Op-Ed: In Social Media Networking, Women Equal Power For Advertisers

ShesConnected, a social network for women, recently published a report on the power of social networking for women. As social networking weaves its way into all aspects of society, marketers are looking at women in a new light, a powerful force to pursue.

While ShesConnected was researching women and social media networking for their own site, that research may be important to others in the business world. The study showed that women are engaging in social media and social networks faster than men. They use these media tools as a means of promoting their business, connecting with others with like interests and using the tools to better organize their lives while staying in touch with those close to them. Women spend more time on social networks than men. That is important to advertisers as women control up to 85 percent of all household spending. Advertisers spent over $23 billion in 2008 on Internet adverts in the United States alone. It has been estimated by eMarketer that $1.56 billion of that money was spent on Social Networking. That represents only 6.7 per cent of monies spent on advertising in an area that is being populated by billions of people worldwide everyday. ShesConnected believes that part of the reason that advertisers spent so little on social media adverts is that in the past the demographic was the youth market. That market has rapidly changed in just the past few years towards a more professional demographic. Social Media networking is no longer an unproven market. As the social media world explodes it is reasonable to assume that the advertisers will seize the opportunities that exist in the medium. That medium is far reaching. It is estimated that one person can connect easily to as many as 110 people during a single session online. Those who use social media are more likely to also use the Internet for their shopping. Liana Evans specializes in social media marketing, blog optimization, video and pod optimization. She has spoken at Search Engine Strategies, WebmasterWorld’s PubCon, and Search Marketing Expo about social media. In her blog Evans wrote: “there is a definite difference in how men and women utilize, share, communicate and move around in social media. Women converse and share more. They want to talk about their experiences or express their feelings – whether they are raving about a product or pissed off about the service they receive. Men are less

expressive. It’s rare you see a man gushing about the brand new suit he picked up.” According to the Small Business Administration women are the fastest group of business owners. Women who are starting their own businesses tend to be older and more educated that other working women. Women on average spend several hours online during their working day. They are not limited to one social media network, often they are members of three or more networks. It is clear that social media networking is an under used area when it comes to the advertising dollar. In the future more of those advert monies will be focused at the medium. The research study was sent to be in a pdf file. Those interested in the entire study please contact me for the file.