Here Comes Another “Women’s Site”
Even when it comes to the stereotype of silly, emotional, dying-to-connect-with-women-everywhere women (can you tell I’m being facetious?), there has got to be a saturation point for shopping, diet, sex tips, parenting and “lifestyle” content. Pretty please?
With the number of women-focused magazines, television shows, radio shows, blogs and sites increasing – and all clearly scrambling a bit for a loyal audience – you’ve got to wonder. Are there really any women left in the world who desire to, but haven’t yet, found their “community?” I doubt it.
Because of my years in the marketing to women realm, and since you may well see my words posted on such blogs or their affiliated sites*, you might expect more enthusiasm about women’s sites from me. But, my cynicism keeps me expecting our culture to move beyond the need for all these big general “for women” gathering places. Still – as each one launches, it proclaims to understand today’s women better than the other 800 million existing female-focused sites out there (I exaggerate a bit with that number – I hope). As Sylvie Barak put it in an Inquirer.net article about a recent addition to the ranks, Yahoo’s “Shine” :
Also, Shine’s idea of reaching out to the new breed of totally-non stereotypical women involves insightful articles and blogs hailing from such non stereotypical sites as Women’s Health, Good Housekeeping, Cosmopolitan, InStyle, Style.com and cooking site Epicurious. Strange, but there’s not a tech site among them.
Shine appears to be a shallow façade of a site, pretending to offer women something new, when it obviously doesn’t. At least other women orientated sites like CafeMom and Glam don’t try to hide their real motives under layers of this season’s hottest pastel lip shades and blemish hiding foundation cream.
Good point, Ms. Barak. If a women-oriented site is going to be stereotypical as far as fashion, diet and astrology content, tell it like it is. Don’t raise expectations about how yours might be the one site that isn’t going to be girly. And, one final thing, before you spend the money on design and editorial, take a second to stop and ask your targeted market if this is something they want/will visit.
Media organizations have a reputation of developing more and more advertising venues that purportedly reach any hot-with-advertisers market segment, while promoting the idea to the public as hugely consumer-driven. But, women can see right through that. It is more likely that they might check out a new site once and then head back to their old favorite. Advertisers will probably not be willing to pay the big bucks for space on any of the newer sites for very long.
So, does research exist that finds women need to see “for women” or “manicure, sex, and fashion tips” in order to think the content is relevant? Alternatively, do men have to see “for men” to realize they want to read a sports magazine? Does a news site have to advertise sports coverage in order to attract a man? (OK, I’ll stop with the questions…)
Men and women go to the sites that deliver information on things that interest them – the more fine tuned the better. Gender may not have a lot to do with it, and neither sex will linger long on sites that throw in a little of everything in order to aggregate consumers according to an advertiser’s hoped-for target.
Take HuffingtonPost.com for example. Arianna Huffington was just covered in the New York Times because of her success with what she co-founded and still guides. Now, is HuffPo “for women” because it is driven by a woman? Is it “for women” because it has an entertainment and living section? No. Instead, a lot of the HuffPo readership, men and women (3.7 million unique visitors strong, according to Nielsen Online, and as mentioned in the NYT piece), would say they came to this site, first and foremost, to read and engage in political debate.
Arianna didn’t have to work to deliver something advertisers would see as “for women” or “for men.” She focused on what she was passionate about and it happens to draw a LOT of readers. For that a wide variety of advertisers must be thankful, and for that an ever-growing readership will continue to stick around.
The last thing women need is another stereotypical “women’s site.” Give women a place to go that is filled with information and commentary on a topic that engages them. Feel free to lay low with the female-specific content and marketing, and men interested in that topic may come along too. Recipes and sex tips are already fully covered elsewhere – believe me.
Bonus link: Diane Mermigas of MediaPost on the topic.
*Full disclosure: In addition to HuffPo and Learned On Women, I also contribute to eBrandmarketing.com, a business-related site published by Glam Media (which is very much women-focused and has a lot of pink on the home page). My eBrandmarketing.com editor has been willing to publish my slightly more cynical views in an effort to give an honest look at varying perspectives.
