Thinking sustainably is about seeing the interconnections of systems around a particular business problem or issue. Since, among other things, the people involved, the natural world, and government regulations are ever-changing, there’s no way for a business to solve the sustainability issue once and for all. Businesses must embrace the fact that there will always be context or circumstances outside of their control, potentially knocking their systems flow off balance.

But there are ways to better prepare for that crazy, unpredictable context.  And, I see employee engagement as a crucial part of keeping any corporation’s sustainability development alive and innovating.   On that note, a recent Economist blog article (on design thinking for the workplace) caught my attention.  What co-authors John Hagel and John Seely Brown write about seems to broadly apply to the sustainable business perspective:

“This suggests another design principle: how to design for evolution rather than creating a static design optimising for the present. What would it mean to design the systems we work in to continually evolve our ability to experience more and more flow, especially the flow of people and ideas?”

The bottom line: corporations must work to maintain the flow of their employees’ brainpower and enthusiasm, which will then aid their smooth(er) ride over unanticipated circumstances.

Employee health, well being and productive participation are crucial to fluid systems interactions with all the other aspects of a business.  Do you want your employees to understand why you are newly enforcing more stringent energy use policies?  Do you want them to make the connection between the people in the local community and what your manufacturing plant puts in the landfill?  Do you want them to enjoy work, stay healthy and stick around?  If so, don’t ask for feedback after your initiatives have already been designed or passively place a suggestion box in the lunchroom.  Instead, proactively leverage employees – at all levels – as internal sustainability-promoting partners now.  Smart employee engagement strategies will fill any static business systems void with more energy, and keep the flow of great ideas strong.

The crucial move toward sustainability may not come easily for either huge corporations or the average consumer, but we can hasten this evolution by identifying and nurturing the personality traits that most naturally drive sustainable living. Those qualities that we’ve long called “feminine” could be the answer.

No matter how many men also possess them, traits like empathy and a focus on communication and social connections have long been categorized as “women’s ways.” But those same traits also seem to be at the root of sustainable personal and organizational behavior. Understanding known gender differences in thinking and decision-making could provide insights and tools to move sustainability forward more quickly and productively.

Gender Differences in Thinking and Talking

The differences, however subtle, in the ways men and women tend to think and communicate may have important implications for sustainability. According to a 2003 study by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, “women’s higher levels of empathy, altruism, and personal responsibility make them more interested in environmentalism as a way to protect not only themselves and their families, but also others.” Helen Fisher, sociologist and author of The First Sex, found that women, when compared to men, are more process-oriented and “gathering,” that is, they look to find multiple interactions and multidirectional paths. And sociolinguist Deborah Tannen notes in her book You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation that, as opposed to men who “speak and hear a language of status and positioning,” women “speak and hear a language of connection and intimacy.” All of the above seems to follow from brain science. For example, Fisher notes that women’s brains tend to be better integrated, right with left hemisphere. From this she suggests that “women probably have more communication between the right and left amygdalas,” which “may provide them with better access to their unconscious feelings.”

Empathy may be key to promoting sustainability. When a person is in the habit of considering the well-being of others as she makes her own decisions, she is more likely to anticipate the longer term and broader implications of each choice or opportunity. This ability to understand and feel what others might feel helps the empathetic person to, for example, connect the dots between the corporation that has been accused of environmental or social irresponsibility and her own consumer purchases. Despite being considered a “touchy feely” emotion by some, empathy can help people see through corporate or political smoke screens around environmental or social responsibility issues.

According to Tannen, women communicate by finding common ground first, while men tend to initiate communication through status comparisons or positioning. This tendency could give women a slight edge in forming the kind of support networks needed for community building and cooperation around sustainability issues.

Putting “Women’s Ways” to Work for Sustainability

How might a more relational approach (i.e., one that recognizes complex interrelationships) directly link to sustainability today? Helen Fisher’s exploration of women as civil thinkers, for one, provides some insight. Fisher finds that women tend “to enjoy making these lateral connections” and to think more contextually, with “a broad focus and long-term social goals.” This broader focus and ability to think contextually can be key to visualizing all that interconnects—and why it matters—in sustainability.

