Author: Dae Ryun Chang

If money talks, then some young women are making a powerful statement with their pocketbooks. This is particularly true of a new segment of professional women in Asia called the “Gold Misses.”

Gold Misses is a play on the word “old misses,” which means unmarried women, but differentiates itself to highlight the group’s massive consumption power. Gold Misses have emerged in Asia as more and more women become better educated, enter higher paying jobs, and then delay marriage (PDF). Even after marriage, many working women have few or no children. The overall result is that professional women have more disposable income to purchase a wider range of products, such as houses, financial services, durables, and especially luxury goods.

Despite the global recession that has dampened demand in many industries, the luxury market is still holding strong. Such continued growth in this sector is being led by new drivers of sales — latecomer countries to luxury, such as China, and fresh lead users like the Gold Misses.

In South Korea, the Gold Misses have become consumer icons, as they influence the demand of not only their peers but also scores of wannabes who aspire to their glitzy lifestyle. In fact, the latter’s more ostentatious consumption pattern was the inspiration for Psy’s satirical “Gangnam Style” music video.

In China, the Gold Misses are called the shengnu, and its contrasting double meaning of “leftover women” and “holy (as in hard to approach) goddesses” reveals their evolving status in Chinese society. The number of never-married women in urban China is estimated to be about 7 million. But since this demographic trend is influenced by economic growth, that size will easily increase as China — and specifically its women — continue to advance.

In India as well, career-oriented women are flexing their spending muscle with income in urban centers doubling over the last decade, enabling them to independently purchase items like apartments, cars, and insurance plans as never before. Looking at China and India alone, BCG estimates that by 2020 their female economies combined will account for $5 trillion annually with professional women fueling some of the next wave of growth.

For companies wanting to better position themselves in this region and to this expanding segment, the following strategies can be some effective first steps:

1. Help them to stand out. These young women see themselves as cultural pioneers, whether as professionals or as consumers. Their purchasing behavior also reflects their desire to not just follow the herd mentality but instead to be trendsetters. The level of marketing individualization to them thus needs to be greater as compared to the communal style of marketing that is sometimes required in Asia. Such a strategy may have worked for Starbucks in China where, as in other places, its customized drinks and personalized service appeal to people who want to embrace their individuality.

2. Create ripple effects to their followers. The product and brand preferences of the Gold Misses can become the catalyst for mass demand among their followers who want to emulate, even at a basic level, their role models. For luxury brands, this kind of social hierarchy has led to greater sales of less expensive “logo” lines. Sometimes this dynamic occurs cross-nationally, such as between South Korea and Southeast Asia, where the former’s portrayal of successful women in soap operas impacts trends abroad, such as in clothing and hairstyle.

3. Establish a digital and social commerce presence. The Gold Misses enjoy and can afford to indulge themselves, but they do not have the time to shop. The solution here can be digital commerce. Asian women are prone to shop online two times more than their Western counterparts, and 81% of these purchases are made for herself only. Niche social networks like Pinterest and Instagram have experienced explosive popularity in places like Hong Kong and Singapore, and generate traffic to global and local downstream sites. For foreign firms, setting up such digital beachheads to an influential segment can ease their brick-and-mortar entries that come later on.

As Asia becomes a new hub of global economic activity, companies may capture new opportunities by tapping into one of that region’s future movers and shakers — its rising professional women.

Success begets not only further success but also harder-to-meet market expectations. That message was clearly evident after Samsung’s unveiling of its latest flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4.

Despite a Broadway-styled launch held in Radio City Music Hall, the new product received somewhat mixed reviews. In fact, in its IT-crazed home country of South Korea, the critics came out in full force and Samsung’s stock price dropped nearly 3%. Some business media attributed the fall to disappointment among analysts over the lack of significant differentiation of the S4 features over its previous generations of smartphones or to existing competitors.

If all of this sounds familiar, then it should because not too long ago Apple faced a similar situation after its launch of the iPhone 5. Apple’s stock has taken a battering since then and in an ironic twist, its shares rose slightly on the day of Samsung’s Galaxy S4 intro — perhaps a reflection that Apple’s worst fears of an arch nemesis’ killer product were not realized.

Samsung’s predicament is a classic example of the new-product juggling act that every company has to perform: While trying to keep its rivals at bay, it must at the same time compete with its own existing products.

Samsung is now the undisputed leading vendor of mobile handsets and smartphones. In terms of sales volume, product line diversity, operating system flexibility, R&D spending, and even customer loyalty, Samsung has emerged as a fierce competitor that has bested former industry champions like Nokia and Apple. But, Samsung may now be asking itself “is that still enough?”

The tougher competitor for Samsung than Apple could be Samsung itself, or at least the Samsung that many tech savvy consumers now desire to see. This is especially true for the updated flagship product that needs to be accepted as being vastly different from existing lines — in Samsung’s case, the wildly popular Galaxy S3. While Samsung gets high marks for added software, an improved display, and fun-related new camera features, the consensus appears to be that there is no major hardware upgrade between the Galaxy S3 and S4 versions.

How then can a new front-runner better manage market expectations and also strive to be more innovative? Samsung could have used the following advice:

Lower the hype. The problem with self-generated hype around product launches is that you have to be able to back it up. The show-business debut, as well as the social media and teaser campaign leading up to the event were collectively seen as being “overhyped, under-delivered.” Publicity is a necessary part of new product introductions. But when new products are over-publicized you are setting the bar of expectations unnecessarily high. In Samsung’s case, the disappointed and boisterous reviewers of the Galaxy S4 may have drowned out the more positive (but quieter) reactions to the product.

Brand confidently. The market must clearly understand how this product is different. Many experts see the Galaxy S4 as a new strategic thrust by Samsung to “De-Google” its phone. In short, it is an Android phone that wants to stand out more as a Samsung made and operated phone. Despite this grand vision, Samsung is hedging its bets just in case the breaking away move does not pan out by keeping its key branding elements (especially the design and naming) more or less intact. That kind of straddling, however, may create confusion among consumers who judge products by their exterior. If the overall brand narrative is that it is a new kind of Samsung phone, then each important branding element must communicate a clear separation from existing phones.

Think the same, but different. Cultivate what I call a “doppelgänger mindset.” Traditionally a doppelgänger is a person’s sinister look-alike or alter ego. But the meaning here is that a company needs to think of itself also in a radically different and liberated way, without losing its core identity. For example, the top-dog protagonist in the movie Black Swan finds her creative expression only after such a figure enters her life. Similarly with Samsung, the pressure of maintaining the number one status seems to have inhibited their freethinking. Your Doppelgänger may allow you to revitalize that “I-got-nothing-to-lose” instinct that is often vital for real IT innovation.

Samsung is now entering uncharted territory as a bona fide leader in many fields. To maintain that mantle, however, it may have to start changing its “business-as-usual” approach.