Recently I’ve been spending a lot of time on gated shopping sites (i.e., Haute Look, Rue La La, and Gilt) that have popped up in the past couple of years. Across all of them, they invite me to use the trust my friends have in me, to invite them to join the shopping site. With each successful invitation they’ll credit me $10 (at most sites) and up to $25.
Rewarding word-of-mouth is not a new tactic. But as I think more and more about being a woman and what it means to trust in the age of a social, real-time Web it really struck me yesterday: Brands want to pimp my trust.
As a woman in marketing, I am more critical about being marketed to because I get it. However, reflecting on recent stats from a Comscore report which found that women make up “just less than half of US internet users but make up a disproportionately large share of online buyers, at nearly 58%” I must admit that I am right in the 58%. And what are women buying? Apparel, accessories and jewelry. Hmmm.
But how many of these women send out invitations to their friends to get a measly $10 credit to their accounts? And you probably wonder why am I so fixated on this? It’s one thing to do a product review out of self-motivation, or passion for the product. But once there is something beneficial inciting the action, is it still authentic?
In a recent Ad Age Insights white paper, titled, “The Reality of the Working Woman” the research breaks down what it means to be a female working professional across Boomers, Gen Xers, and Millenials in 2010.
The white paper quotes More magazine’s editor-in-chief Lesley Jane Seymour. “Women don’t just influence the buys—they control it,” she said. “The real revolution is what is happening to men. Women have taken over so much and gotten so far, they don’t know who they are anymore. It is going to be really interesting to watch what has happened to the millennial guys. What has the focus on girls and working women done to this generation of men?”
Wow, this is really a bold statement: “we’ve gone so far that we don’t know who we are anymore.” Are the exchanges that are happening between women online authentic? Do we know what we want? Regardless, we are all still shopping, something we’ve always been doing in the age of commercialism. And now as an increasing percent of the breadwinners, we have the buying power in many cases to expend on disposable items such as beauty and fashion. And frankly, men now play a different role in the lives of women given the autonomy that women increasingly possess.
So, what does this all mean? Be thoughtful about how your friends look to you as a trusted source – especially since the greatest commodity these days is time.
Just don’t pimp my trust, and as a marketer I won’t pimp yours. Look to engage with your fellow working women online in ways that support both of you. If you’re going to invite someone to benefit $10, do so in ways that really support the greater good. And that goes for men, too.
Photo credit by thorinside
