Archive for the ‘CSR’ Category

Who Cares More, Coke or Pepsi?

Posted on: April 2nd, 2011 by Geoff Livingston 9 Comments

Friends
Image by Orin Zebest

Much has been said about Pepsi’s falling market share and its social media driven Refresh cause marketing effort. Extremists have dubbed Pepsi Refresh as the iconic symbol of failure for social media as a marketing mechanism. Like many conversations about social media, this view is too simplistic. It fails to acknowledge several key issues, including product weaknesses, the fact that PR and advertising were well integrated into the effort, and the debatable use of cause marketing as the primary thrust behind Refresh. Meanwhile primary competitor Coca Cola continues to widen the gap with its marketing and quieter CSR initiatives.

The lack of a tangible theory of change, the over-focus on PR 2.0 participation metrics, and generally a failure to report the results of its community investments, lead one to question the authenticity of Pepsi Refresh. The market has been repeatedly told about the great marketing successes, and in context, there’s a notable under-emphasis on the social good results from Pepsi. On the cause side, nonprofits who have won grants have grumbled about the lack of post-award support from Pepsi.

Because Pepsi Refresh did not have a tangible theory of change, a measurable approach towards social good, one can conclude that these outcomes are natural. They also show a lack of understanding about corporate social responsibility, authenticity and social media. In short, now that the fanfare is over, what good did the company achieve, and how do people feel about their participation in the campaign since the primary reported result is that they posted about Pepsi Refresh?

Social good campaigns only work when people feel the company genuinely cares, and when social media is used that participants feel their contributions have had a societal impact. Pepsi has not successfully communicated either outcome. On the contrary, Pepsi’s approach to reporting Refresh results have been short sighted and undermined some of the good will built with community investments.

In fact, when closely examining Refresh’s “social good” and market leader Coca-Cola’s CSR efforts, one cannot help but question which soda company really cares more? Coke has taken incredible strides in water stewardship, and while it doesn’t market this activity, it actively communicates its strategy to resolve an issue that its products directly impact. It works with environmental partners, and reports back on lessons learned.

Let’s be clear, from a holistic standpoint, Coke’s CSR efforts are not ideal and leave a lot to be desired. They don’t even use many of these efforts to promote themselves, but at least the company works towards tangible end goals. There’s an authenticity to Coke’s efforts that one does not get from Refresh.

In considering corporate social good it seems that quiet authenticity is more effective than fanfare in the long term. The hare loses to the tortoise. The primary reason why is not the method, but the intent and purpose of waging social good. Who do you think cares more, Coke or Pepsi?

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Galvanizing Your Organization to Help in a Disaster

Posted on: March 19th, 2011 by Geoff Livingston 2 Comments

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Sxswcares

There are times when a cause campaign is not about mutual reward for brand and beneficiary, rather responsible citizenship. Disasters are such times. There’s no greater example of this than the current triple crisis of earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster in Japan. Using online tools, it’s easy to participate in charitable activities, and help situations like the Japanese crisis.

When your cause or company’s employees and stakeholders want to act and participate on the frontlines of the relief effort, there are several things you can do. Whether it’s leveraging your online community, offering financial resources or volunteering, almost every person and organization has assets to offer.

Before going too far, please ensure that the organization is motivated by a clear desire to resolve or provide relief to a devastating event. If your goal is to market or strengthen the social responsibility factor of your brand, the disaster campaign could easily achieve the opposite and tarnish your brand with an opportunistic hue (consider Spirit Airlines oil spill faux paux). Disasters are a time for social responsibility and altruism.

When the Deep Horizon oil spill occurred and companies began stepping up their response, Dawn dish soap stood out. Dawn soap products were donated as a means to clean birds, and the effort was well received publicly. The company simply publicized it was donating the products. Further Dawn’s bird cleaning ads can be considered in good taste because they had been deployed prior to the oil spill accident. In fact, because life matched brand promise, the ads were strengthened.

Here are some tips if you are considering participating in disaster relief…

Spur of the Moment

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If an event happens such as the Japanese earthquake that’s so compelling it inspires you to act, the best thing to do is to affiliate with an entity that is well prepared. For example, the America Red Cross literally exists for crisis situations and its business is preparedness. If you prefer a less organized effort, consider Crisis Commons and the fantastic job they do getting coders and other techies to help out in crisis like the Sendai earthquake.

The point is that there are dozens, even hundreds of causes and organizations that prepare for such events. Rather than reinventing the wheel on the fly, find and support them in the ways that they suggest.

Many of the more experienced players have grassroots systems for you to participate in and fundraise. Further, independent fundraising platforms like Crowdrise, Razoo, Causes and Jumo allow you to set up your own social fundraising campaign autonomous of a charity’s oversight.

One of the most powerful testimonial effects of the #SxSWCares effort last weekend was its use of grassroots word of mouth power to support Japan. But it did so as an independent fundraiser for the American Red Cross. Similarly, when Google founder Eric Schmidt wanted to donate $100,000 in matching funds to Japan, he sought experienced nonprofit Citizen Effect. Lady Gaga also decided to support the Schmidt/Citizen Effect effort.

Prepare for Unfortunate Events

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One of the best things a communicator can do is create a crisis communications plan for missteps and disasters. Similarly, preparation to help in advance of disaster situations makes sense. This allows the organization to literally pull a book off the shelf and follow directions or adapt them to unique situations. Network for Good was able to send attendees to SxSW AND prepare its network for recovery efforts thanks to prior planning for crisis events. As of last evening, Network for Good had raised $4.3 million for its group of earthquake causes.

