The English Rugby Football Union is introducing a new strategy aimed at increasing the number of women playing regular contact rugby by 10,000 to 25,000 within three years.
England's World Cup triumph last month has raised the profile of the women's game and 20 players have since been placed on central contracts, enabling them to train full-time.
The RFU launched its new campaign on Wednesday and development director Steve Grainger has outlined the objective of "normalising women's involvement in rugby".
"Women's rugby has been a work in progress for the last 12-18 months," Grainger said on Wednesday.
"Our key aim is normalising women's involvement in rugby and positioning the sport as something that has athleticism, strength and toughness.
"All of our research shows that those aren't things women are afraid of. They're things they're proud of, so we have a real asset."
Grainger confirmed the RFU's commitment to using the next year's men's World Cup, hosted by England, as the platform to increase participation in state schools.
"There's been much talk of the demise of rugby in schools, particularly in state secondary schools and we're on a real mission to reverse this," Grainger said.
"Four hundred state secondary schools who don't currently play rugby will be playing rugby by the time the World Cup kicks off in September."
"We're well on the way to that target - another 100 are starting this week which will take us to 300. The final 100 will come in September 2015."
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