Sustainability is not a movement that can be addressed by just a handful of powerful people forcing the issue from a pedestal on high. Rather, the most powerful change agents may be the people who can connect the big thinkers with the most motivated “doers,” keeping all the players working together and motivated. Such people will certainly call on both left and right brain traits, and will require great empathy to succeed.

When organizations start to operate more along these lines, the men and women within them will be encouraged to incorporate sustainable personal values into their business decisions. When businesses and organizations appreciate and nurture these values in all employees and reward teamwork over individual success, they may come closer to achieving the crucial balance between linear and relational thinking.

Interface Inc. is an example of a company that has practiced these ideas with great success. It is the world’s largest modular carpet manufacturer and has emerged as a global leader in sustainable business. Since 1996, through the vision of the company’s founder and chairman, Ray Anderson, Interface has reduced the energy it uses to manufacture carpet by 43 percent and has cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 44 percent (94 percent if you count offsets). The company’s long-term goal is to eliminate any negative impact it has on the environment by 2020. Anderson has acknowledged that “women’s ways” influenced his thinking about sustainability. Anderson writes in his book Mid-Course Correction, “I believe, too, that the ascendancy of women in business is coming just in the nick of time. It is that instinctive nurturing nature, found more frequently in women, but also present in men if they will allow it to surface, that will recognize and elevate in business the vital, indispensable role of genuine caring. Caring for human capital and natural capital (Earth) as much as we have traditionally cared for financial capital will give social equity and environmental stewardship their rightful places alongside economic progress, and move society to reinvent the means for achieving economic progress itself.”

Taking a more “feminine” perspective could mean that organizations pursuing sustainability might be more open to risking competitive vulnerability in order to form creative partnerships or share information. For the greater social good and for the responsibility of the industry, companies could tend to a broader vision, while still maintaining their focus on the all-important bottom line. The Organic Exchange (cotton) and the Green Exchange (with Nike as a founding member) are examples of unexpected and committed cooperation that has resulted in significant industry innovations.

Finally, it is worth noting that, within sustainable development, the values that serve or inspire an organization’s employees or members also attract and serve today’s consumer market. Relational, or more “feminine,” thinking balances out the long-rewarded, linear strengths of successful businesses, and brings them to a more holistic and consumer-connected level of operation.

Women as Sustainable Consumers

In recent years, Ford has been greening its automobile models, perhaps due to recent findings that point to a growing demand for green products among female consumers. A 2009 Synovate study, for example, found that “more American women than men say that their dream car is a green car” (20 percent women versus 17 percent men).  And “The Green Mom Eco-Cosm Revisited,” a 2010 poll of green mom bloggers conducted by the Social Studies Group, found household cleaning brands are under more scrutiny than ever. The study reports, “Regardless of income, respondents were equally likely to buy organic, buy local, seek out alternative energy sources, buy green toys, and choose greener transportation sources. Respondents who identified themselves in lower income brackets were more likely to minimize their overall purchasing than give up buying more costly, but environmentally safe products.”

It’s worth noting that parenthood seems to be a key indicator with regard to how consumers respond to sustainability messages or green brands. The Social Studies Group, in fact, found that family health, not the environment, seemed to be the biggest driver for going green. This is likely true for car purchasing decisions as well; the safety and quality of the vehicle come first, before sustainability. As one mom quoted in the study says, “My consciousness changed a great deal when I became a parent. Those of you who are blessed with children can relate—suddenly every electrical outlet, every strange chemical smell, every dog running down the sidewalk gives you pause: could this harm my child?”

It would seem that many women are receptive to environmentalism and sustainability not necessarily for “green” reasons so much as for the well-being of their families. And if parenthood, not gender, is a critical factor encouraging sustainable choices, then certain progressive policies, such as guaranteed parental leave for both men and women, might have positive implications for sustainability.

