The role of women has shifted "dramatically in terms of buying cars and homes and managing family finances," she notes. "We didn't used to buy a car without consulting our spouse or brother or dad, and now we go o­nline and do the research — we know what our options are and we do the deal."

Indeed, a 2005 report from research firm Hitwise indicates that women create the majority of traffic to auto finance, registration and vehicle insurance sites.

"The medium allows us to self-help and self-serve and pre-shop and know more than we've ever known before — we're behaving in a totally different fashion than we did even five years ago," Mooney says.

So what, exactly, do o­nline women shoppers want? According to Resource Interactive, the ten key principles are:

1. The Big Picture. Female shoppers, Mooney says, aren't fans of the piecemeal approach — they prefer to shop with a context in mind: a room layout, a larger trend or a list of qualities grouped for a personality type.

   "While women still go o­nline and type in the search box to look for something specific, a lot of them also go o­nline looking for a starting point," she says.

   "When you ask men what's the most important thing when they look for a big screen TV, they'll say 'size, of course.' A woman would never say that," Mooney says. "What she'd say is 'I really want to know 'what are all the brands? And what are all my choices? Does it come with a warranty?' And how will I get it through the font door of my house?'"

   The Internet tends to reduce information into bits and bytes, but merchants will more effectively reach women if they present their inventory as part of a story or worldview. Does your site provide a vignette?

2. To Control the Edit. Many merchants are adept at controlling how shoppers see and interact with their product. But, Mooney says, sometimes a woman shopper says "You know what? I want to see all the lamps," or "I want to see all the t-shirts that are short-sleeved and black."

   So instead of forcing shoppers to wade through a predetermined organizational grid, let them control the navigation to look for a product "the way they want to get to it, not the way the retailer wants you to see it."

3. Details. Details. Details. As much as women like the big picture, when they're ready for the details, "they want there to be richer details," Mooney says. "On a lot of sites, you can click o­n an image and it gets incrementally bigger, versus filling the screen. They want to see the side view, they want to see it in context, they want to read more narrative copy that really explains the product beyond two lines of type."

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