diagram of a store that says how men do shopping with very short straight lines and how women do shopping with lots of squiggly lines. the word "men" has been crossed out and replaced with "item shoppers" and the word "women" has been crossed out and replaced with "power shoppers".

Do women shop differently than men? Yikes—Is that sexist?

Or is that missing the point entirely?

History is so littered with the bones of misogynist “truths” that typically we either take them as gospel, or take them for granted. But sometimes there’s a hidden nugget of truth that is genuinely helpful. You can see it in “Women shop differently than men”, but only if you don’t fall into old tropes that no longer fit.  

Change the phrasing and uncover it’s true power

Every woman doesn’t shop differently than every man, but power shoppers do shop very differently than item shoppers. Power shoppers love to shop, shop often, and typically buy more when they do. Item shoppers can’t be bothered looking around at things they don’t need yet, they get what they came for, and they get out. Item shoppers look at shopping as a chore that needs to be done efficiently and infrequently. 

Animated gif showing a laptop that displays Stylaquin's Look Book Feature

Does Your Site Do This?

It can with Stylaquin! Stylaquin is the easy to add Shopify app that transforms your website. Stylaquin makes shopping faster, more engaging, and more fun. Stylaquin shoppers stay longer, view over 85% more products, come back more often, and buy more when they do. Find us in the Shopify App Store.

Online shopping is still designed for item shoppers

The online experience was originally designed to replace call centers for catalogers. Anyone remember “Open 24/7”? Primordial e-commerce used quick-shop codes so you could buy things by number. The web was too slow for many images back in the 90’s, but over time it got faster. And then nothing really changed. Nothing. Which is surprising since the pandemic changed where we shop and online is now a much bigger channel than it was in 2019. Think about how odd it is that after 40 years the online shopping experience is still designed for item shoppers.

But what about the power shoppers?

Yes, why aren’t power shoppers getting their needs met? They love shopping, they spend more time shopping, and they buy more than item shoppers. Well, until Stylaquin arrived, there was no way to have both experiences, the one that works for item shoppers, and the one that works for power shoppers, on the same website. (Actually there has never really been anything designed for power shoppers, but letting that go for now.) With Stylaquin, both kinds of shoppers can have their ideal shopping experience on the same website, without re-engineering. 

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

The Stylaquin Idea Board keeps customers engaged in two ways: it’s an interactive styling board where shoppers can collect and curate all the things that interest them; and it also acts as a wishlist that shoppers can return to. Find us in the Shopify App Store.

Animated gif showing a laptop displaying Stylaquin's Idea Board

What do power shoppers want?

Have you ever watched people shop? Really spent some time watching and thinking about the actual process of searching, sorting, trying/imagining, curating, selecting and buying? There’s a lot of brain engagement that goes into making a purchase for those who care about how things will look, fit, coordinate, delight, and fit into a budget. (Power shoppers!) 

Browsing

Power shoppers like browsing and they want to have fun doing it. It’s that simple—power shoppers like looking at things they could buy. You’ve heard the phrase “Retail therapy”, it’s just a human thing to enjoy looking at things you can buy. Some clearly find it more therapeutic than others. Power shoppers LOVE browsing. Stylaquin’s Look Book feature lets them flip through a site like they flip through a magazine. It’s faster and more fun. It’s also intuitive and makes the experience more engaging. We are all slaves to the pleasure centers in our brains. We do more of the things we enjoy. Make the shopping experience more fun and engaging, and shoppers will come back for more.

Collecting and curating

One of the biggest problems power shoppers have is that it’s hard to collect and curate all their options before committing to the cart. Power shoppers will create lots of open tabs, one with each item they’re interested in. This isn’t an ideal shopping experience, but it gets the job done. Stylaquin solves that problem with the Idea Board. It’s both an interactive styling board and a wish list. Power shoppers can add all the things that interest them, move them around to see them together, change colors and sizes, and if they make the cut, add them to the cart right from the Idea Board. The items on the Idea Board remain there as long as the cookie is active so when shoppers revisit the site, they can pick up right where they left off. That’s why Stylaquin shoppers come back more often and buy more when they do. 

Make your store power shopper friendly

If you’re on Shopify, it takes less than 15 minutes to add the Stylaquin app. The Look Book pages are created automatically, and the biggest decision you’ll have to make is what color you want to make the Stylaquin bar so it matches your website. (Of course you can change it whenever you want to.) 

Power shoppers are the backbone of the e-commerce world, it’s time they got the love and shopping experience they deserve!

Picture of Stylaquin

Stylaquin

Helping you engage and delight shoppers!

One thought on “Do women shop differently than men? Yikes—Is that sexist?

  1. Pingback: The future of online shopping is actually easy - Stylaquin

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