Using Sponsorship and Cause Marketing in Lieu of Advertising

In the Great Recession some companies are turning to sponsorship, including cause marketing, instead of carpet bombing us with more ads. Sponsorship is potentially cheaper than just buying ads, probably more targeted, more easily attuned to social media, and ‘stickier.’

Pepsi famously is spending a goodly chunk of its enormous ad budget on its Refresh Project, wherein the company is giving away millions to individuals, small groups, businesses, and organizations who are trying… broadly speaking… to better the world. The giving is determined by popular vote, thus ensuring that funding candidates get the word out. Pepsi has recently... and smartly… added a subset called Refresh the Gulf.

Less well known, perhaps, and less grandiose is Dodge Ram Trucks campaign called Letters for Lyrics. Write a letter to a soldier, take it to your local Dodge Ram dealer and you get the CD 'Breaking Southern Ground.' The campaign’s stated goal is to give away 1 million CDs. A download from the album is available from the Ram Trucks website.

I’m not a big enough country music fan to know the featured group, the Zac Brown Band, but I like this campaign. Someone once described country music as the ‘soft, gooey center of America,’ a portrayal I find fitting. Country music can be sentimental, patriotic, and clever in ways that other popular music seldom wouldn't even try.

("I'd Like to Check You for Ticks," by Brad Paisley comes to mind, for instance).

Given that, here’s a trick I hope Dodge tries. Somewhere hidden in the stack of the million letters they hope to get will be some really emotional stories. Old men who tell of their exploits in earlier wars; young children who tell of their own heartache; decent Americans who just want to help; and more.

Dodge should create a series of web documentaries that go behind those letters to tell the whole story. And then they should give two Dodge trucks away during the CMA Awards in November: one to the letter writer and one to the soldier who received it.

Comments

Anne Eigeman said…

Great post, Paul! I am not a country music fan and so don't watch the CMA awards but if Dodge was able to rig up your exciting plan, I would definitely tune in next fall.
Thanks!

7/13/2010 8:14 AM

Chili’s and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital

I was in Chili’s today and I ordered their “Triple-Dipper,” a three appetizer combo. While I waited for the food, I noticed another kind of combo. Chili’s is doing a full-featured cause-related marketing campaign for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. There was a four-sided laminated table tent outlining the campaign on the table. When the waitress brought the drinks she slapped down Chili’s trademark square paper beverage coasters and on them was a call to action for an element of the campaign called ‘Create-A-Pepper,’ a kind of paper icon campaign. The wait staff was all attired in black shirts co-branded with Chili’s and St. Jude. The Create-A-Pepper paper icon could be found in a stack behind the hostess area. The Peppers are outlines of Chili’s iconic logo meant to be colored. I paid $1 for mine, but they would have taken $5, $10, or more. The crayons, too, were co-branded with the ‘Create-A-Pepper’ and St. Jude’s logos. There’s also creatapepper.com, a microsite, but again wi...

Part 2: How Chili's Used Cause-Related Marketing to Raise $8.2 million for St. Jude

[Bloggers Note: In this second half of this post I discuss the nuts and bolts of how Chili's motivates support from its employees and managers and how St. Jude 'activates' support from Chili's. Read the first half here.] How does St. Jude motivate support from Chili’s front line employees and management alike? They call it ‘activation’ and they do so by the following: They share stories of St. Jude patients who were sick and got better thanks to the services they received at the hospital. Two stories in particular are personal for Chili’s staff. A Chili’s bartender in El Dorado Hills, California named Jeff Eagles has a younger brother who was treated at St. Jude. In both 2005 and 2006 Eagles was the campaign’s biggest individual fundraiser. John Griffin, a manager at the Chili’s in Conway, Arkansas had an infant daughter who was treated for retinoblastoma at St. Jude. They drew on the support Doug Brooks… the president and CEO of Brinker International, Chili’s parent co...

A Clever Cause Marketing Campaign from Snickers and Feeding America

Back in August I bought this cause-marketed Snickers bar during my fourth trip of the day to Home Depot. (Is it even possible to do home repairs and take care of all your needs with just one trip to Home Depot / Lowes ?) Here’s how it works: Snickers is donating the cost of 2.5 million meals to Feeding America, the nation’s leading hunger-relief charity. On the inside of the wrapper is a code. Text that code to 45495… or enter it at snickers.com… and Snickers will donate the cost of one meal to Feeding America, up to one million additional meals. The Feeding America website says that each dollar you donate provides seven meals. So Snickers donation might be something like $500,000. But I like that Snickers quantified its donations in terms of meals made available, rather than dollars. That’s much more concrete. It doesn’t hurt that 3.5 million is a much bigger number than $500,000. I also like the way they structured the donation. By guaranteeing 2.5 million meals, the risk of a poor...

Cause Marketing

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