Sustainability Traits Worth Nurturing

While not a lot of significant gender-difference research has been done related to sustainability-promoting traits and characteristics, a study published in late 2010 on climate change belief seems telling. Using data from 2001–2008 Gallup Polls focusing specifically on environmental issues, Michigan State University sociologist Aaron M. McCright found that women were more likely to accept climate change science than men. A greater percentage of women than men worry about global warming a great deal (35 percent to 29 percent), believe global warming will threaten their way of life during their lifetime (37 percent to 28 percent), and believe the seriousness of global warming is underestimated in the news (35 percent to 28 percent).7

But, the story is not simply “women get it,” and “men don’t,” when it comes to climate change. In my opinion, McCright’s work suggests something that demands more attention in the sustainability movement. His results largely confirm an earlier account by Paul Mohai of gender differences in environmental concern. Mohai concludes that “Background characteristics, including homemaker and parental status, appear to have little, if any, effect on these [gender] differences [in environmental concern]. This suggests that, to the extent that gender differences in environmental concern do exist, the differing socialization experiences of men and women may account for the differences, rather than the roles they occupy or other structural factors.”

What if, despite the fact that the female gender seems most naturally suited for sustainable thinking and decision-making, it is actually socialization—not sex—that forms the basis for the incredible opportunity our culture has today? Being born a man should not preclude a person from being able to understand or engage with sustainability in productive, and passionate, ways. Rather, the traits and characteristics that are typically seen in women likely exist in most people. If women drive sustainability, naturally, then men—or any person who does not easily default to empathy and relational thinking—can be socialized or taught to think in new ways. Sustainable thinking does not have to come naturally in order to be worth nurturing.

Feminine Traits, Genderless Potential

Given what we know about the traits and characteristics that seem to be behind interest and engagement in sustainability, businesses, organizations, and universities can now lead the charge to ensure that this sort of “feminine” thinking becomes more natural for everyone.

The truth is that a lot of people are capable of bringing more empathy or relational thinking into their work decisions. To the extent that these abilities can be taught and can become the behavioral norm, they can provide the foundation for an overarching sustainable movement in the United States. They are not simply “women’s ways.” To be sure, any gender differences along these lines may give us a template for what to encourage and nurture, but we still have to see the possibilities as inclusive, not exclusive. Women may access such traits more naturally, but men can acquire them.

Sustainability—taking what we need now, while providing for life, human and otherwise, in the future—is in essence an exercise in empathy. The competitive, stereotypically masculine approach likely helped get us into the scary environmental state in which we currently find ourselves. I believe that encouraging the relational and empathetic aspects of human thinking—and better balancing that which has been perceived as masculine and feminine—will lead us to a more sustainable, enduring, and productive global community.

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Please visit the full March issue on The Solutions Journal site to read many other articles demonstrating why everyone’s so-labeled feminine traits may be worth a second and third look in pursuit of global sustainability.

The surprises that emerged from our findings, in The Green Mom Eco-Cosm? Many of the green mom bloggers who are on the more radical or fully committed end of the spectrum are perhaps not the nutty margin you’d assume.  Even though “green consumerism” is something these committed women may personally try to avoid, they still recognize the value of measures being taken by companies like Clorox to head in a greener direction.   Furthermore, through their blog post writing, these moms have been sharing higher expectations and actively challenging their readers toward significantly uncomfortable levels of green scrutiny and commitment.  No slackers need apply. It seems that the more women know, the more engaged they become with their lifestyle “greening up” efforts.  You can almost feel the momentum building.

Read The Green Mom Eco-Cosm: A Social Study into their Motivations, Convictions and Influence (PDF) for more.

While it may be more commonly used in self-help or religious books, I’ve been seeing the word “journey” a lot in my sustainable business practice research. It strikes me that the word may, as well, be a good term/image both for representing a woman’s buying path AND representing the path by which any brand should be traveling to better reach said woman.

Let me go back to the marketing to women basics a second. The idea is that women tend to buy in a more complex, winding path while men tend to buy in a more linear manner. “Journeying” seems to connote this stop/start, turn right/left, circle back and start over type of process. Both sides of the brain are used – some fact and some emotion – as a woman works her way to a goal (or purchase). Still, she may never get to the originally intended place at all – and that’s OK.

