In Memory of Anita Roddick, the Queen of Green

I just heard the news that Anita Roddick, The Body Shop founder and human rights and environmental activist, passed away on Monday, September 10th.

Anita was the first to bring civic concerns to business practice and succeeded wildly, eventually selling the company for more than a billion dollars and introducing civic participation to millions of beauty consumers. She was the mother of today's cause marketing; a creative and business genius with a huge heart and soul and a true inspiration.

Here are just a few of her innovations:

• Cruelty-free testing for Body Shop product development, and environmentally-solid packaging (including a refund when customers bring in empties to refill)
• Requiring franchisees to support an environmental or community cause
• Spreading the word via Body Shop trucks with short, funny but meaningful slogans including Roddick's favorite (according to the Washington Post), "If you think you're too small to have an impact, go to bed with a mosquito."

Here's to Anita Roddick.

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Is Cause Marketing Right for Your Nonprofit?

I find myself increasingly intrigued by cause marketing. It's marketing, right? And getting bigger all the time. A recent IEG study finds that cause marketing spending totaled $1.34 billion in 2006 -- an increase of 7.5% -- and is expected to reach $1.44 billion this year.

Cause marketing seems to be a strategy used by the known few -- like the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation/Avon and Red/Gap partnerships. But how does your nonprofit get a piece of it?

For answers, I turned to Joe Waters, one of the best cause marketers (and bloggers) I know, and Director of Cause & Event Marketing at Boston Medical Center. Read on for Joe's guidance on capturing cause marketing dollars for your organization.

Take a look for more of Joe's insights in his two blogs -- Selfish Giving and The Savvy Giver.

And don't check out these recent GA posts on the topic:

• How cause marketing benefits both parties (the sponsor and your nonprofit)
• A great Campbell's Soup cause marketing case study  .

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Learn How to Use Social Marketing to Generate Health and Social Change -- Nedra Weinreich offers D.C. Training

                           Great news. Social marketing expert Nedra Weinreich is bringing her social marketing intensive to Washington, D.C.

Join her for a 2-1/2 day training to learn how to use social marketing to bring about health and social change. Includes the Next Generation Social Marketing Seminar on March 30! More information and registration here.

 

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Cause Marketing Secures Brand Trust -- Proofs for Your Cause Marketing Negotiations

Using social-cause marketing techniques -- as opposed to sports/entertainment affinity marketing -- increases consumers' perception of brands' trustworthiness, according to a recent MIT Sloan Management Review article. That said, the research indicates that, when it comes to attributes related to functionality or performance, the type of affinity marketing partner does not sway consumer perception.

The authors use a market-research technique called “conjoint analysis” to help corporate marketers gauge the relative benefits of various types of affinity marketing programs, including sponsorship of social causes, sports or entertainment events. Conjoint analysis involves creating a variety of hypothetical brand profiles that contain combinations of brand attributes; by asking consumers to rank the profiles, researchers can gain insights into how different brand attributes affect consumers’ preferences.

In several experiments, the authors used conjoint analysis to examine how consumers’ responses to a brand of beer, milk or juice would be affected if the brand had a marketing affiliation with a social cause or with a sport or entertainment event. For some of the products studied, affiliations with social causes had more positive effects on consumer rankings than affiliations with sports or entertainment events. However, this was not always true; for example, it was not the case for the milk brands studied, suggesting that the effect of social-cause marketing initiatives may vary by industry.

This research, outlined in detail in the full article, is strong ammunition when you're trying to close a deal with with corporate marketing folks. Assuming you're not dealing with the Milk Council, that is. Put it to use and let me know how it works.

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Campbell's Soup Parlays Pink Ribbon to Double Soup Sales

You know that it's October when the leaves start turning and the world turns a glorious pink. Yes pink, the herald color of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (NBCAM) is showing up everywhere.

Advertising Age reported yesterday on Campbell Soup's cause marketing success story -- turning its iconic soup can on its ear by replacing the traditional red-and-white with pink-and-white, and adding a pink ribbon for breast cancer awareness month at Krogers, a major national supermarket chain.

This is an incredibly smart strategy, and one that makes a far greater impact  since it's on a product package so broadly recognized (and  one that does generate some emotional feelings of comfort, warmth and Mom). Few product packages  match the power of the Campbell's soup can.

Campbell's took its cause marketing to the max by "pinkifying" its best-selling soups. The result? Campbell's sales for these varieties to the 2,500 participating Kroger stores doubled for the month of October, and motivated Kroger managers to display the soups outside the soup aisle.

It'll be interesting to see sales figures at the end of the month. Assuming the campaign is successful, and since women are the main family shoppers, I bet it will be, Campbell's plans to expand the campaign roll out for October 2007.

Win-win for Campbell's and for breast cancer awareness as Campbell will donate $250,000, or roughly 3.5 cents per pink can, to the Susan G. Komen Foundation in exchange for its doubled order. And a win for Kroger too.

