Cause Marketing

Consider this cause marketing hypothetical. You’ve made your best cause marketing pitch to a would-be sponsor. It’s smart, strategically appropriate, and well activated across new media and old. You’re certain your prospect’s customers will get it and respond. But then a week goes by without hearing back from the prospect. So on day eight you call, but don’t press very hard. The prospect apologizes all over herself. Everybody back at corporate loves the proposal, she says. Trouble is, unbeknownst to the marketing staff, the CEO had promised a campaign to another cause. The marketing department doesn’t think they can or should do both this year. So sorry. Maybe next time. While you could play off of their guilt and press for a donation from the company foundation, instead you decide to offer a counter proposal. How about if all the company does is ask their customers for a straight ahead donation? I don’t know whether or not this is what happened with this effort from big box sports ret...

Cone’s recent Cause Evolution study found that while transactional cause marketing is still esteemed by consumers, it’s only slightly more so than when a company just makes a lump-sum donation to the cause. Transactional cause marketing is when the sponsor ties its donation to a purchase. I posted on the study back in October and while I didn’t quite throw a wet blanket on the idea, I found that part of Cone’s study unpersuasive. What happens, I wondered, if the charitable donation is in-kind? Does the company’s halo shine just as brightly as if they donated cash? What if the in-kind donation comes in the form of shared ad space? That seems to be what’s happening in this ad for vitamin D supplements from GNC and in support of the Melanoma Research Alliance . The Alliance funds research into melanoma, which kills right around 9,000 Americans every year. The great Bob Marley died of melanoma at the tender age of 36. GNC sells supplements and nutritional products at mall stores. The ad c...