In the same way, the consumer who is aware of social responsibility and sustainable business practices is also on a journey. Each one of us (since this probably includes you) is deliberately taking steps toward a more responsible way of living. Trying to be the “Perfect Green Human” overnight could well overwhelm any one person, so we each must settle for the process. As we each get closer to that end, we definitely have reason to be proud. And, with each step – we may also get more engaged in the effort to keep up the momentum of change: from recycling and switching out cleaning products to better insulating our homes, installing solar panels and choosing never to fly unnecessarily again (if only!).

Who gets “there” (end of journey) first and best has long been the rule by which our culture has operated. But, here’s the thing – we have no idea where that definition of success came from, or if it is really true for our life as consumers or in our brand marketing efforts. I believe that consumers are now leading a charge, with women driving that movement – toward switching the paradigm to the experience of the journey rather than its end.

Why do I say this? Because, women are looking to connect with the human-scale of brands and issues (like the environment). And, just like humans, brands make mistakes, apologize, work to do things better the next time and move forward. As long as the forward/positive progression is visible and authentic, women will have patience and goodwill. Simply stating you’ve reached the industry pinnacle, without visibly going through any process, is a sure sign your brand has not and likely never will reach that pinnacle. The implication, then, is that such a brand can’t be trusted on any front.

Instead, women trust a journey. They make buying decisions along a non-linear, possibly meandering, stepping stone path. The process of getting there is the thing, and it lends itself to more holistic, right with left-brain purchase decisions, that lead to richer brand experiences and greater human interaction along the way. The end may remain in sight, but finally getting exactly to that place may lose a bit of importance.

I predict that we will see this even more, with men AND women, as we watch the sustainability movement gain steam. Many, many consumers are now taking baby steps in the challenging journey toward a new way of living. These people will expect, if not demand, brands to take similarly scaled steps in that direction – and report successes and failures along the way.

Wrapping sustainable business practices around consumer gender trends and how brands serve them is my new self-instigated journey. I am up for the stops and starts, right and left turns, and total re-dos that such a path may lead to, and hope that what I learn will be of interest for your journeys as well.

A few related links:

The David Report’s Checklist for Sustainability: This look at sustainable design insights points to emotion, narrative and value among other keywords – all of which exemplify the right with left brain way that women tend to buy.

A great article by Martha Shaw for GreenBiz.com on the conscious consumer: Shaw says most “green consumers” are women and they are very interested in health, among other tips.

Women may be the best index of the coming consumer hour (to paraphrase Walt Whitman), but men are starting to catch on to the benefits of making more brand demands, as well.  In my just published ChangeThis manifesto: Beware the Gender Trap: Marketing to the 21st Century Consumer I look at why we should be careful of gender polarization, even as women’s ways of buying still guide our marketing paths.

(Consider this manifesto the next generation of my 2005 ChangeThis contribution, Marketing to Women for the Common Man.)

The women’s market is roaring and brands are indeed starting to listen, but the gendered framework may keep marketers from the broader opportunities of the future.

Ad Age recently conducted one of their mini-polls on the question of whether positive ad messages were especially important for reaching consumers in a recession. While I am admittedly a glass half full type, when I take off my rose colored glasses and put on my more skeptical professional hat, I still see a positive marketing spin as the right choice, right now.

Could you blame consumers for not wanting to join a tribe of woeful and anxious peers, but instead choosing to see themselves as enduring the current hardships with a smile? Enter the Frugalista!

[Editorial note: For the many male consumers who also now fit this description, the term would be Frugalisto. All that follows also applies to him.]

Now, she may not sound like a marketers dream. After all, her MO is to scrimp and save, cut back on her gym membership and forget about name brand products for the duration. But, the fact is that our Frugalista represents the women you are all now trying to serve. Her more determined, super savvy approach to consuming truly does represent your toughest customer (women, in general), but on steroids (as it were)!

As a brand, you can run the other way and hope to find the few remaining consumers who aren’t cutting back (is there a one?), or you can face this newly even more extreme shopper with bells on. Serve THIS woman and you’ll be miles ahead of any of your competitors when the economy gets back to normal.

