Personal approach offers female edge

30 June 2010

Women value strong relationships with individual service providers more than men, a new study into consumer loyalty has revealed.

Dutch University Erasmus has found that while both genders value loyalty, men tend to be stay true to a company or brand whereas women value personal relationships.

The study, which took in a series of different experiments, shows that women are more likely to follow an individual should they move company. Erasmus University’s professor of marketing at Rotterdem school of management Stijn van Osselar said the report showed that “marketers should make sure they treat women as individuals and encourage one-on-one relationships.”

Various techniques were used to compile the report, including using a number of male and female graduates to generate a list of 20 different things that they were loyal to. Female respondents were more likely to relate the phrase ‘I am loyal to...’ to individual people or things.

The research was conducted by van Osselar with the help of Valentyna Melnyk, senior lecturer at the University of Waikato in New Zeland and Tammo Bijmolt, professor of marketing research at the University of Groningen.

Josh Colley, London