I presented at the 2006 Synergy conference hosted by UW-Stout in Menomonie, WI, this week. I offered the standard insights on Next Cities and shared the findings of our research project: the West Central Wisconsin region’s handprint.
Following my presentation, the 200+ attendees asked serious questions about brain drain and how to market the region to newcomers and “boomerangers.” The most provocative question (i.e. I was stumped) was, “do women and men make relocation decisions differently, and if so, shouldn’t our handprint reflect it?”
Ahh, grasshopper, this is an excellent question.
My response included anecdotal evidence that women not only choose differently, they may be more important than their husbands in relocation decisions. Here are examples to support both arguments:
- Lowe’s home improvement stores allegedly redesigned their stores after research showed that women drive their households’ decision about home improvement projects. They cleaned and brightened their stores, put featured products at a targeted height of 5 feet 6 inches, and featured fully assembled products that appeal to women’s aesthetic eye;
- Executive placement agencies tell stories of male executives deferring to their wives on whether to relocate or not. Their wives often ask about quality of schools, soccer clubs, and shopping before giving their husbands the green light to accept the job offer.
To test the assumption of whether women or men make relocation decisions differently, we will add “gender” to our 2006-2007 Global YP Survey, which will be distributed through YP organizations across the country in the last quarter of this year. Stay tuned. And if your YP leader is not already signed up and coming to the 2006 International YP Summit in Madison, WI next week, I’m sure you can still snag a modest airfare online.
If you’re serious about market research on women consumers, you can drop a thousand Benjamins on DataMonitor’s research. Here’s the abstract.
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