He may have youthful good looks and easy charm, but David Cameron has felt it necessary to seek professional advice on deciphering the female psyche.

The Conservative leader has been taking guidance from Pretty Little Head, a marketing agency, on how to broaden the party’s appeal to women.

Jane Cunningham and Philippa Roberts, the agency’s founders, have been hired to coach Cameron on how to woo the middle-class mothers whose votes are likely to determine the outcome of the next general election. The pair are understood to have been responsible for helping to “feminise” the traditionally rather male Conservative brand.

“Persuading women to come back to the Conservatives is vital,” said a Tory source. “Pretty Little Head has provided us with some important insights.”

The consultants use research drawn from brain science, anthropology and marketing to help their clients to improve their understanding of women consumers. Their big idea is that while men regard the world as a stadium in which they compete, women are more “altruistic” and “utopian”.

The consultants, who are close to Steve Hilton, Cameron’s director of stategy, have been holding regular meetings with the Tory leadership for the past 18 months. Their influence can be seen in the Tories’ changes in marketing, political style and policies. The replacement of the “phallic” Tory torch logo with the “organic” oak tree brand was a clear attempt to create a more female-friendly image.

Cunningham and Roberts advised Cameron to end the macho “Punch and Judy” routine of Commons clashes with a quieter, more conciliatory tone. Here they have been only partly successful: the most recent bipartisan truce over the economy ended last week after little more than a fortnight.

Partly at the suggestion of his new advisers, the Tory leader has played down traditional Conservative “masculine” subjects such as tax cuts and Europe in favour of more “feminine” issues such as maternity nurses, schools and care for the elderly.

He has promoted more women to prominent frontbench jobs and drafted in female candidates to winnable parliamentary seats, such as Annunziata Rees-Mogg who is standing in Somerton and Frome.

It was no accident that at the Tories’ recent Birmingham conference Cameron was introduced by Louise Bagshawe, a novelist and Tory candidate who spoke of juggling motherhood with political ambitions.

In his speech the Conservative leader went on to make a number of deliberate references to his wife Samantha’s position as a successful business-woman. The Pretty Little Head consultants advise clients that women naturally respond positively to “real” role models.

Cunningham and Roberts, who previously worked for the advertising agencies Ogilvy & Mather and BMP, were the creative brains behind the Terry’s Chocolate Orange campaign starring Dawn French.

For the Tories, building their appeal to women will become even more important during any recession. Many female voters have insecure part-time jobs and are therefore more at risk from a downturn.

A leaked internal memo last week showed how the Tories were aiming to capitalise on Cameron’s ability to connect with worried voters and claimed that Gordon Brown was “incapable of empathy”.

The Tories have ordered Cunningham and Roberts not to speak publicly about their work for the party. However, their manifesto is laid out in a book published two years ago called Inside Her Pretty Little Head.

“Women are more philanthropic, giving more time and proportionally more money than men,” they write.

“Whereas men are most likely to think the nation’s most pressing issues are budget and cutting spending, women . . . are more inclined to favour social programmes and services such as education, healthcare and childcare, poverty, joblessness, environment, world hunger and the United Nations.”

The consultants point to scientific research which shows that while men use only part of their brains, women are more “whole-brained”.

Men are described as active, analytical, competitive and interested in things, while women are more concerned with feelings, relationships, people and empathy.

“Women have a stronger sense of moral order and justice and are, as a result, driven to improve the world at large,” the consultants write.

A Conservative spokesman said: “They are a consultancy we have used.”

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