Play well with others
- 30.01.2010
- Strategy
Advocating social change or “social marketing” is not a sales job. It’s true, convincing someone that homelessness is unacceptable and that your organization can make a difference is not the same as touting the outstanding—and entirely new!—features of a gadget. The benefits of getting involved in furthering a cause are often difficult to quantify or even visualize. How do you show the advantages of a new community garden? How do you represent someone’s emergence from a life-threatening depression? How do you explain the complexities of eating disorders?
As you know, your audience is bombarded with thousands of messages everyday. It’s a matter of efficiency—and sanity, at times—to sift through the din and retain what’s essential. One of the main reasons more people don’t get involved is due to the perceived complexity of social issues, yet it isn’t their job to understand every facet of the problem your organization is tackling; it’s yours. All they need to understand is what they can do to help.
Many not for profits we work with have a strong understanding of who they are. Their missions are clear. They know what they stand for. But when asked about their audience(s) a common answer will be: “We want them to understand the importance of what we do and support us.” Usually this means volunteering or donating money. This implies that all of these people share the same values, that they want to achieve the exact thing your organization does.
But people buy things for a million different reasons: it’s new, it matches their trousers, the old one is broken, Bobby has one . . . Why would contributing to a cause be any different? So it’s your job to identify your audiences, these unique people impelled to do things for their own reasons, and get to know them.
Companies who sell products shifted their strategy long ago to selling lifestyle and personality—rather than objects—through consumerism. If you apply the same thinking here then social marketing shouldn’t be about converting audiences to your cause, it should be about persuading them that their values are the same as yours. They don’t need to know or understand everything your organization does; they need to know what matters to them. By aligning your messaging and outlining a simple, specific, call to action you will make it effortless for the right people to get involved.
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Nicely done, Isabelle!
Thank you so much Casey. It means a lot that you think so. Love your pic!
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