To succeed in your home sales, catering to that statistic is important!  It begins and ends with home designs that appeal to what women want in a home. Their answers may surprise you: 

To begin, women like to imagine and dream.  Unique features and spaces that allow a woman to paint a picture; of friends having wine in the hearth room, wrapping presents in the mud room workspace, expansive and open floor plans for future parties and extra space for "guests" to stay are what drives a woman behind her purchase. This also translates to lots of flex space such as for a hobby room, kids play area or a  reading or computer nook.

Safety.  The proximity of children's rooms to parents, the location of the master bedroom and front door and features such as a built in security system plays on a woman's mind.  

A formal dining room increasingly dwindles in appeal - with women opting for a large eat-in (and impressive) kitchen instead. 

Organization features, such as closet dressers and garage cabinets. Storage and space saving features.  Window seats, large pantries, corner closets and built in bookshelves are in demand.  In the past, men asked for larger garages.  Now women are asking for additional storage in garages as well to accommodate SUV's, bike and stroller storage and tools.

How to market to Women?

The first four of  the five steps in a joint purchase decision is made by a woman, with the 5th being a joint decision or actually making the purchase.

How does your company capture ( or repel) this enormous market? If your marketing strategies aren't using some or all of these tips - you could be losing the interest of a huge segment of your market:

1.  Web site design, catering to women that is clean and easy to navigate!  95% of the women in 2010's "What Women Want from The Web Report" Unicast planned to go online, and  according to Yahoo, more than a third of women say the Internet is the best way to interact with their favorite brands, 54% say it's their primary way of interacting with the world, and 61% shop online.

2.  Women are time starved and will blow off marketing that waste her time. Inadequate online services, lengthy forms and hard-to-understand copy must be avoided. They also avoid aggression and head-on approaches - in design or marketing. 

Women are extremely safety conscious as well.  Asking for too much upfront information is a turn off. You'll get on their short list if they like the way your product feels - not if you demand a follow up conversation with them.

3.  Most women are relationship-oriented and they will build relationships with you-your company, your customer service representatives, even your website.  Your marketing efforts should be all about securing that relationship. 

4.  Women tend to base their thinking on examples, experience, personal details, and the context of a situation.  This all adds up to: stories. They want to imagine how your product will effect their lives in a positive way.  According to Paco Underhill in "What Women Want" "Women enjoy visualizing what role a product will play in their lives, and how it will enable them and their families to enjoy a certain kind of lifestyle. Some women consumers enjoy imagining a family gathering, a playroom with comfortable seating so that the whole family can enjoy a good movie," Underhill points out. "Women relate to computers as interactive and collaborative. They form a relationship with them and with the websites that they browse."

5.  "Women appreciate the subtleties, they look for the nuance," States Faith Popcorn, a trend analyst who advises Fortune 500 firms.  They notice the palette, the feel of your brand,  even the number of electrical outlets in a new home".  Major and minor women-oriented design features should be pointed out - they will appreciate it.  An ironing board cabinet, a reading corner, clever storage - the more you integrate needs even they didn't anticipate, the more you'll earn their appreciation.