Women on the web

Written By: - Date published: 8:00 pm, August 2nd, 2009 - 3 comments
Categories: blogs - Tags:

Is the blogging world becoming more gender balanced? This story in the Times indicates there’s a group who are wanting to get some space. But what interested me was that some big business names are getting involved:

Not only have attendee numbers increased from just a few hundred at the first conference in 2005, but big-name sponsors have taken notice. Microsoft Office, Nokia and PepsiCo are in attendance. General Motors has signed on for the fourth year running.

The owner of the social media consulting firm Lava Row, Nathan Wright, is here along with one of his clients who sponsored a party. While the number of bloggers here is comparatively small, says Wright, ‘their influence and voice are pretty huge’.

He cites the example of the major pharmaceutical company that provoked the ire of mums with a controversial advertisement for a pain reliever called Motrin. After a blogging campaign against the company, it scrapped the ad and embarked on serious spin. All the sponsors say the same — women online are a group too powerful to ignore.

Yet further confirmation that the advertising/marketing world is revolutionising around social media.

3 comments on “Women on the web ”

  1. just another student 1

    I think women are finding their “public voice”. The web is the idea place for them to develop it. Big business would be fools to ignore the trend.

  2. Deciduous 2

    I think that big business have always known where the majority of the household spend is spent from (the housewifes purse), web 2.0 / social media is just another touch point, along with existing websites and mailing lists etc to the consumer so not really a paradigm shift in how consumers interact with ‘big biz’. Not unless you happen to run a website design agency or social media consulting firm as they are now known.

  3. The blogging world becoming more gender balanced? I’m unsure whether Michelle Boag’s blog adds to the sum total of female blog happiness but it puts in the number, I suppose.

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