If you don’t yet know Ms. F., never fear. Just as the general women’s market was not a whole new, previously unknown alien organism when you put your mind to reaching it, so, too, do you likely already have the knowledge and advisory board foundation to understand this new gal. Whoops! You haven’t yet built even an informal panel of women to be your marketing partners? Now is the time.

There are incredible subtleties in how the Frugalista tribe weighs price, sustainability, cause sponsorship and snappy, minimal packaging, among so many other variables. Pre-recession women’s market purchase decision-making qualities that are even more apparent now include:

• Investment versus short term, quick fix: the longer term gains priority.
• Local economy implications: might a purchase benefit neighboring businesses (that need business) while serving her needs?
• Less packaging, and less hoopla: unassuming natural brands have long presented in this way, and right now this practice is looking mighty fine to a broader consumer base.
• More information/education: The “new info shopper” is one who seeks the extra background (via web sites, mainly) on the products he/she buys.

Since we may all resemble her now, it is surely a positive/hopeful approach to call such spendthrift-ing ways “frugalista” of “frugalisto” rather than take the fear angle and bemoan how awful our lives have become. Pretty much every consumer, right now, is taking a good hard look and scaling back their purchases.

It is our job as marketers to keep up the good work in serving who that person really is today (and not who we so wish they still were, because it would be a lot easier…). So, let’s take a cue from Facebook and “Friend” the Frugalista!

For women making purchasing decisions, many variables surrounding a product—beyond the basics of price/features—have long come into play. Women may perceive a brand to be unacceptable because they might perceive it has been slow on the environmentally responsible uptake, for example, or that its parent conglomerate’s executives have been in the news once too often for questionable ethics.

On the other hand, women may be perfectly happy with a brand and then notice that it competitor is sponsoring a local run for a cancer fund… inspiring them to consider at least a trial switch.

Consumers “naturally” consider a new product/brand when some element catches their eye as different and they assess that the switching process will be mostly painless. When such a brand change might also make a consumer feel good or reflect a lifestyle with which they like to be identified—all the better.

Let’s take Method brand dish soap as a case study:

• Eye-catchers: Clever package shape and trendy scents, including the option of no scent (well, I guess that’s a nose-catcher).
• Painless entry: It washes dishes like the traditional brands.
• Bonus: Lifestyle-reflection factor (“green” products are in, and in many communities you are perceived to be cool if you use them.)

Of course, there may be a drawback, in the form of Method’s higher price, but just as with Prius and its amazing growth in popularity, a lot of people think those extra benefits are worth paying for.

With a triple bottom-line of making money for shareholder/owner, and doing well by not only employees/the community but also for the environment, sustainable business practices naturally address many common considerations of a woman’s buying mind, all the while creating relevant products.

Let’s map out a few ways that women’s buying and sustainable business are a fit:

1. Women tend to use both their left and right brains, taking in the facts/figures while also taking in the more emotional, including community-related, implications of a purchase.

Sustainable businesses operate with the shared goals of making money for shareholder/owner (left brain), and doing well by employees/community and the environment—which seem to be heavily right brain “touchy/feely” issues at first, but may well turn out to positively influence left brain issues like sales figures. Seventh Generation has become a well-known brand that exemplifies this practice.

2. Women think first of their immediate “constituents” (i.e., family), then add in their neighborhood, community and so on—seeing the connections between their consuming decisions and the broader good.

Sustainable businesses focus on the corporate and local angle first, then address regional, national and global considerations as they develop. GE is leveraging this approach now with ad campaigns that seem to humanize the behemoth down to the local, “we care about what you do” levels.

3. Women pay attention to whether the brands they buy and retailers they frequent seem to have good working conditions for employees and also support causes that resonate with what’s important to them.

A sustainable business builds corporate responsibility (which includes treating employees fairly), giving, and environmental programs right into their model—and transparently shares what it is doing on those fronts, and what needs work—with their customers. Google is consistently rated as one of the best places to work, with benefits that include a corporate commitment to environmental practices and to healthy/local foods in their cafeterias.

