Behind the Curtains at Orkin's Fight the Bite

In June I profiled Orkin's Fight the Bite campaign, which benefits the UN's effort called Nothing But Nets, a cause that purchases insecticide-treated mosquito nets for people in Africa so as to stave off malaria, a vicious killer on the continent.

In the wake of that post, I asked Martha Craft, the VP of public relations and communications at Rollins, Inc., Orkin's parent company, to 'open the Kimono' on the campaign. Ms. Craft was kind enough to respond.

1. How did the campaign come about?

Fight the Bite was a natural fit for Orkin because it directly relates to our business and our ongoing commitment to protect public health. This commitment is two-fold: 1) we have strategic partnerships with organizations such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and 2) we educate our customers on the threats/risks that pests can pose.

In 2007, we learned about the UN Foundation’s Nothing But Nets campaign – a global, grassroots effort to save lives by preventing malaria, a mosquito-borne disease and leading killer of children in Africa. Although malaria isn’t prevalent in the U.S., mosquitoes do pose a health risk here because they can carry West Nile virus. At the presentation to upper management, there was immediate agreement and enthusiasm that Fight The Bite was an important way that Orkin could make a difference and save lives around the world. We launched the program through a live satellite broadcast to our coworkers nationwide, and they embraced it with tremendous passion. We are in our second year of the campaign, and the support has only strengthened.

2. What are Orkin's goals for the campaign?

Ultimately, we want to save lives by helping stop the spread of malaria in Africa. We also want to help American homeowners reclaim their yards from mosquitoes. This year, we pledged to raise at least $150,000 through consumer and employee contributions as well as mosquito sales (Orkin gives one net for each mosquito sale made this year). With the funds we raise, Nothing But Nets will distribute at least 15,000 insecticide-treated mosquito bed nets to the areas of greatest need in Africa and teach recipients how to use them properly. Through June, we’ve raised more than $114,000.

3. How do you measure the campaign's success?

We measure the success by raising awareness and funds through:
1. Employee Engagement: Employees can purchase nets through a special internal net drive, by making payroll deductions or by purchasing nets directly on our website: nets.orkin.com.
2. Mosquito Sales: Every time a customer purchases Orkin’s mosquito service this year, we contribute one net to Nothing But Nets.
3. Consumer Engagement: Consumers, Orkin friends and family can buy nets at nets.orkin.com – whether they purchase mosquito service or not.

4. Who put the campaign together?

Orkin, Jackson Spalding (our public relations agency) and our partners at Nothing But Nets.

5. Nothing But Nets seems really grassroots. How does that relationship work?

Nothing But Nets is a fantastic organization with many partners and sponsors. We work closely on communications initiatives, community outreach and events with their team based out of Washington D.C. Nothing But Nets hosts City Tours around the country, which we have participated in on a local level. They’re also very open to our suggestions to expand the program.

6. Has anyone from Orkin been to Africa to see the donations 'on the ground'?

Not yet! We just announced a new Fight the Bite employee essay contest where Orkin employees can win a trip to Africa with Nothing But Nets to distribute nets themselves and visit the people we’re helping in person. To enter, Orkin employees submit a short essay (150 words or less) about their Fight the Bite experiences and how the campaign has impacted their lives, their community and/or Orkin. A panel of Rollins executives and public health partners (like NBN) will judge the essays and the winner will be announced this fall. Plans for the Africa trip are still underway, but it will likely take place in the first quarter 2010.

Open Standards Cause Marketing

If cause marketing is to really grow, I'm increasingly coming to the opinion that cause marketing needs the equivalent of an ‘open standard.’ When speaking of software especially, the term ‘open standards’ means an agreed-upon convention that is free and unconstrained in how it can be used.

Open standards are enormously valuable to you and me. HTML and XHTML are open standards. PDF is an open standard and CD-ROMs will run in any computer with a CD-ROM drive because of open standards.

That you’re reading this post is because of an open standard called TCP-IP, which is the way website data is divided up into packets, transmitted, and then reassembled by servers somewhere near your computer or phone.

According to the entry on the topic in today’s (August 17, 2009) Wikipedia: Open Standards means “a published specification that is immune to vendor capture at all stages in its life-cycle.” Its more complete definition according to the Digital Standards Organization is:

“The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit organization, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties.

The standard has been published and the standard specification document is available freely. It must be permissible to all to copy, distribute, and use it freely.

The patents possibly present on (parts of) the standard are made irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.

There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.

A key defining property is that an open standard is immune to vendor capture at all stages in its life-cycle.

Immunity from vendor capture makes it possible to improve upon, trust, and extend an open standard over time.”

What would be the benefits of open standards cause marketing?

1. It would create a series of cause marketing conventions that anyone could adopt, change and modify.
   
2. Because it would be free, it would eliminate some of the transaction costs of cause marketing.
   
3. It would make it easy for any sponsor to quickly plan and begin a cause marketing campaign.
   
4. It would give charities an easy starting point when approaching prospective sponsors.

What elements might be part of any cause marketing open standards?

1. Sponsorship contracts.
   
2. Maybe a seal of some kind.
   
3. General cause marketing approaches.
   
4. Standard donation amounts.

What else?

Honestly, my thinking on the subject is a work in progress. I’m not sure I know enough about the all the ins and outs of open standards to give more complete answers right now.

But I am convinced that just as all the big hotel chains in the U.S. profited when they worked together to create open standards for their reservation systems about a decade ago, the development of open standards for cause marketing would benefit all stakeholders involved in cause marketing, including the 'donors,' charities, sponsors and consultants like me.

I hope you’ll weigh in with your own thoughts and ideas.

Sustainable Charity

Back in 2003 I was working for a company that was considering a relationship with Dr. Laura, the no-nonsense radio show host famous for kicking her listeners in the pants.

Part of relationship was to be with her charitable foundation, which at the time was best known for handing out ‘My Stuff Bags,’ which were bags of essential items for kids being removed from homes and taken into shelters; blankets, stuffed animals and basic toiletries.

While the effort was successful… they donated more than 250,000 bags in 6 years, with less than 10 percent overhead… Dr. Laura shut it down in December 2004. The press release issued at the time didn’t say so, but one of the sticking points was that the business warehouse, package and then transship all the donated stuff to participating shelters. I saw that warehouse in Southern California and it was packed to the rafters.

The problem was that business model didn’t really scale. The more successful they got, the higher their expenses grew. The foundation was funded by donations from Dr. Laura and her listeners, but they didn’t have any other way of generating cash. Without a better business model the My Stuff Bags could have grown so successful that it would have bankrupted the effort!

Now I’ve seen a very similar charitable effort, but with a sustainable business model. Founded in in San Francisco in 2005, Project Night Night gives kids, especially in homeless shelters a canvas bag with a new security blanket, a stuffed animal and an age-appropriate book.

The difference is that Project Night Night is more decentralized and it generates a cash donation. The charity asks donors to buy the canvas bags, priced at $3.50 each, and then hold parties to gather up and pack the totes with the blankets, stuffed animals and books. So long as the items in question aren’t worn-out, you can collect the items from your own stores. Project Night Night also receives in-kind and monetary donations.

After parties, the totes are taken directly to local participating shelters. The list of participating shelters is on the Project Night Night website.

As Yogi Berra might have observed, “if it’s not sustainable it can’t be sustained.”