• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
QuestionPro

QuestionPro

questionpro logo
  • Products
    survey software iconSurvey softwareEasy to use and accessible for everyone. Design, send and analyze online surveys.research edition iconResearch SuiteA suite of enterprise-grade research tools for market research professionals.CX iconCustomer ExperienceExperiences change the world. Deliver the best with our CX management software.WF iconEmployee ExperienceCreate the best employee experience and act on real-time data from end to end.
  • Solutions
    IndustriesGamingAutomotiveSports and eventsEducationGovernment
    Travel & HospitalityFinancial ServicesHealthcareCannabisTechnology
    Use CaseAskWhyCommunitiesAudienceContactless surveysMobile
    LivePollsMember ExperienceGDPRPositive People Science360 Feedback Surveys
  • Resources
    BlogeBooksSurvey TemplatesCase StudiesTrainingHelp center
  • Features
  • Pricing
Language
  • English
  • Español (Spanish)
  • Português (Portuguese (Brazil))
  • Nederlands (Dutch)
  • العربية (Arabic)
  • Français (French)
  • Italiano (Italian)
  • 日本語 (Japanese)
  • Türkçe (Turkish)
  • Svenska (Swedish)
  • Hebrew IL (Hebrew)
  • ไทย (Thai)
  • Deutsch (German)
  • Portuguese de Portugal (Portuguese (Portugal))
Call Us
+1 800 531 0228 +1 (647) 956-1242 +52 999 402 4079 +49 301 663 5782 +44 20 3650 3166 +81-3-6869-1954 +61 2 8074 5080 +971 529 852 540
Log In Log In
SIGN UP FREE

Home Market Research

How to Start Marketing to Men

selling to men

Last week I wrote a quick article on marketing to women. So you shouldn’t be surprised that I’m going to give equal time to the guys in this article.

selling to men

While it’s common to say that women are “ignored” in a variety of segments, I can say that the men have been ignored in just as many traditionally female segments.

Big brands have finally opened up to the possibility that guys like the same things as the “fairer sex” but small business hasn’t quite gotten on board with all that. I mean, have you seen the health and beauty sections of the grocery store lately?  And what about the TV advertising for skin care, deodorant and hair care products that are squarely aimed at the guys?  In fact, if you think about the products and services that you’re selling — YES — even you B2B folks, you’ll find that with a little messaging tweak, you could open up a whole world of opportunities with MEN.

Understand how your “male” customer thinks and feels

So the first of these three things that we need to do is understand how a man thinks and feels. The reason we have stereotypes is because they are often very true.

First, let’s get one thing straight.  EVERY purchase decision is an emotional decision.  It’s just that men relate differently to their emotions. They aren’t as easily swayed by their emotions and they tend to internalize their emotions.  Men are more visual and while it appears (from the outside) that they are feature focused, there are subtle tweaks in your messaging that can really make a difference.

Check out this commercial for Ford Trucks with the Dennis Leary voice over –

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnfE5zODgak]

Notice how the choice of Dennis Leary (a no-nonesense, plain talking, celebrity recently known for playing an NYPD firefighter on the acclaimed TV series “Rescue Me”)  I mean if there were any more male-triggering symbols in just the voice over, the screen would explode.

Then pay attention to the actual script copy — notice how they’ve matched visuals to features and tightly knit it inside of a lot of emotional triggers.  From the CONTENT, you think it’s about feature, but the context is pure HERO, get it done kinda dude.

You don’t get results like this from just throwing something up on the tube — you get it by doing the work it takes to get there.

Create memorable experiences based on real-time data, insights and advanced analysis. Request Demo

Do your research

Next thing you want to do is conduct surveys. Don’t believe everything that you hear and read. Find out for yourself. If you have free space on your web site, assuming you have one, place a survey box on it with some basic questions related to your product. If you’re an offline business, build a mailing list and send out questionnaires. Get as much data as you can. It’s critical to your success.

For example, let’s say you’re selling golf clubs. Golf is a typical thing that a man does in his free time, though women are into it as well. But both have different expectations out of the golfing experience (refer back to how men and woman feel differently) unless of course they’re playing on a pro level.