4. Women, moms especially, think and assess the longer-term ramifications of everything. They have long been driving the environmental movement by demanding nontoxic cleaning/household solutions, to start, and then looking at the broader ways they can ensure that their kids and grandkids will have a clean and safe world in which to live.

Sustainable businesses are aware of their energy use and carbon footprint, and are making choices to build or retrofit structures/facilities that address broader environmental concerns over the long run. If they can reduce packaging or make environment-oriented changes to the products they sell, they are doing it. Staid IBM continues to demonstrate a pretty progressive position with its dedication to improving on the environmental front. /

5. Women seek connections and common ground. They look for community in every walk of life and gravitate toward people and organizations that have shared values.

Being a sustainable business and reflecting that commitment throughout gives women an immediate cue that they might find a community of like-minded people—either employees or fellow customers—therein. Shared values are a great brand-customer conversation starter. Wal-Mart, a brand that has already promoted its folksiness in ad campaigns, is trying hard to become known for its sustainable practices and draw in that community of like-minded shoppers.

(More examples of brands that are getting noticed along these lines.)

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Brands that produce the quality and close-to prices of the products that today’s consumers seek, while tending to sustainability along the way, are making it easy for women choose them.

The triple bottom line of good for shareholders, society, and the environment fits to a T the “it all matters,” holistic way that women are known to buy. With the economic power of women inarguably growing, and with women really learning to leverage that power, sustainable businesses clearly have the advantage.

Even the big, traditional brands are noticeably backtracking a bit to change outdated practices and proclaim their new “responsibility.” They have seen the writing on the wall: An authentic and established sustainable commitment resonates with women, who tend to be the largest market for many of the products they sell.

Working toward more sustainable operations and delivering products with that intention behind them is in fact serving how women buy. And, that is good business with a double whammy.

In this time of economic downturn, it is worth it for marketers do just that. The data has not served us all that well lately (part of why the country is in the mess), and, here’s the thing: Most of you reading this newsletter are primed for very well educated gut decisions as it is. Simply because of your years of experience in marketing decision-making, your brain is well fertilized for growing wise and quick judgment calls based on less input. You just have to trust that this is so, and educate your colleagues to do the same.

One way to get more practice at the gut approach is to take a more journalistic approach to gathering and using information – another point I took from Gladwell’s presentation. Consider that journalists have been trained to filter out helpful and unhelpful input very quickly, and they have absolute parameters (in time and budget) that force them to make judgment calls or raise points with a lot less data and a lot more gut.

Non-journalist types have learned that the more input the better, sometimes no matter how long it takes. Marketers, for the most part, do not get rewarded for gut decisions as often as they are recognized for the brand dollars and consulting time that went into a new product development or strategy (“Brand XYZ spent eight gazillion dollars and thousands of consulting hours to come up with this fabulous new ad campaign approach.”)

I have noticed over my years monitoring the marketing to women realm that the big, quantitative and much publicized gender-focused studies certainly produce the results we expect, but perhaps not the insights we seek. However, when you add cross-industry or cross-discipline sources to the usual mix of research and data, and practice, practice, practice filtering out what’s important and what is not, you will be taking a more journalistic and often more trend spotting approach (that not a lot of your competitors are even attempting).

Consider the insights into how men and women buy that might be gleaned from any one interpersonal relationship self-help book. (Now, THAT’s “cross-industry”!) Or, isn’t it possible for a financial services brand to go way off their usual marketing track and learn about how to serve women from auto manufacturers or skincare companies? Yes.

What to do with this commentary of mine? Women’s market students like you and I should strive to take this more journalistic approach. No need to mire ourselves completely in the same old reports and studies that everyone else is reading, but instead, while still giving those things a look, we should also: 1) do our own, as grassroots-as-possible consumer connecting, 2) review all sorts of non-industry marketing case studies or ad campaign best practices, and 3) just become aware of the interconnectedness of random bits of information.

