“Women had an insane amount of success in 2024 that demanded widespread attention, and we don’t anticipate that slowing down in 2025,” Kaitlin Ceckowski, associate principal consultant at Mintel, said during a recent webinar on Mintel’s 2025 omnichannel marketing trends.
Brands must be strategic. “When so much attention floods in one direction, we start to see a lot of efforts that really just miss the mark,” said Nicole Bond, director of marketing strategy at Mintel. “[Brands are] showing up just to borrow from the clout [and not] finding unique connection points that resonate with the fandom or showing why [their] brand is playing a role in this space to begin with.”
Here are three data-backed ways to authentically engage with female-led trends and which brands are doing it right.
1. Lean into the bit
The data: Two-thirds of US adults ages 18 to 44 love when brands offer hidden messages, inside jokes, or Easter eggs for their fandom, per Mintel.
The example: Verizon partnered with Jools Lebron, the originator of the “demure” trend that took over TikTok in August, to promote the carrier’s guaranteed trade-in program.
- “We don’t have a crunchy phone. We don’t do a cracked screen,” said Lebron in the video. “That’s why I partner with Verizon. She keeps it elegant. She keeps it cutesy. She keeps it classy … She’s very demure.”
- Verizon quickly capitalized on the trend before consumers tired of it.
- “Brands have a tendency to jump on things a little late and then kind of, I don't want to say, ruin it, but over-exhaust consumers with it a little bit,” said Ceckowski. “And this was an example of getting in on it from the beginning.”
2. Give consumers more of what they want
The data: 65% of US adults ages 18 to 44 are always looking for new ways to further immerse or involve themselves in the world of their fandom, per Mintel.
The example: Alex Cooper, host of “Call Her Daddy” podcast, created a before, during, and after campaign for reality show “Love Island USA.”
- “The people America had been falling in love with, or seething with anger at, got a chance to come on the podcast, and it created this full 360 moment,” said Ceckowski.
- Again, timing and authenticity were crucial. “There’s an inflection point, a fever-pitch moment,” said Bond. “And those that are standing out [are those that are tapping] into something that is genuine.”
3. Do your research
The data: 56% of US adults ages 18 to 44 do not like when brand partnerships try to appeal to or pander to their fandom without understanding it, per Mintel.
The example: Powerade teamed with Simone Biles for its 2024 Paris Olympics campaign on a two-minute short film called The Vault.
- The film, part of Powerade’s “Pause is Power” platform, explains why Biles withdrew from the 2022 Tokyo Olympics after experiencing something she called “the twisties.”
- By having Biles herself explain it, the ad provides more context into the highly controversial move.
- “Simone Biles is nationally known, globally known,” said Bond, so Powerade needed to ask itself, “What’s something we as a brand can tell about her that maybe [consumers] don’t know.”
Why it matters: Marketing to women isn’t a new strategy for brands, but this year showed marketers how powerful the female consumer can be.
- Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour entered its second year, boosting sales of everything from makeup to luxury friendship bracelets.
- WNBA star Caitlin Clark signed a $28 million deal with Nike, the largest ever for a WNBA player.
- Author Sarah J. Maas brought romance and fantasy books into the mainstream via TikTok, becoming the bestselling #BookTok author of the year to date, selling almost 5 million print copies from her book series.
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