Turning Data Into Information

An Average Hour for Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki, Seven Months for Me

On Tuesday, October 17, 2006 I posted my first entry on this blog called Eyeballs vs Tears. According to Google Analytics, in the 202 days since the blog has received about 4380 visits and 7300 pageviews, for an average of 1.67 pageviews per visit.

I confess I’m pretty proud of those numbers, although they probably represent at best an average hour’s worth of traffic at Guy Kawasaki’s or Seth Godin’s blogs.

Nonetheless, I think it’s instructive to parse the data revealed in Google Analytics and try to turn it from ‘data into information,’ as the immortal Peter Drucker (seen above) used to say.

Not surprisingly, the most common Google search terms were phrases like “cause-related marketing,” “cause related promotion,” or variations on a theme.

More than 200 visits came courtesy of Newsweek magazine’s article on the Red campaign in which I’m quoted. Philanthopy.com’s roundup of nonprofit blogs called Give and Take, where this blog has been featured several times, has generated 175 referrals. By contrast, natural search on Google has generated more than 2,000 visits.

Thus, while referrals, especially from the ‘old’ media can drive traffic and build respectability, the biggest chunk of traffic comes from ‘new’ media.

In terms of postings, the most popular was the Top 5 Bottom 5 Cause-related Marketing Campaigns of 2006. The next three most popular were Montblanc Nicolas Cage Ad, followed closely by the Viva Glam Lipstick for the MAC Aids Fund, and Using Celebrities to Enhance Your Cause-Related Marketing. It appears that people interested in cause-related marketing believe there’s a strong role for celebrities and glamour.

Among postings that received 50 or more unique pageviews, Keeping Your Cause-Related Marketing Relationships Fresh had the highest average time spent on that page; 3:33 minutes. That leads me to believe that there’s a hunger for information about the people part of cause marketing.

I have tried not only to highlight and dissect the big cause marketing campaigns like Susan G. Komen, Red, the Red Dress campaign and others, I’ve also aimed my radar at smaller efforts, like the Rocky Mountain Power Cool Keeper Program and Silk Soymilk and the Bonneville Environmental Foundation. Neither have generated much readership.

When I have tried to be self-consciously clever I’ve had mixed results. I thought I’d get calls from book publishers after I posted Cause Marketing and Galvanic Corrosion. But most people found it about as exciting as rust. My posting on the need for a ‘MacGuffin’ or a mechanical devise that impels action in cause marketing campaigns did better. Still, no calls from publishers.
The great plurality of visitors come from the United States. But I’ve had readers from a total of 83 countries on six continents, none more surprising to me than a visitor from Myanmar who read 19 pages! But early on a great number of my readers came from Europe and Asia, especially China.

As a result although I’m an American and all but a small handful of the cause marketing campaigns I’ve reviewed have been American campaigns, I’ve conscientiously tried to write posts that I thought had at least some application for cause marketers whether they were in Mauritius, Morocco, Mexico or Massachusetts.

I’ll end on a related note. For my readers everywhere, I hope you'll share with all of us notable cause-related marketing campaigns where you live along with your review. Please direct any campaigns to aldenkeeneatgmaildotcom. And if it’s not in English, please include a translation.

And thanks to all of you for finding and reading Cause-Related Marketing. It’s been fun!

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...

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...

Cause-Related Marketing with Customer Receipts

Walgreens and JDRF Right now at Walgreens…the giant pharmacy and retail store chain with more than 5,800 stores in the United States and Puerto Rico… they’re selling $1 paper icons for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF). This is an annual campaign and I bought one to gauge how it’s changed over the years. (Short list… they don’t do the shoe as a die cut anymore; the paper icon is now an 8¾ x 4¼ rectangle. Another interesting change; one side is now in Spanish). The icon has a bar code and Jacob, the clerk, scanned it and handed me a receipt as we finished the transaction. At the bottom was an 800-number keyed to a customer satisfaction survey. Dial the number, answer some questions and you’re entered into a drawing for $10,000 between now and the end of September 2007. I don’t know what their response rate is, but the $10,000 amount suggests that it’s pretty low. Taco Bell’s survey gives out $1,000 per week. At a regional seafood restaurant they give me a code that garner...

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