eMarketing for Women

In today’s global economy, the ability to connect with other professionals is essential. Whether you are in a networking event, a business meeting, or even a job interview, developing relationships can help you grow your career, your business, and even your social network. Women in particular face a few challenges in this area, I explore them further and provide some suggestions on how to overcome them.

First, women are reluctant to speak to strangers. Since we were little girls our parents told us is not safe to talk to strangers, and somehow that idea still lurks in our minds as we become grown women and approach the later stages in our lives. However, in business talking to strangers is a necessity to market our products and services, and to grow our own personal brand.

If women only talk to the people they are familiar with, we will miss opportunities to make new connections and establish valuable contacts.

Techniques for Women to market themselves in Networking Events:

1. Have clear goals before you attend the event. Review the attendance sheet and decide who you want to talk to. Make a plan to have questions to ask by researching the company and the industry. Read on industry news and trends so you sound knowledgeable and sincerely interested in what they do. That should give you the confidence you need to approach strangers in a networking event or any other industry event.

2. Be confident in how you look. It is very importalnt that we feel confident in how we look and feel, so thatwe are clear to focus on the event and the people we want to meet. How many times have you left the house hating what you are wearing?

Plan the night before what you are going to wear the next day, together with shoes and jewelry, even put it on to make sure it all feels right, and the next day you take the guess work out of getting dressed. But don’t be afraid to change if you do not ‘feel’ the outfit. The important thing is to feel confident on your appearance and yourself.

3. Rehearse a self-introduction. Since men usually initiate conversations in a social setting, women many times feel intimidated to just walk up to a stranger and start a conversation. If you are prepared, you will feel confident to start a dialogue and the conversation can run smooth from there.

4. Ignore the preception that you may be flirting! This is an unspoken misconception that have cast a shadow on professional women for many many years. It can be misconstrued as flirting when a woman approaches a man with a confident smile, shake his hand, and start a conversation.

Women, do not be afraid of this, it is a fact that may never change. We can no longer hold back because of this silly misconception and must move forward and take advantage of any and all opportunities to harbor relationships that will serve beneficial for our careers.

So to recap, be confident, have a plan, know what to say, and networking will become easier with time. It is a skill that will take some time to master, but as long as you are putting yourself out there and try, you will be fine.

By Geludys del Rosario

The percentage of women involved in the STEM fields is shrinking. According to the Commission on Professionals in Science & Technology, the share of engineering baccalaureates earned by women dropped to 18.6% in 2007, down from 19.3% in 2006. One reason for this can be the failure of the education system in encouraging women to pursue highly paid careers in Engineering and in the computer sciences.

NPR reported this week that many colleges (especially community colleges) where many women start their career path back to school, do nothing to attract them to the male dominated world of engineering. The majority of those women going back to school include single moms, stay at home moms and low income women. They are not encouraged to obtain degrees in highly paid positions in technology or science. Instead, they fall into the comfortable pattern of the business school or the education career path, increasing the already growing gender gap in the technical field. (more…)

By Geludys del Rosario

As consumers, the internet is a great tool to research brands, products, read reviews and check prices before we buy. It has become an integral part of our lives as we can research anything from today’s weather to how much a vacation might cost. The fact that we can also interact with vendors and our favorite brands, makes it an enjoyable experience for most. And that rings true especially with women.

According to 2009 Women and Social Media Study by BlogHer, iVillage and Compass Partners, it found that over 50% of 2,821 females surveyed interact with a form of social media. Whether is posting videos on YouTube, updating your Facebook status, or printing those precious sale coupons, women should play a great part in how advertising target their online presence to them.

Many brands are joining the social media movement by investing more dollars into it, and making a bet that by making it more interactive; women will buy their products, and tell her friends. Pepsi gave up over one third of its advertising budget to ditch the superbowl, and instead invest in a charitable giving social media campaign called The Pepsi Refresh Project.

It has given so far twenty million dollars for art projects, health related grants to build hospitals and schools, rebuilt playgrounds across the country. Everything from cheerleading squads for disabled students and a project to make school bus windshields more aerodynamic. Though it has acquired some criticism in the last months for alleged voter fraud, it has become the best known charitable campaign on the internet. (more…)

by Geludys del Rosario

We are living in a world where information sharing is everywhere. We login into social networking sites to share what we did last weekend, our family photos, what we think about a new movie or a new restaurant. Sharing our political views is no different, according to a Pew report prepared around the political campaign of 2008 called “The Internet’s Role in Campaign 2008”, the researchers at the Pew Institute found out that 74 percent of the online population visited online blogs and news sites to get involved in the political campaign, to get information about the candidates and their views on the issues that the American people want to know about. The numbers have not come out for this current political campaign, but based on my own personal observation, it looks just as impressive as in 2008.

Every candidate has a YouTube channel, a Facebook account, Twitter, Tumblr and any social networking media outlet they can use to reach as many voters as possible. The millions of people that use the same outlets are exposed to political propaganda and personal messages from these candidates, who push their message with the purpose of persuading voters to get them to office.

All these facts bring up one interesting question, is this information the truth? Or is it riddled with bias from the writers of these blogs who speak their mind based on their own personal preferences to one party versus another? Who and what can you trust? (more…)

By Geludys del Rosario

Here comes another platform for all of us to keep tabs on each other, welcome Tumblr to the scene. In this era of tweets, Facebook wall updates and YouTube videos featuring everything and everyone, do we really need another site to keep up and update? When will we have time to actually “interact” with our “actual” friends?

Tumblr gives you the feeling of a WordPress blog, but the blue background and big white letters give it a very cool feel that appeals to a younger and hip audience. Actually, it appeals to everyone that wants to be cool and hip.

Navigating on the site, I see everyone from political candidates to fashion designers is joining the Tumblr bandwagon. But are they going to keep up with their pages? Or is it going to be a land of abandoned web real estate, much like MySpace have become?

If Tumblr suddenly starts to head for the web cemetery or the land of the forgotten, it could be attributed to a few factors. Innovation is one of them. One lesson learned from MySpace is the fact that News Corp, the big mogul behind the site, have failed to keep the layout and navigation of the site fresh and interesting to their young demographic. Tumblr is not immune to this, it needs to understand that in order to keep their users coming back and interacting with their site, it has to offer new and entertaining ways to keep users from moving on to the next best thing. (more…)