Ask the prospect what they want most out of a golf club. Is it the feel? Is it how far they can drive the ball over all else? How important is price? Are they more inclined to trust a brand name over a no name brand? And so on.

You can get more information out of surveys then you can by simply trying to guess. Nothing beats going directly to the horse’s mouth for the answer.

Watch the big brands

Finally, and this is so easy to do, is to actually look and see what the competition itself is doing. There is an old rule of thumb in marketing. Your competition will tell you all you need to know about your target market by the way THEY approach that market. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. The successful companies in your niche have already done the leg work. Look to see what the best selling products are in your niche. Then analyze the approach. This is an excellent exercise in improving your own marketing skills as you might see tactics that you might have never thought of before such as using videos or Facebook ads to reach your target market.

What you need to get, more than anything, out of this article is that men and women are indeed different and you can’t market to them the same way. Men, for the most part, are driven by power, money and sex and not necessarily in that order. They need to be in control of their situation at all time. They do not like feeling vulnerable and become very uncomfortable when they are. Don’t try to sweet talk him with how he’ll fall in love with his new Porsche. Just tell him how fast it’ll go and how all the women will be climbing all over him.

In other words, get to the point. What’s in it for him?

Do that, understand his feelings and scope out the competition and you’ll be more than on your way to marketing to a man in a, whether we like it or not, man’s world.
photo credit: PatLoika via photopin cc

SHARE THIS ARTICLE:

About the author
Ivana Taylor
Ivana Taylor provides DIY Marketing advice, marketing trends and marketing how-to tips and strategies for small business owners and CEOs.
View all posts by Ivana Taylor

Primary Sidebar

Research what's on your mind. Find out what's on theirs!

A suite of tools to leverage research and transform insights.

Discover our insight platform

RELATED ARTICLES

HubSpot - QuestionPro Integration

Popular poll questions with examples and samples

Jun 22,2023

HubSpot - QuestionPro Integration

The Holiday Inn Customer Experience: Why Caring Matters

Sep 19,2023

HubSpot - QuestionPro Integration

Customer Engagement Platforms to Boost Interaction

Oct 01,2024

BROWSE BY CATEGORY

  • Academic
  • Academic Research
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Assessments
  • Audience
  • Brand Awareness
  • Business
  • Case Studies
  • Communities
  • Consumer Insights
  • Customer effort score
  • Customer Engagement
  • Customer Experience
  • Customer Loyalty
  • Customer Research
  • Customer Satisfaction
  • CX
  • Employee Benefits
  • Employee Engagement
  • Employee Engagement
  • Employee Retention
  • Enterprise
  • Events
  • Forms
  • Friday Five
  • General Data Protection Regulation
  • Guest Post
  • Insights Hub
  • Life@QuestionPro
  • LivePolls
  • Market Research
  • Marketing
  • Mobile
  • Mobile App
  • Mobile diaries
  • Mobile Surveys
  • New Features
  • non-profit
  • NPS
  • Online Communities
  • Polls
  • Question Types
  • Questionnaire
  • QuestionPro
  • QuestionPro Products
  • Release Notes
  • Research Tools and Apps
  • Revenue at Risk
  • Startups
  • Survey Templates
  • Surveys
  • Tech News
  • Tips
  • Training
  • Training Tips
  • Trending
  • Tuesday CX Thoughts (TCXT)
  • Uncategorized
  • VOC
  • Webinar
  • Webinars
  • What’s Coming Up
  • Workforce
  • Workforce Intelligence

