Did you know that a top factor that leads to the end of corporate-nonprofit partnerships is a lack of fresh ideas? Don’t let your partnership fizzle out due to a lack of inspiration!
Instead, help your organization thrive by using this end-of-year planning season to set yourself up for future success. In a recent Engage for Good Webinar, Mollye Rhea, President and Founder of For Momentum shared six different cause marketing activation types, examples of organizations leading the way in each area and tangible takeaways for our community to implement. Here’s an overview of this stellar webinar.
Six Activation Types:
- Embracing the Digital World
- Activating and Rewarding Employees
- Capturing B2B Dollars
- Launching Cause Events
- Expanding from Consumer to Community
- Refreshing Long-Standing Campaigns
Within each category, Mollye shared many great examples of companies partnering with great causes to deliver creative campaigns that make a business and social impact. Here are a few highlights that may pique your interest:
Salvation Army, Cricket Wireless and Amazon Echo
Activation Types: Embracing the Digital World and Refreshing Long-Standing Campaigns
With the advent of online shopping, traffic to brick and mortar retail stores (as well as the number of people who carry cash) has declined. The Salvation Army, with its long-standing tradition of using “Bell Ringers” and the “Red Kettle” to fundraise over the holidays, found that its donations were decreasing too.
To offset this decline, the nonprofit embraced the digital world, refreshed its long-standing campaign, partnered with Cricket Wireless and Amazon Echo and positioned itself to deliver a fully integrated online and in-person experience that drove donations. In addition to the traditional bell ringing, the expanded cause campaign included text-to-give, online registration for bell ringing and donation, Alexa integration for fundraising, and donations from Cricket Wireless based on their Facebook page “like” campaign.
Through their revamped and expanded activation, Salvation Army saw a rebound in their donations. In 2017, online donations increased both regionally and nationally, raising an additional $45.4 million in online donations, a 26% increase over the previous year.
One Warm Coat and Maker’s Mark
Activation Types: Embracing the Digital World and Launching Cause Events
Launching consumer-centric, event-based initiatives that leverage live experiences for good are becoming more and more popular. One campaign of note is One Warm Coat’s partnership with Maker’s Mark to collect coats the nonprofit could then distribute to anyone in need, free of charge.
Through “Give Cozy, #Get Cozy,” Maker’s Mark drove its Truck Tour Campaign 2,100 miles across 7 states to raise awareness, accept coat donations and spread holiday cheer. To expand beyond the truck footprint, the activation included both paid and organic marketing campaigns as well as a text-to-give initiative.
While some nonprofits may be reticent to work with alcohol brands, done right, there’s a lot of good that can be accomplished for both parties. In this case, One Warm Coat and Maker’s Mark donated over 20,000 coats to those in need and the activation drove 26.14 million impressions across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, resulting in 40K new followers for Maker’s Mark.
Tips For Success
We hope that these campaigns have gotten your creative cause juices flowing. Here are a few things to keep in mind as you set out to develop a new campaign or refresh an existing one, according to Mollye:
- Asses your existing digital assets before collecting content, testing new ideas and experimenting with different platforms.
- Focus first on storytelling and the experience. Fundraising will follow.
- Make communications and engagement two-sided, empower your targets to participate and spread the message.
- Identify key donors and focus on their interests to create a community rather than simply a promotion.
- Host ongoing planning sessions with your partner(s) to ensure future business goals are integrated and strive to introduce a new activation tactic each year.
Looking for additional tips and inspiration to re-energize your cause activations and take your partnership results to new levels? Check out our (free) recorded webinar with For Momentum’s President and Founder – Mollye Rhea.