With a pre-determined crisis plan, you can deploy resources in a manner that better plays to your strengths. Further, the nonprofit or company can save funds and allocate other resources for that unfortunate day in advance, ensuring impact.

For example, Google has a crisis preparedness team for disasters. The team has been actively engaged in the Japan crisis since the earthquake, using tools like Person Finder, Checkout for direct donations the Japanese Red Cross, maps via Google Earth, and news aggregation. Google’s impact is significant and helpful, using its tools and networks to ease the situation as best as it can.

The questions you have to ask is how the organization can best assist in a time of need and how much is it willing to give. From there building a plan becomes easier.

Free Agent Experimentation

Taylor Anderson

Many organizations and people feel like they can do more than the current authorities and causes involved. Or they feel inspired to use tools in an unthought of way. Whether it’s an independent fundraiser or a new tool, this is the heart of innovation. If innovation can possibly make a difference it only makes sense to engage.

Two recent examples, include Kira Siddall deploying widespread Twitter networks to find Taylor Anderson in Japan, and the MIT Media Lab’s use of hot air balloons to document the oil spill. Further, technological innovation can seed breakthrough applications, including unique Uhsahidi map deployments, Google People Finder, and several tools developed by Crisis Commons. In times of crisis, inspiration can save lives and make a big impact.

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The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Online Cause Marketing

Posted on: February 21st, 2011 by Geoff Livingston 10 Comments

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly of Cause Marketing

The above presentation was delivered to the Cause Marketing Forum last Tuesday, February 15. It focused on lessons learned integrating social media into cause marketing campaigns, and how the influx of conversations requires a new level of authenticity from causes and nonprofits.

All of the campaigns featured were from 2010 or 2011 with the exception of one (Haagen Dazs). Here is a discussion of three of the campaigns, the Good, the Bad and the Ugly featured in the first half of the presentation.

The Good: AMEX’s Small Business Saturday

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American Express launched its Small Business Saturday campaign to encourage Americans to purchase from small businesses the day after Black Friday. Primarily a Facebook effort, AMEX integrated the application with a media push that included a launch with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, as well as a Twitter campaign.

For every Fan Page “Like” up to 500,000 (the page surpassed 1.4 million), AMEX gave a $1 donation to Girls, Inc. to foster female entrepreneurship. Small businesses were featured on the page, and 10,000 small business owners received $100 worth of social advertising from Facebook.

The campaign had a lot to like about it: There was an obvious tie to American Express’s business, demonstrating authenticity. The effort integrated media relations, online advertising, and influencers and Twitter, all in addition to the strong use of the Facebook application. There were several great calls to action including a like turned into a dollar for Girls, Inc.; in exchange for signing up and spending, consumers got a discount; and using the wall to share small business stories, which along with Twitter encouraged participation and engagement.

The only possible improvements would be extending it beyond a moment in time, and making it a sustainable effort. In addition, there was too much focus on Facebook as the final destination with not enough traffic driving back to the AMEX site.

The Bad: Groupon’s Super Bomb

Van Cleef Good Ugly l

Not much more needs to be said about Groupon’s series of “humanitarian” ads. An attempt to make fun of American consumerism, the ads just insulted a good portion of the country, not to mention the Chinese government. In addition to the questionable creative, numerous tactical errors were made making Groupon’s 2011 Super Bowl ads one of the worst cause marketing campaigns ever.

No call to action helping the charities was present in the ads, and Groupon did not include an obvious URL. There was no explanation of the ideas behind the ads on Groupon’s social channels. When the blogosphere blew up, Groupon did not address concerns, instead it justified the attempted joke on their blog. Further, Groupon did not engage bloggers directly, and disregarded feedback. It took four days of mounting criticism for the company to pull the ads.

The Ugly: KFC’s Buckets for the Cure

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While selling a lot of buckets of chicken for charity ($8 million donated), this partnership had issues due to the tie between Komen’s mission to cure breast cancer, and KFC producing fatty foods. Komen’s own site had research demonstrating obesity as a precursor for older women developing breast cancer. This represents a larger issue where a nonprofit and company choose money over strategic partnerships, dancing with the wrong partner and degrading brand value.

When people put two and two together, bad blog posts started popping up. This campaign went from being a lethal generosity win for both parties to a full on blogodrama.

Here’s a breakdown of the good and the bad on the Buckets for the Cure: First of all financially, it has to be considered a win. Lots of chicken sold and money raised. But it was poorly engineered from the get-go as the Komen web site contradicted the campaign with its research. There was no explanation of why Komen chose KFC as a partner, and what they hope the relationship demonstrated.

Then there was no major social media component, but social media ended up being a key media set when bloggers took to their WordPresses. The good was that KFC engaged directly with bloggers and probably made friends, stopping the bad publicity from spreading too far. However, Komen completely ignored it, and 2010 and 2011 acts have continued to negatively impact their online and offline reputation.

Conclusion

Again, the whole presentation is above, but here are the concluding points for online cause marketers:

  • Civic media is the great opportunity to embrace customer voices
  • It can also turn on us
  • To avoid worst case scenarios, cause marketing campaigns need better engineering
  • Campaigns need authenticity mapping to corporate cultures and ethos
  • Use the tools to connect dots for stakeholders
  • Have your own site, use Facebook and Twitter for In AND Outbound
  • Empower stakeholders to participate, embrace and own your story
  • Be prepared for the ugly, and evolve (two way dialogue)

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