Web goes female as women overtake men online

Recent US research shows women are using the Internet in increasing numbers and are even beginning to overtake men online.

Underscoring a trend identified by others, NetSmartAmer ica.com, a New York research firm, predicts that women will make up 60 per cent of US Internet users in three years, compared to 50 per cent now.

Women use the Web "as a tool, while men are using it more as a toy", said Ms Bernadette Tracy, NetSmartAmerica.com founder and president. "Men focus on the features and the cost. Women focus on the benefits of saving time."

Companies' marketing should be steered accordingly, she said. "They need to more aggressively target time-starved women," she added.

In other research, Media Metrix and Jupiter Communications found that, for the first time in the Internet's existence, more women than men were going online. During the first quarter of this year, 50.4 per cent of Internet users were women and there was a 125 per cent increase in teenage girls online.

The survey also found that women don't surf as much as men. Instead, they find sites that help them save time or money, and they return to these sites. There's certainly no shortage of sites women can go to and there's a slew targeted directly at their needs. Ms Emily Hofstetter and her partner Ms Candice Nelms set up New York-based Silicon Salley in September 1999 out of their frustration with the lack of exposure for women in the high-tech industry.

SiliconSalley.com launched a Web magazine in April to bring timely, accurate and factual information to women. "In many different ways, we pose the question `who are women who are building and innovating the World Wide Web?' and then we suggest `could you be one of them?'," said Ms Hofstetter, chief executive officer.

The site hopes to act as a networking resource guide for women eager to embrace the challenges of the high-tech world. Right now, it receives 300,000 visitors per issue and it has 24,000 registered members.

Nine weeks ago, it launched InvestHerVision, a venture capital exchange designed to accept pitches mostly from women. "Women are very tech-oriented and driven," Ms Hofstetter said. But, they are "less sales people who go out and raise money". That's why SiliconSalley set up a password-protected site where venture capitalists can log on and hear women pitching their ideas in a 90-second videotape. They can also download a PDF file, which contains an executive summary of their business plans.

According to VentureOne, women constitute only 6 per cent of CEOs of Internet companies. Ms Hofstetter is optimistic that figure will change. She said her site was receiving 12 to 15 business plans a week. SiliconSalley's objective, she said, "is to become the one-stop resource for all things woman and computer". As technology moves forward, she said, "we will find that the Web will serve more entertainment needs, just like TV and radio. Women just go about their needs more methodically than men and with more attention to a `find it now, buy it now, use it now' system."

Another company specifically targeted at women is going beyond the Internet realm into cable television. Oxygen Media, also of New York, is a blend of seven websites and a 24-hour cable television network, whose goal is to serve women better than they've ever been served before.

"We'd like to create a new kind of relationship with you - one based on honesty, humour and heart," the Oxygen.com website states.

Oxygen was founded in 1998 by Ms Geraldine Laybourne in partnership with Oprah Winfrey, Ms Marcy Carsey, Mr Tom Werner and Ms Caryn Mandabach. This autumn, the Oxygen Tank Tour, a cross-country bus tour, will make stops at colleges, shopping malls, sporting events and other community events to reach out to women in each location. Last December, LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the luxury goods group, and Europ@Web, the Internet investment company, made a $122 million (€135.5 million) investment in Oxygen Media so it could develop a brand for women on the Internet and on cable TV.

The company had previously received investments from Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Entertainment Group, America Online and Mr Paul Allen's investment organisation, Vulcan Ventures.

For women who want help to better understand and manage their finances, there's the Women's Financial Network. It acts as a financial portal where women can view their accounts, pay bills, get insurance, manage debt, make investments and find a financial adviser.

WFN.com is not the first affinity financial services website. For example, the Gay Financial Network in New York offers a range of services targeted to gays and lesbians. However, financial advisers to WFN must comply with its female-friendly code of conduct, which requires them to offer courteous and expedient service, create an atmosphere that encourages a client to ask questions, and be sensitive to such life-changing events as divorce or widowhood.