Footer

MORE LIKE THIS

albertsons-companies-nps-2025

Albertsons Companies NPS and Insights in 2025

May 23, 2025

data-augmentation

What is Data Augmentation? Methods & Uses in Research

May 22, 2025

livecast a new way to do research

Here’s how LiveCast can help you survive the great Stanley Cup debate of 2025

May 22, 2025

Credit-Unions-NPS-2025

Credit Unions NPS Leading in Loyalty in 2025

May 21, 2025

Other categories

  • Academic
  • Academic Research
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Assessments
  • Audience
  • Brand Awareness
  • Business
  • Case Studies
  • Communities
  • Consumer Insights
  • Customer effort score
  • Customer Engagement
  • Customer Experience
  • Customer Loyalty
  • Customer Research
  • Customer Satisfaction
  • CX
  • Employee Benefits
  • Employee Engagement
  • Employee Engagement
  • Employee Retention
  • Enterprise
  • Events
  • Forms
  • Friday Five
  • General Data Protection Regulation
  • Guest Post
  • Insights Hub
  • Life@QuestionPro
  • LivePolls
  • Market Research
  • Marketing
  • Mobile
  • Mobile App
  • Mobile diaries
  • Mobile Surveys
  • New Features
  • non-profit
  • NPS
  • Online Communities
  • Polls
  • Question Types
  • Questionnaire
  • QuestionPro
  • QuestionPro Products
  • Release Notes
  • Research Tools and Apps
  • Revenue at Risk
  • Startups
  • Survey Templates
  • Surveys
  • Tech News
  • Tips
  • Training
  • Training Tips
  • Trending
  • Tuesday CX Thoughts (TCXT)
  • Uncategorized
  • VOC
  • Webinar
  • Webinars
  • What’s Coming Up
  • Workforce
  • Workforce Intelligence

questionpro-logo-nw
Help center Live Chat SIGN UP FREE
  • Sample questions
  • Sample reports
  • Survey logic
  • Branding
  • Integrations
  • Professional services
  • Security
  • Survey Software
  • Customer Experience
  • Workforce
  • Communities
  • Audience
  • Polls Explore the QuestionPro Poll Software - The World's leading Online Poll Maker & Creator. Create online polls, distribute them using email and multiple other options and start analyzing poll results.
  • Research Edition
  • LivePolls
  • InsightsHub
  • Blog
  • Articles
  • eBooks
  • Survey Templates
  • Case Studies
  • Training
  • Webinars
  • All Plans
  • Nonprofit
  • Academic
  • Qualtrics Alternative Explore the list of features that QuestionPro has compared to Qualtrics and learn how you can get more, for less.
  • SurveyMonkey Alternative
  • VisionCritical Alternative
  • Medallia Alternative
  • Likert Scale Complete Likert Scale Questions, Examples and Surveys for 5, 7 and 9 point scales. Learn everything about Likert Scale with corresponding example for each question and survey demonstrations.
  • Conjoint Analysis
  • Net Promoter Score (NPS) Learn everything about Net Promoter Score (NPS) and the Net Promoter Question. Get a clear view on the universal Net Promoter Score Formula, how to undertake Net Promoter Score Calculation followed by a simple Net Promoter Score Example.
  • Offline Surveys
  • Customer Satisfaction Surveys
  • Employee Survey Software Employee survey software & tool to create, send and analyze employee surveys. Get real-time analysis for employee satisfaction, engagement, work culture and map your employee experience from onboarding to exit!
  • Market Research Survey Software Real-time, automated and advanced market research survey software & tool to create surveys, collect data and analyze results for actionable market insights.
  • GDPR & EU Compliance
  • Employee Experience
  • Customer Journey
  • Synthetic Data
  • About us
  • Executive Team
  • In the news
  • Testimonials
  • Advisory Board
  • Careers
  • Brand
  • Media Kit
  • Contact Us

QuestionPro in your language

  • English
  • Español (Spanish)
  • Português (Portuguese (Brazil))
  • Nederlands (Dutch)
  • العربية (Arabic)
  • Français (French)
  • Italiano (Italian)
  • 日本語 (Japanese)
  • Türkçe (Turkish)
  • Svenska (Swedish)
  • Hebrew IL (Hebrew)
  • ไทย (Thai)
  • Deutsch (German)
  • Portuguese de Portugal (Portuguese (Portugal))

Awards & certificates

  • survey-leader-asia-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-asiapacific-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-enterprise-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-europe-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-latinamerica-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-middleeast-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-mid-market-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-small-business-leader-2023
  • survey-leader-unitedkingdom-leader-2023
  • survey-momentumleader-leader-2023
  • bbb-acredited
The Experience Journal

Find innovative ideas about Experience Management from the experts

  • © 2022 QuestionPro Survey Software | +1 (800) 531 0228
  • Sitemap
  • Privacy Statement
  • Terms of Use