You never really know how your greatest trend spotting or marketing ideas will emerge. Regularly feeding your brain with broad and varied input will seed a unique knowledge bank for powerful marketing ideas that seem, to your competitors, to come from nowhere. But you will know that they came from a trusted and seasoned source indeed.

- I’ve just read news of Dove.com’s new more social media-style web site. – Mom-blog, Dooce.com also recently got big coverage for its advertising sales numbers, even given the take-no-prisoners writing style of its founder, Heather B. Armstrong. – Yahoo just launched it’s “women’s site” – Shine, and; – A month or so ago, Wowowow (say that three times fast) launched with the mission of serving Baby Boom women better than all the other sites out there.

What is going on? These sites are not launching because loads of female consumers are begging brands and media entities for them. No, I’d say it was more a matter of advertisers getting all psyched about this “women’s thing” and rushing to do whatever it takes to seem more involved/committed to female consumers. But, women see right through it.

There is a difference between being a “me-too” online presence and actually delivering something uniquely relevant to an as-yet under-served group of consumers (men, women or both). The former is all about the advertiser, while the latter actually bubbles up from consumer needs or interests. In this recent rash of coverage for women-focused sites, I’d say Yahoo’s Shine was most certainly developed as yet another advertising vehicle for the brand, while Dooce.com launched without a thought to all the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of advertising it now sells. Heather Armstrong, it seems, began that blog as her own thing, and her readers LOVE Dooce.com for its irreverence and individuality – and that’s why the advertisers have come a-callin’.

The new Dove.com is a more creative take on a “women’s site.” and that very female-savvy brand knew they had access to a community of women who already loved their products and mission. So, they developed a site that they hoped would better connect those women to one another, but still also lead to selling more products. In a way, Dove stepped back a bit from their Self Esteem and Evolution video buzz, for instance – and took some time to figure out a way to leverage the goodwill they’d created. Now, they’d like to see some sales growth, of course, so it will be worth keeping an eye on. If any brand could make this happen, Dove would be the one.

All in all – I remain a bit of a skeptic (as is my way). So, what’s the cautionary tale for you? Step back and make sure that any site or blog, “community” or ‘social networking” presence you build or become involved in is really driven by the interests of the consumer and not by your advertising needs first and foremost. Otherwise, it may look flashy and get media coverage, but won’t make a lasting connection with anyone.

By the way, do you think that men feeling slighted because they don’t have as many “men’s sites” to sample?

No. The biggest lesson in reaching women is that, no matter how hard you try, you can never say, “OK. We’ve figured out our female customers.” (Just as you could never reach that point with consumers in general, by the way). But, the first step to facing the issue is a pretty straightforward one:

Admit ignorance. Acknowledge what you don’t know, and that you will need the continual help of your female customers to better serve them.

That space or informational void you admit to having becomes the open invitation for women, who likely have input they’d like to share, to do so.

Women like to be involved and engaged. They appreciate feeling like they have inside information to share with their friends. And, they are delighted to think that their comments may have real traction within the brand. Here’s an example of admitting ignorance and inviting input to really connect in a relevant way with your women’s market:

Say you are on the marketing team for a retail brand that has done very well reaching customers so far, but you are sensing a changing tide in their green/sustainability demands. How do you proceed?

Don’t assume. Invite their input.

While integrating more sustainable practices and policies throughout your corporation might seem a daunting task, it will be worth stepping up. And, it might not need to be as immediately dramatic a project as you’d think. Your customers will likely tell you that even a few “baby” green steps toward the larger goal can reflect your increasing awareness and commitment.

Using feedback and slowly making changes is perhaps less newsworthy (at first), but it still makes a difference with customers.

Why do I bring this up now? Because there are always issues, like the green/sustainability movement, that are perhaps under a woman’s consuming radar for a while, and then – whoosh, become front and center. 2008′s savviest marketers need to be looking beyond the immediate horizon – and be open to getting lots of help from customers – in order to keep up with them.

So, what’s really going on with your customers while the media is focusing on – the presidential election, the car show, or the latest Apple product? Admit you don’t know, start asking, get your customers involved, and take some baby steps in a new direction.