Starting Conversations about Marketing and Purpose

Category Archives: Causes

What country has the most generous football fans? Score for the Red Cross…

Posted on June 21, 2008 in Causes, Geneva

Most of Europe is currently under a football (soccer) “spell” as the Euro 2008 championships near the semi-finals. I was in Cologne yesterday as Germany beat Portugal. Believe me, it was loud & crazy!

Not just a European football competition, but a humanitarian competition as well?

UEFA - the Union of European Football Associations, came up with a great idea for a cause related marketing program during the championships. UEFA partnered with the Red Cross (ICRC) to conduct a fundraising campaign called “Score for the Red Cross”. Football fans can help their team win the title of UEFA EURO2008 humanitarian champions. Fans can purchase virtual goals for their chosen team through the website scorefortheredcross.org. The money will go to Afghan mine victims, helping them receive artificial limbs.

How it Works:

Fans buy goals for their favorite team. Goals cost one Euro each, and a minimum of seven goals must be bought. Fans can buy as many goals as they like.

What country is winning the humanitarian EURO 2008 competiton?

Interestingly, many of the teams that are “still alive” in the Championships (Germany, Netherlands, Spain, Turkey, Italy, etc.) are at the top…Winning produces more giving!!

Here is a link to the TV ad for the campaign…it is very well done. (Random Side Note: Switzerland & Austria are co-hosting the championships…there were even a few games in Geneva, but I was unable to get tickets!
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Design 21: Social Design Network

Posted on June 16, 2008 in Causes

Social design is gaining some traction lately. I just stumbled upon Design 21, a great site that holds online design competitions for GOOD. They have a series of design competitions in the queue. The one that is currently open is the Millennium Promise Competition. The winner of this competition receives $10,000. Designers are asked to design an online campaign to advocate the Millennium development goals.

Who is behind Design 21?

DESIGN 21: Social Design Network is collaborative project between a small design & merchandise company called Felissimo and UNESCO.

What a great idea…a site that encourages GOOD/social design and engages the global design community in regular competitions. Go check it out.

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The next Obama…? David Gustave, a man with a purpose

Posted on June 11, 2008 in Causes

Barack Obama’s mythical rise to (hopefully) President has inspired the world. In Europe, there seems to be a similar grassroots effort starting for a new British Obama–David Gustave. James Pattinson, a good friend and fellow P&Ger, recently started a facebook group that has spawned mainstream media articles around the possibility of David Gustave becoming the next British Obama.

How similar are they?

There are definitely similarities between Gustave & Obama. Both are tall, in their forties, and of mixed ethnicity. One major difference is the Obama is a Christian (yet many in the US still think he is a Muslim) and Gustave really is a Muslim.

David Gustave

Gustave’s story is inspiring…he left school (and home) at 16 unable to cope with an abusive father. He then spent several years finding a range of (sometimes dubious) ways to earn a living. At 30, a series of unpleasant events caused him to truly seek a life change…and so he enrolled in an adult ed. course. One thing led to another, and at 32, he entered Oxford as an undergrad!

David’s Cause

David currently works as an educational motivator for Kids Company, a charity founded by Camila Batmanghelidjh in 1996. Kids company provides emotional and educational support to vulnerable inner-city children and young people primarily in London.

David is, no doubt, a fantastic role model for inner-city kids. From what James tells me, he is very inspiring, really a “man on a mission”. So, I am signing myself up to the facebook group…

Marketing Gustave

A quick Google search shows that several political new-comers are being touted as “the next Obama”.  Gustave and his supporters will need to move fast if they want to brand him as the next Obama in the minds of everyday Brits.  The Facebook group is a great idea and has already led to press coverage.  Indeed, by using social media/web 2.0 tools to get the Gustave grassroots movement started, James and co. are already thinking ahead.

David has a big challenge ahead if he wants to make it to the Obama level. But then again, did anyone think he would actually make it to (and through) Oxford? And did anyone think Obama would beat Clinton?

Stranger things have happened…

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What do marketing mix models have to say about cause?

Posted on June 3, 2008 in Causes, Marketing

Cause marketing campaigns are on the rise…indeed, companies have increased their “cause spend” significantly since 2005 (click here for details).  All this increase in spending would suggest that marketing mix models (within companies) are signaling high ROIs for cause related campaigns.  But is this really the case?  Are TV, Print, Interactive campaigns centered on cause being rigorously measured internally?  Jack Neff posits in a recent AdvertisingAge article that YES, there is an ROI for Doing Good but admits that numbers are “hard to come by.”

Wouldn’t it be great to see cause campaigns measured more effectively?  If there was more convincing data available to the global marketing community, doing good would become even more fashionable…

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A sucker for…

Posted on May 28, 2008 in Causes, Uncategorized

…cool cause campaigns like the one new media writer/consultant Joseph Jaffe is conducting on ebay. Joseph is basically auctioning his consulting services over dinner. If you win the auction, Joseph will have a chat/brainstorm session with you somewhere in the NY/Conn area.

I thought about throwing in a bid for fun…but I will wait & see if it remains low before plunging on in. Plus, I am currently living in Geneva, so it will be hard to get to the NY area over the next few months. Click here to see where the bidding is currently.

THE (m)CAUSE: Joseph Jaffe is helping Jennifer Leggio raise money for her participation in the Nike Women’s Marathon, which is Team in Training’s largest event, to support the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

Note: Other social media notables like Chris Brogan are participating as well.

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More web 2.0 sites popping up around “cause”

Posted on May 27, 2008 in Causes, Social Entreprenuers

I just stopped by one of my favorite cause related marketing blogs…aptly titled Cause-Related Marketing.  Paul Jones does a great job of covering cause related marketing campaigns.  I suggest you check out his blog.

