When I started the company 22 years ago, we were all about integrated marketing and helping brands to have that one voice. It was about driving the brand and behaviorin a single spend and eliminating those turf wars.

All of that really changed about 12 years ago, when I was working on a rebranding assignment for SnackWells. During that assignment, I had a transformational moment that forever changed my business and my life.

We were doing ethnographic research in people’s homes and I saw first-hand the passion and emotional connection that women had with this silly box of cookies. They were actually hoarding and hiding these cookies behind cereal and pasta boxes to keep them away from their children and their husbands.

We found this change in the world with women having more authority and decision-making power in the workplace and yet nothing had changed at home. She was struggling in her efforts to redefine priorities — and it really came down to this box of cookies being a first step of permission to do something for herself.

Based on this insight, we recommended that SnackWells become the brand that would act on behalf of women of all ages. This revolutionary platform for the late ’80s led to an integrated strategy that supported women and girls through a series of intellectual, physical and spiritual initiatives. My efforts were positively impacting women and girls’ lives, and the brand was seeing double-digit growth.

This was my transformational moment. My business expertise and personal passion would become one. Through our efforts, women would be more deeply understood and their brand relationships could bring greater personal fulfillment. In the end, our clients would have a competitive advantage because they would have more meaningful relationships and relevance in women’s lives.

The biggest challenge for marketers is women’s indifference to their brands. There is growing irrelevance of perceived parity products and undifferentiated brands. There no longer is information overload because she has basically just stopped listening.

Most marketers say that they’re targeting women and recognize that women are the chief purchasing officer for the household, and yet there is this huge gap. She is buying 93 percent of everything, and yet, 85 percent of women will say that they do not feel understood by marketers.

Add to that the economic downturn. Harris recently published a survey finding that 63 percent of people feel that they are savvier since the financial crisis. If you look at those who rated themselves as being savvier, nearly 70 percent feel marketers haven’t adjusted their marketing to keep pace.

An insufficient understanding of women is the fundamental reason for marketing failure today. We’re solving for that, in part, by specializing in insight mining and using that knowledge to develop and shape businesses.

We look at it as three “I”s: Insight, Inspiration and Impact. From an insight standpoint, we have a unique process that helps us to get to disruptive insights. That is the ability to dig deeper to get to her subconscious motivators to behavior.

We are looking for what we call the emotional truth; that single subconscious emotional trigger within the context of a brand and her life. The emotional truth defines the intensity of the relevance your brand owns in her life. The deeper your brand’s personal relevance, the more intense her response.

Getting at that subconscious truth is ambitious, but it’s not magic. It requires a unique approach to mining insights. We’re not listening in a dark room behind a two-way mirror. We’re observing and interacting with women in their homes, when they’re shopping, during girlfriend get-togethers, through psychological exercises and more.

Girlfriend Groups allow us to leverage women’s gender traits and social communication dynamics. It allows us to dig deeper. We use proprietary projective techniques, which means we don’t rely on women to be able to articulate why they do what they do.

As marketers, we all agree that emotions drive most, if not all, purchase decisions. And yet, traditional tools rely on women to articulate what they are not consciously aware of. Our unique approach to insight mining helps us to get at gender, cultural, sociological and psychological factors that drive behavior.

We don’t present our findings in a traditional bullet point report, but rather in a dynamic presentation that elicits a sensory “felt understanding.” The result is a deeper emotional understanding of who she really is and the inspiration to propel innovative thinking. It turns uninformed or complacent stakeholders into passionate visionaries.

The third piece is impact. Insight is only helpful if it truly helps the brand team and key stakeholders see their business in a new light and to be able to put it into action to make a difference to the bottom line. We inspire activation.

Part of the impact is to know the cultural shifts that are happening and to have a vision for how consumers are changing. Right now we’re in conflicted and uncertain times and confidence in institutions is at an all-time low.

Consumers are moving forward in a new era of responsibility. They expect business to have a social responsibility beyond just profit. They expect the same of themselves. They are seeking ways to make a difference and to bring more meaning in their lives. It’s a principle we call, “me, we, higher purpose.”

The “me” is the opportunity for the brand to find that emotional truth so that they can fulfill a deep aspirational desire. From a marketing standpoint, it is about a shift from what to why. It’s no longer about features, benefits, and promises. It now becomes more about why the brand is relevant.

Why is your brand so important to her that it becomes intrinsic to her life and she’s willing to advocate for it? Understanding “me” is the critical part of enriching her life, showing her she matters.

The “we” is fulfilling her sense of belonging. She is seeking a sense of oneness with others and wants to be part of something that’s bigger than herself. She is looking to join people, brands, institutions that have the same ideals and values as she does.

From a marketing standpoint it’s a shift from us and them to we. Together, we are at one with the consumers. We have these shared ideals and values and can make a difference and move things forward.

“Higher purpose” fulfills her desire to leave a legacy and make the world a better place. She really is looking to make a difference. She wants to transform her community and society at-large. She wants to help bring that higher meaning. From a marketing standpoint, it’s a shift from focusing on a transaction to bringing meaning in her life.

WomanWise is a group of people driven by a common purpose. Each of us here was drawn to the company and stays at the company because it is making a difference in our lives. We want to help businesses and brands see that they have an obligation to make the world a better place.

Marketing to women is our profession, our passion and our cause. We are enriching women’s lives and transforming the relationship between a consumer and a brand. We are helping our clients gain a competitive advantage because they are more relevant to what women really care about.

Women don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. That’s where we can help businesses get to the higher level of answering that question of why and bringing that more relevant engagement and connection with women.