who are still devoting the majority of resources to traditional media, the train has left the station. The article list five keys to engaging with 18- to 34-year-old guys.

Posted by Universal Ad