Today, Paul talks about some cool new cause related web 2.0 sites that could use a little network effect love.  So, I am doing my part to link to the them this evening…go on over and check them out.

Good2gether: This is a very interesting idea (my favorite of the 3) led by serial entrepreneur Greg McHale.  Currently, many of the 1.5 million non-profit websites out there don’t get much traffic & suffer from a lack of awareness…Greg is trying to solve this issue via a widget provided to media outlets (e.g. newspapers). When a story pops up around a crisis event (e.g. Chinese earthquakes) the widget will provide links to local nonprofit resources helping to battle the issue.  If a user clicks on a link, they are directed to a page where they can get more info about the non-profit…cool idea, I will put Good2gether on my watch list

Just Cause:  A “social networking with a purpose site”.  JUST CAUSE is an integrated media property with a  national print magazine, an interactive online community site, and community events.   I am a big fan of Good Magazine and its online site + print pub…it seems Just Cause will try to differentiate via the creation of community & a more local focus.

uPlej: In Paul’s words, a fundraising company that uses the power of a networked downline to raise money for charities.

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Cannes and “faux cause” campaigns

Posted on May 22, 2008 in Causes

I am back after dropping down to the south of France and the Ligurian region of Italy for a short break.  While stopping over in Cannes to check out the scene at the 08 film festival with my family, I happened upon a couple of cause related campaigns out on the streets.  One ad in particular caught my attention as I strolled down the beach…a large billboard asking for a 1 Euro donation to support the search for missing journalists in Iraq.  Turns out that the ad was merely a ploy to promote a new French movie called Envoyés très spéciaux.  Thanks goes to Michael Jones from the Variety blog “The Circuit” for pointing this out.  Click here to check out his post and the (in)famous billboard.  Michael calls the ad “rather tasteless”.

Another cause activity out on the street was a UNICEF auction for a “star studded” autographed car.  Here I am having a look at the names on the car…

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Are Marketers becoming more like Politicians?

Posted on May 11, 2008 in Causes, Marketing

In a recent AdvertisingAge article called: For Unilever, P&G, No Good Deed Is Going Unpunished Jack Neff quotes Howard Rubenstein as saying:

[the] confluence of marketing and politics that shows no signs of abating, with marketers tracking online buzz and other measures of public opinion as doggedly as politicians track polls He goes on to say…high-profile marketers are in the political arena to stay, whether they want to or not.

Indeed, the rise in social responsibility + the rise in social media (& the ability to track it) does seem to = a challenging new world order type mix for companies. As for those working in Brand Management (e.g. people like me who lead R&D, PR, sales, finance, and creative agencies etc.) it becomes more and more critical to surround yourself with fantastic, forward thinking PR/marketing to help navigate these new waters. Certainly, there is little room for error in this brave new world. And even great ideas that drive wonderful causes can easily go wrong as public opinion can now shift on a dime. It is one thing to be able to track the conversation, but an entirely new thing to react quickly once it starts going into an entirely unintended direction. Side Note: I do hope the current raging greenwashing debates do not discourage companies from leveraging “Good” going forward.

So who volunteers for the job of brand pollster? There might be some positions opening up soon… :-)

Check out this good post from What Do you Stand For? commenting on the AdAge article:

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Asking hard questions on the weekend…

Posted on May 10, 2008 in Causes, Randomness

There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up. –Oscar Wilde

Closets full of clothes and basements full of stuff…but we still buy more & lag when it comes to giving. Oscar Wilde’s quote made me laugh…and then think. So as a follow-up to my “sufficiency” article a couple of days ago, I am asking myself a couple of hard questions on giving this weekend.

One hard thing to reconcile as a marketer is balancing the need for growth with sustainability. Consumer spending makes our economy move and we definitely depend on it more than ever. But over-spending is an epidemic in the US (click here for the numbers). How can we give more when we are in over our heads in debt? One way to reign in all of the spending (read greed) would be to see a surge in lifestyle change combined with giving. On the giving side, according to Intelligent Giving the avg. person from the US gives roughly 2.0% of their income to charity. This is anemic, but when compared to Brits (1.0%) and the French (0.1%) Americans seem quite generous. There are encouraging signs of an upsurge in philanthropy and giving over the past few years as influential celebs like Bono and Bill Clinton have made it a focus. Bill and Melinda Gates have demonstrated amazing examples of giving.

Maybe we should shift our mindset the next time someone comes up and asks for a donation…all to often our response is: I don’t have the cash, so I better not. But if we are honest this lack of cash has not stopped us from over-spending when a purchase is for us & benefits our own world. Indeed, we don’t let the fact that we “just don’t have the cash” stop us from upgrading our lifestyle though we may not have the means…so we need to ask ourselves if acquisition and upgrading does, in fact, = our life (wouldn’t this be sad). I am challenging myself to get more creative & find bigger ways to give…even when “I don’t have the cash.”

Note: Andy Stanley influenced the closing paragraph.


Here is a good recent blog post on the state of philanthropy from tactical philanthropy

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New Social Network for Causes: Make the Difference Network

Posted on May 5, 2008 in Causes

I just saw a new social network for causes called Make the Difference Network. The aim of the network is to leverage social networks to help non-profits extend their message. MTDN leverages celebrity influencers in a big way. There is even a celebrity tab across the top toolbar…MTDN was co-founded by a celebrity as well–actress Jessica Biel.

I will try to check out the site more. It will be interesting to watch how the team swings into action to promote the site.

If you want the full back story on how the site really came to fruition, check out Kent McBride.net Kent seems to be very well-versed in the online “how to” marketing world.

Great to see even more celebs out there promoting good cause stuff!

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