Cause Marketing
Brands are much more visible today than they were even ten years ago, thanks to the use of social media. While this creates a powerful tool for marketing professionals, it also poses a challenge, as feedback is given instantaneously and any wrong move — even if taken down — can be captured and preserved by viewers for years to come. Given the viral nature of social media, brands need to be careful about the way they go about furthering social causes. I think that a few key principles, in particular, would help brands to do so successfully.
The most important consideration in my opinion is conveying authenticity. It is important that brand campaigns demonstrate authenticity and one way to do this is by having good alignment with the social causes that they are seeking to further. Otherwise such affiliation can sometimes leave people scratching their heads. While it is not necessary that a brand have an obvious tie-in (though it can help), explaining why a brand is so committed to a particular cause is important. For example, it makes sense for a founder that has personally dealt with breast cancer to donate part of her company’s proceeds to support breast cancer. But that story needs to be explained. Otherwise, such a decision may seem random, insincere, and not inspire as much trust as to the authenticity or sincerity of the company’s choosing such an alliance.
An excellent example of using social cause marketing to effect change in a way that feels authentic is Ariel’s “Share the Load” brand campaign. Ariel is a laundry detergent product that has been produced since 1967 and that is owned by Procter and Gamble. Its campaign garnered worldwide attention by asking the question, “Is laundry only a woman’s job?”
The campaign called for gender equality by skillfully depicting through the use of videos how disproportionate the split of household chores is among Indian men and women who both work outside the home. The campaign sparked intense debate and discussion regarding societal expectations of women both in India but also worldwide. By using heartfelt videos and playing on the words of “sharing load” (i.e., laundry load) to mean so much more, the company was successfully able to move forward a social discussion about gender roles in India that led to increased discussion about equal rights for women, including equal pay. In so doing, the company also masterfully engendered a lot of goodwill from women (who typically make purchasing decisions regarding household items such as laundry detergent). Thus, this campaign not only increased brand awareness and improved brand perception, but also drove an increase in its sales by 60%.
This post is part of a blog series for a Social Media Management course that I am taking at MIT Sloan School of Management. For this blog, we were asked what we consider to be the key principle or principles for a brand to adhere to when furthering/partnering with a social cause.
