Whether Jane is a CEO in charge of major company purchases; whether she is an office manager in charge of supply cabinet and conference room; whether she is a homemaker trying to keep her family happy and healthy; or whether she is a college graduate starting a new career; Jane is looking for you online and she isn’t asking Dick’s permission to buy. She needs office supplies; she needs a good leather briefcase, a cell phone, a PDA, a desk, a picture frame for her desk, a new car, and business, career, or health advice. She needs business cards and stationery. She needs technology advice and financial advice. She needs all of things her partner and friend Dick needs. Sell them to her.

Bury those old Dick and Jane days and their outmoded thinking with your 4.5inch floppies and old versions of DOS. Join new millennium and get with game: women as entrepreneurs are looking for you online. If they like what they see, they’ll go home, put on their consumer hat and share their good fortune with all their friends, both male and female. The fact is, more than half of time your message is being looked at by Jane, not Dick. Forward thinkers will also recognize that marketing to Jane doesn’t alienate Dick. He’s merely waiting for Jane to give him head’s up.

Offline vs. Online: Hand in Hand We Go Everyone knows that women are shoppers of world. Make friends with them. In 2003, Maya Draisin, of Webby Awards, http://www.webbyawards.com/main/in_motion/index.html had this to say about e-commerce, “The trend this year is toward using Web to connect people online to mobilize them offline.”

This means if you make friends with women, they will shop at your Web site and also at your offline store, if you have one. Today, women purchase or influence purchase of more than half of normally male-dominated products such as cars, lawn mowers, computers, and other electronics. What’s not to like about that? Smart Marketing to Women Online; it’s a good way to start 2004 and a great way to make some loyal new friends and customers.

This is a short sighted tactic because it invites "price wars", and if you get involved in a "price war" against an opponent with deeper pockets you are bound to loose.

A better strategy is to compete on high product value and build quality Brand recognition over time.

Brands Are Not Eternal ----------------------

Brand building is an ongoing Business strategy.

The emotional and intellectual associations and recognition that together make up Brand loyalty wear off if not re-energised frequently.

Brands are subject to fashion, fads and change, and understand recognition is not same as popularity.

Your market may recognise your Brand, but that may not translate into sales if association is unfashionable.

The temptation, in such circumstances, is to spend less on Branding, cut prices, or , drop business line altogether.

These are knee jerk reactions to uncontrollable events when taken in short term. A measured initial response is to re-invent Brand, freshen it up and market it to a new generation of consumers.

Many businesses re-invent, and re-brand themselves and go on to achieve new consumer acclaim.

Strategies For Brand Building ---------------------------

Here are a few short to medium term tactical measures you can start using today to kick start your Brand building program.

* Get a professional web site with customised headers, footers and logos - Make your "visitor experiences" happy ones.

* Advertise regularly using paid channels where you can. If money is a problem, use f'ree advertising, but advertise regularly !

* Write useful articles and publish regularly. Invite visits to your site through your resource box.

* Syndicate your articles and build personal name recognition using a tool such as Name Branding Syndicator available from http://www.highprofitsoftware.com/syndicator/

Visit http://www.simplyeasier.com/mbd to see how you can get this tool for F'ree as part of a product bundle.

* Brand your business by associating and complimenting other succesful products - Develop a quality reciprocal link and partnership strategy.

Try products like Zeus (http://www.cyber-robotics.com/ ) and Arelis (http://www.axandra.com/index.htm) for this tactic.

* Use a good autoresponder service and communicate frequently with your customers and prospects giving useful, and personal information.

There are many good tools for this tactic, but try Getresponse (http://www.getresponse.com) or Aweber (http://www.aweber.com) for a start. * Use Zip Brander available from Russell Brunson of http://www.zipBrander.com/ to put your products, affiliate programs and other offers in front of your purchasers easily and frequently.

------------------------------------------------------------ Branding your business and products is a key part of your success strategy.

You want people to associate your business name and products with high quality, and high value. Successful Brands make money - just ask Microsoft, Levi, Ford, Coke.

Start Branding your business and products today, and generate maximum lifetime customer values. ------------------------------------------------------------ Charles Kangethe of http://www.simplyeasier.com is a leading new wave Netpreneur and a published author from England. The "Simply Easier" brand name is your guarantee of high value, quality Marketing Products, Services and Resources. -----------------------------------------------------------