There have been a few conversations that have been going on in the London Girl Geek Dinners discussion mailing list and I thought I would post some bits of information out as a result of this as a way of hopefully guiding people when they think about marketing at technical events.

I’m sure many of these subjects have been covered before in the past but after the TechCrunch UK launch party and Pizza On Rails it seems the same subject has come out again… sex to sell software. With the subject has come comments and counter comments…. and I’m sure opening up the discussion to a wider audience will do it some good.

Firstly a disclaimer: I am a developer not a marketeer! As such the guidance note below is based on what I have heard, seen and felt about things… so take and do with it as you please.

  1. The use of “pizza girls” etc as a marketing tactic is old fashioned and not always appreciated by the guys or the girls in the tech industry… as such learn from others mistakes. (? Was it a mistake… we are talking about it now…. hmmm? )
  2. Just because there are more guys in tech, doesn’t mean that you need to exclude the women when marketing at events, by including them you will capture an additional market.
  3. Scantily clad women or men can be off putting to men and women alike… if you want to try a risque advertising campaign in the tech industry… fine, but remember you may alienate part of your potential market.
  4. Technology is gender agnostic! It is neither a male or a female…. please remember this.
  5. Think geeky… geeks and technology enthusiasts like to toy with technology… capture their imagination!

I am going to leave that there… I am also going to respond to Robert Loch’s comment on Ben Griffiths site direct to him, rather than online to get to the bottom of what he sees as the problem with the name of London Girl Geek Dinners… 175 registered on the mailing list… to date.

About Sarah Lamb

Sarah is the founder of the Girl Geek Dinners & GirlyGeekdom. She is a lover of gadgets, geeky things and sport! Find out more about her on her website.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 5th, 2006 at 8:47 pm and is filed under Women Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.