The most influential woman in every country across the world has been revealed, with Adele, Celine Dion and Ariana Grande all making the list, which is dominated by the music industry.
The research, conducted by the nation’s favourite bingo site, Gala Bingo used a wide variety of ranking factors, including social media following, Google searches, media mentions and fan engagement, to identify the most talked-about women in the 100 biggest nations on the planet.
Almost half (45%) of the most influential women are from the music business. Adele topped the list for the UK, narrowly beating Dua Lipa and Game of Thrones’ Emilia Clarke. The Skyfall singer is the most popular British woman on social media, with a combined following of over 155 million, and the UK’s most-Googled female celebrity, with almost 12 million searches over the last year.
Internationally, South Korea’s K-Pop superstar, IU, is searched for the most – her name was Googled over four billion times.
The top five most influential women in the UK are:
1) Adele
2) Dua Lipa
3) Emilia Clarke
4) Demi Rose
5) Victoria Beckham
Film and TV stars also feature heavily, with Indian actress Deepika Padukone taking the number one spot for her country. She has the largest social media following in Asia (139 million) and was mentioned in over 200,000 news articles over the last 12 months.
The world’s undoubted social media queen, however, is Ariana Grande, with a combined following of 430 million people. The award-winning singer is the most influential woman in the United States and each of her tweets receives an incredible 70 million interactions on average – more than the entire population of the UK.
Kim Kardashian ranked second in the USA, largely thanks to her massive media presence, having been written about almost 30 million times in the last year.
Credit: Gala Bingo
The research was launched alongside a survey of 2,000 female Brits, which revealed the 10 traits they find most inspiring in other women.
The study found that women are far more inspired by ladies who donate to charity (37%), promote good causes (34%) and speak out on difficult topics (34%) than they are by personal wealth (5%) or accolades (7%).
The 10 traits which female Brits find most inspiring in other women are:
1) Charitable giving (37% find this very inspiring)
2) Promoting good causes (34%)
3) Speaking out on difficult topics (34%)
4) Intelligence (33%)
5) Championing other women (31%)
6) Sharing knowledge (31%)
7) Showing a vulnerable side (22%)
8) Coming through hardships (21%)
9) Having multiple talents (20%)
10) Academic achievements (17%)
This varies quite significantly by age, as the research found that each generation of women is inspired by different characteristics. Those over 65 are almost twice as likely to feel inspired by intelligence than 25-34-year-old millennials (42% vs 22%), while younger women are more impressed by those who champion others.
Millennials are also more than six times as likely as over 65s to be inspired by a person’s social media following (19% vs 3%), with the number decreasing with each older age group.
This could be because millennials are the most influenced by celebrity culture. Four in five (80%) say they are more inspired by celebrities than by people they know, compared to just over three in five older women (62%).
Therefore, it’s perhaps unsurprising that it is the younger generations of British women which are leading the call for more positive female role models. More than two in five (42%) millennial women say there aren’t enough famous female figures to look up to.
Karina Adrian, head of brand marketing at Gala Bingo, said: “It’s great to see so many female Brits are inspired by other women and it’s fascinating to learn the traits which they admire the most.
“We totally agree that there needs to be more positive female role models and we’re determined to help shout about all the incredible women across the world.
“That’s why we recently set out to identify the most influential woman in every country on the planet, to show that that there are inspirational women wherever you look.”
To see the most influential woman in every country on earth, broken down by continent and industry, visit: www.galabingo.com/women