At least 1 out of every 4 Americans owns a smartphone and this number is only going up. Half of all Americans will likely have a smartphone by Dec. 2011 and the development is greatly changing the way that individuals shop and interact with retailers. Market research has identified a group known as mobile shopping warriors…in other words “hyper-connected individuals” who will account for 28 percent of The National Retail Federation’s consumer projections for holiday shopping. This means that over $125 million in purchases will be completed via mobile devices.

We’re definitely in the thick of the holiday shopping season, what with Black Friday and its newer counterpart, Cyber Monday having passed by a few weeks ago. No matter, it’s not too late to identify and reach consumers to boost those holiday sales. Thanks to a Retail Shopper Segmentation System by Experian Simmons, businesses can be more aware of who is shopping and therefore strategize on how to reach them. The market research finds shoppers to fall into the following 6 segments:

The above quote is from a great book by Brian Solis & Deirdre Breakenridge called Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR. It's definitely something to consider as social media continues to permeate many aspects of our society. If virtually everything we do online is visible to somebody, how do the choices we make affect our image, both in the digital world and "in real life?" Things to ponder!

Today's blog post turns the spotlight on a woman who definitely embodies the phrase "She's SO Empowered," California's First Lady Maria Shriver. She might have grown up as a member of the iconic Kennedy family (her mother Eunice was sister to US President John F. Kennedy), but she certainly hasn't rested on any laurels of her famous name. The Women's Conference is an annual event that she has led since 2004, having built it into the largest one-day conference for women in the nation. When the event began in 1985, it was to serve as a nonpartisan forum for women business owners. At that time, women-owned businesses were failing at a high rate and the conference was created to provide support to this growing sector of the economy and to help women access funding and resources. Shriver holds fast to her belief in the "power of WE," working to empower women everywhere.

It’s no secret that the spending power of women is a force to be reckoned with. Statistics show that women make the majority of the household purchasing decisions both for family and personal needs. Marketers have begun to take notice of this trend, but another important demographic within the female sector that offers great opportunity for segmentation is that of the “tween population.” Tween refers to the stage of life between childhood and teenage years. In ‘olden days’ you were considered a child until the age of 13. Restaurants provided a kid’s menu for ages 12 and under and parents demanded that we eat accordingly. Now, young people identify themselves as tweens starting at about 8 years old.

Social media, while once the wave of the future, is now here to stay. In this day and age, if an organization doesn’t have and maintain a Facebook page, we just don’t know what to think. When we want to tag a brand in a post, whether it be for professional or personal purposes, if there isn’t anything to tag, we are left scratching our heads.

HER VOICE has lived in my subconscience for years. As a little girl growing up in North Carolina I wanted to BE Karen Carpenter. HER VOICE captivated me. I would stand in front of the mirror singing her songs for hours, secretly wishing that someday, I would possess the power to make people feel how Karen Carpenter made me feel through her music. So, I became a professional singer (my voice teacher told me that if I made enough money singing to pay the rent and feed myself for a year, I could call myself a professional). It took me years to embrace that word, and even longer to embrace the fact that I'm a creative and talented marketing professional.