The Register reports today that research by the Dublin City University has shown that women now dominate online shopping in Ireland. For some time now the Internet has primarily been a male dominated world, with websites designed by men, for men. The most popular sites are often technical in nature, sports pages, gaming and gambling sites – all of which are the play things of men all over the world.
In recent years more emphasis has been made toward improving the market for female surfers and net shoppers. This seems to have paid off well in Ireland at least. Women now are more likely to do their weekly household shopping online, plus shopping for clothes and lingerie, make-up, jewelery, perfumes as well as the usual books, Cd’s and DVDs, and airline tickets.
There is definite evidence that the market for female shoppers is growing, and male web designers need to consider what a woman wants when building a sites style and content.
However, the most important aspects of web design remain efficiency, fulfilment and system availability. Dr Connolly of the Dublin City University said “consumers wanted a service that was easy to access, delivered goods quickly and didn’t crash”.
The Internet is still a growing and evolving market, with new populations, countries and cultures coming online to shop all the time.
