Reading Is Fundamental Cause Marketing Campaign with US Airways

Fly With US. Read With Kids.

Reading Is Fundamental (RIF) promotes family literacy and dates to 1966. It's the oldest and largest such literacy organization in the United States and darn hard to miss. Chances are, every American who's ever been in public or school library has seen their posters, which feature images of the celebrities of the day encouraging kids to read.

Currently RIF is doing an interesting campaign sponsored by US Airways called "Fly With US. Read With Kids." It's targeted at adults, encouraging them to log minutes reading with a child.

There's a media component with NBC's 'The Today Show,' a dedicated microsite with a 'paint-a-plane' element, and a sweepstakes with a grand prize trip to Walt Disney World in Florida. Throughout March every US Airways passenger received a book to share with a child.

In other words, there's a lot to learn from this promotion from some veteran campaigners. And... believe it or not... it all started when US Airways attended RIF's 2007 gala. Proof positive that you can cross-pollinate your fundraising and cause-related marketing efforts.

I conducted an online interview with Laura Goodman, Director, Corporate Relations at RIF, and asked 15 questions. In today's post we'll cover the first seven questions and answers. On Thursday I'll post the remaining 8 questions and Laura's answers.

Who is your audience/audiences for the campaign?

"The audience for the campaign includes RIF’s coordinator network, US Airways
employees, and the general public."

What are your goals for the campaign?

"RIF and US Airways share a goal of an increasing the public’s awareness of the importance of children’s literacy. Together, we’ve created a variety of resources for parents and volunteers to foster excitement for reading with children, such as the online “Read with Kids Challenge,” placing Maisy books on the planes, and US Airways support of local RIF programs.

How will you measure the campaign's success?

"The success of the campaign will be measured in a number of ways including: media coverage, US Airways employee/customer feedback, level of employee volunteerism, increased donations to RIF, increased internal/external awareness of the airline’s corporate citizenship initiatives, increased traffic to rif.org, number of participants in the reading challenge, number of collective minutes read to children, number of books distributed, number of communication materials distributed about RIF and reading and other program specifics. We already know that campaign has been successful because over 300,000 books have been distributed to children, 1 million minutes read and thousands of dollars donated to RIF."

How did the campaign come about?

"The 'Fly with US. Read with Kids.' campaign was built around the goal of both RIF and US Airways, which was to increase the public’s awareness of the importance of children’s literacy. US Airways was interested in partnering with RIF because children’s literacy is a cause that is important to every person in every community. RIF is happy to partner with US Airways as a chance to reach a broad audience with our mission.

When did you launch?

"The “Fly with US. Read with Kids.” Campaign officially launched on February 29, 2008

How long will it go on?

"The on-flight books will be available through the month of March. The Read with Kids Challenge runs through May 31, 2008. The support of local RIF programs, the lending libraries in US Airways clubs, and information will be available for the rest of 2008."

What prior experience did RIF have with an online effort like this?

"RIF has an award-winning website, and we have conducted several successful online reading contests for children, including a Summer Reading Contest sponsored by Target in summer of 2007."

Top Eight Cause-Related Marketing Campaigns of 2007

Yeah, You Read it Right. It's a Top 8 List.

More cause-related marketing campaigns are unveiled every day across the world than I review in a year at the cause-related marketing blog. And, frankly, I don’t see very many campaigns from outside North America. So I won’t pretend that my annual list of the top cause-related marketing campaigns is exhaustive.

But, like any other self-respecting blogger, I won’t let my superficial purview stop me from drawing my own tortured conclusions!

So… cue the drumroll (and the dismissive snickers)… without further ado, here is my list of the eight best cause-related marketing campaigns of 2007.

My list of the worst cause-related marketing campaigns of 2007 follows on Thursday.

Chilis and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
I was delighted by the scope of Chilis’ campaign for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. As you walked in you saw the servers adorned in black co-branded shirts. Other elements included message points on the Chilis beverage coas…

Profile of Cause Marketing Veteran Joe Lake

Blogger's Note: What follows is a profile and interview I wrote of Children's Miracle Network co-founder Joe Lake, who was recently installed as the CEO of the Starfish Television Network. This originally appeared in the Salt Lake Enterprise on Monday, May 11.

Lining the walls of the office of Joe Lake, the new CEO of the Starfish Television Network, a 501(c) (3) public charity and television network founded in 2006 and headquartered in Midvale, are pictures of the many celebrities he has worked with.

There are pictures of Joe with Goldie Hawn, Sidney Poitier, Jeff Bridges, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Rob Lowe and Walter Cronkite, and affectionately-autographed publicity stills from Bob Hope and Rich Little.

It’s something you’d expect in the office of a Hollywood agent, or at a celebrity hangout in Manhattan, or Chicago or Vegas. But the Starfish Television Network, whose mission is to tell the stories of nation’s nonprofits in a way that educates, entertains and inspires its audi…

The Alden Keene Cause Marketing Stock Index Dramatically Outperforms Other Indices

There are stock indexes galore; the Dow, S&P 500, the NASDAQ Composite, the Wilshire 5000, the FTSE, and hundreds more. But how would an index of the stocks of companies that do a meaningful amount of cause marketing perform compared to those well-known indexes? Pretty well, as it turns out.

I first floated the idea of a stock index that would track companies that do cause marketing back in 2009. I tried to figure out Yahoo Pipes so that I could put the feed right into this blog. But alas sometimes the geek gene does fall pretty far from the tree.

So I talked to programmers to see if I could find someone who could do the same, but it was always more than I was willing to pay.

Finally, last week I hired a MBA student to do it all in a spreadsheet, and what do you know but that over the last 15 years a basket of 25 cause marketing stocks dramatically outperforms the Dow, the S&P 500, the NASDAQ Composite, and the Wilshire 5000.

The index, which I call the Alden Keene Cause Market…

Cause Marketing

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