Does Dell Know What Women Want In a Laptop?

Hugh Pickens writes "Finding the right approach for gender-specific marketing can be really tricky, said Andrea Learned, a marketing expert and author of Don't Think Pink — What Really Makes Women Buy. So when Dell recently took the wraps off a new Web site called Della, geared toward women, featuring tech 'tips' that recommended calorie counting, finding recipes, and watching cooking videos as ways for women to get the most from a laptop, a backlash erupted online, as both women and men described the Web site as 'ridiculous' and 'gimmicky.' Della's heavy emphasis on colors, computer accessories, dieting tips, and even the inclusion of a video about vintage shopping 'seems condescending to women consumers,' says Learned. Instead, Dell should have emphasized function and figured out ways to sell the netbooks that weren't clichéd and reliant on gender stereotypes. 'Some brands go too far with the girlie stuff,' Learned says. 'Della's marketing strategy sounds like it's advertising a purse. There's a level of consumer sophistication they're missing.'"

Comments

News flash...

[Overzeetop]

In the top ten percent of the personal market, women want very similar things to men. In the bottom 90, they want pink frilly stuff. If you want the 90%, you have to figure out how to silence the 10% of people you're going to offend.

Hint: Men are the same way (not the pink part). Give them sports data and stuff with their favorite team logos.

Business is a whole different world...

Re:Stereotypes usually have some kernal of truth

[smooth wombat]

Then after a month, come back to me and tell me how comfortable you felt about doing it.

I'm not the OP but I did wear a pink shirt for a while when I had to wear a tie. It was a very nice pink. Only one person asked me about the color and I had no problem telling them I liked the color of the shirt.

That said, I also have a wonderful, no-longer-able-to-find tangerine-colored shirt which I wear in the cooler months. I would like to find more shirts like this but retailers, aside from not carrying clothes in my size, are more interested in grey, black and white than they are about splashy colors to liven up ones day.

But that's just me. I'm still trying to find a neon-yellow shirt I saw at a store closeout but wasn't in my size. It's from a well known manufacturer but I haven't been able to find that shirt anywhere.

While stereotypes, as others have pointed, are there for a reason, there are always exceptions to the rule.

Recipes? Cooking videos?

[kimvette]

Recipes? Check.
Cooking videos? Check.
Calorie counting? Check.

However, I also do:

* occasional gaming (unfortunately I need to run Windows for that - neither cedega nor crossover games will run the games)
* video editing and transcoding
* graphic design
* embroidery (unfortunately I need to run Windows for that)
* web design
* occasional small coding projects

My preferred environment is Linux. When I buy desktop computers, I build them myself; I want workstation-level motherboards and nvidia-based video cards with low failure rates and decent performance.

When I buy laptops, I seek out desktop performance. For me, that means Dell Precision, Dell Latitude, or a higher-end Asus. Fast dual core processor (quad core isn't worth the premium Dell charges), internal RAID, and the smallest hard drives and RAM they'll ship because I can upgrade those from a distributor or Newegg for 1/5 to 1/3 the markup Dell charges.

It'd be really neat if I could get a Precision M4400 or M6400 in purple or hot pink, or even blue, but unfortunately the only option is an orange color (Covet). Thanks but no thanks, I'll take the industrial-looking graphite.

Now, when it comes to a netbook, which I will buy, a nice blue would be nice. The Aspire One would do nicely but there is a huge range of options, and since the goal there is solely maximum portability, performance isn't the goal. For a netbook I will accept compromises for style.

A computer is a tool, not an accessory. When it comes to tools I try to be practical.

$.02