Worry not, Campbell's shareholders. The potential benefit for the soup scion is huge. 91% of consumers reported, via a recent Cone Communications survey,  that they have a more positive image of a company or product when it supports a cause, and a full 90% will consider switching to another company if it's aligned with a cause.

What this shouts to nonprofit marketers is that there's lots of opportunity out there for cause marketing development. Arm yourself with the right data (Cone's research findings are a great start), and get going.

Keep your eye out for future posts outlining when cause marketing is right for your nonprofit, and how to take the first step.

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Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants -- Nonprofit Marketing Tales and Twists

Here’s the latest Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants – on the theme of nonprofit marketing this week.  I tell you,  I’m more impressed than ever by the great bloggers out there focused on the nonprofit sectors. So, read away, and don't forget to comment, and to participate in next week's Carnival.

Always funny (as in haha, not weird) Joe Waters at Selfish Giving jumps off from the somewhat-successes of the Verb campaign, guiding nonprofits on how to be Merchants of Cool. Hats off to Joe for nudging us nonprofit types to put ourselves out there a little more boldly.

Beth Kanter at Beth’s Blog offers an incredibly practical post on Using Flickr as a Visual Resource for Presentations. Beth makes introduces some very specific ways to increase audience engagement in presentations, and outlines the value of Flickr images as a no-cost, high-engagement presentation component. Thanks, Beth. Love the how-to stuff.

Pithy, punchy Jeff Brooks at Donor Power Blog cautions against The White Man’s New Burden,  reporting on a recent change in the way international relief organizations like the International Red Cross are limiting images to those that convey the “dignity” of the subject. Jeff contends that when the needs disappears (as it does in these more dignified photos), so do the level of engagement and giving. I'm with you, Jeff.

Kivi Miller at Writing911 discusses Activities v. Accomplishments in Annual Reports. Kivi’s on-target recommendation to focus on what your nonprofit has achieved, rather than the work its done, is particularly relevant as we plunge into annual report season.

Marc Sirkin, VP of eMarketing at the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS) and blogger extraordinaire at npMarketing Blog shares a useful Case Study in Online Event Fundraising. Make that events, as the campaign was put into place at the national and chapter/local level. In his post, Marc details the strategies – most centrally, a wiki --  LLS used to ensure that chapters shared experiences, materials and successes. And no, Marc isn’t a consultant, but he’s an insightful, innovative communicator in our field who shares some very useful recommendations and perspectives. Just coloring outside the lines a bit.

Celeste Wroblewski of Studio 501c pitches her concept that a blog can be like a business lunch. There’s nothing I relate to more than food metaphors, Celeste. Ideal for a nonprofit CEO blog, but applicable in other situations as well, Celeste’s approach is a great way for nonprofits to start blogging. What’s next, the all-you-can-eat-buffet blog?

Betsy Harman of betsy's blog advises nonprofit organization on Reaching Donors Under 40. Especially important is Betsy’s point about executing multiple marketing strategies to different target audiences to ensure you engage each one (or, to put it conversely, to make sure you don't alienate anyone). That’s a particularly vital technique when segmenting donors and prospects by age.

And last, and maybe least, Nancy Schwartz, of GettingAttention, shares the story of How a Small Nonprofit Shaped a Clear, Memorable Brand – Five Steps to Low-Budget Branding for Big Results.

Next week's Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants hones in on Young Professionals in Philanthropy. Don't forget to submit your post, and to read all on Monday, October 2nd.

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Win $100,000 Of In-Kind Marketing Services

I just read this morning about a great opportunity for your nonprofit. Relative newcomer The Bemporad Baranowski Marketing Group (BBMG), which specializes in branding services for nonprofits and "socially-responsible businesses," has just launched the It's How We Live grant program (IHWL). What a great chance for the winning nonprofit and its corporate partner to get $100,000 of in-kind marketing services to create and launch a cause marketing campaign. And what a great way for BBMG to get attention.

Read carefully. This grant is for cause marketing only. Specifics are clearly outlined in the IHWL site, including BBMG's clear definition of suitability.

Jump on today. Deadline is July 31, 2006 but you have to do some groundwork before you apply. It's too good an opportunity to miss.

Hospital Cause & Events Marketing Expert Shares Insights in New Blog

Selfish Giving (Self-Interest + Idealism) is the tongue-in-cheek title of this blog on "doing well and doing good." This anonymous cause marketer offers frequent, pithy observations on the world of cause marketing, usually based on a case study. The way s/he brings illustrates these examples, and comments on them, so clearly conveys her/his perspective on cause marketing. Great strategy.

Take a look today. Recent posts include:

• Memo to McDonald's: Supersize Your Cause Marketing
• Is Corporate Giving Dead or Just Sleeping?
• Cruise Line On Deck to Help Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation

Thanks mystery cause marketer for your great examples and observations.

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