The evolution of cause communications: Is your message stuck in the past?
I grew up in the ‘70s and ‘80s. It was a time when game show contestants cried hysterically when they were given the chance to win a new car. Not when they won a car, just when they got the chance to win one. Ads that aired during those same game shows informed us that whatever problem we had, from yellow teeth to grey hair, could be solved by a trip to the corner drug store. Your favorite tunes and all the good times that went with them were a 1-800 number away. It was a time when a soft drink could claim to unite a war-torn world without inciting backlash.
How I miss the luster of the promises the TV once posed. Today’s problems seem more complex, dire and stubborn. That’s not actually true, as most of us have an innate bias called fading affect that causes us to downplay negative memories and enhance positive narratives. Or, as a sage songwriter of this era once crooned, “The good old days weren’t always good and tomorrow ain’t as bad as it seems.”
Biases aside, I take all the good I can get. I’m resolutely pro placebo except when it comes to cause marketing. Like my fond memories, too many of us are in a feel-good fog. While nonprofits’ intentions are golden, much of our communications are backward, and not in a retro-cool way. We need social impact brands that compel behavioral change, and too many of us are branding like it’s the 19th century. Recent history shows that there have been three distinct evolutions of brand development. And where your cause is on this continuum may well dictate its level of impact.
Where it all started:
The Teaching Brand
Coinciding with the introduction of the electric light bulb, business partners William Proctor and James Gamble shifted their factory’s production from candles to soap. Their debut product, launched in 1879, became America’s first national brand, Ivory Soap. Before Ivory, few bathed regularly, and soap was a volatile and unreliable product. Bathing occurred in opaque rivers, lakes and streams, so “It Floats” was a huge selling point. Ivory’s early magazine advertisements had to explain the benefits of a bath and how to use the product. This information-only approach was fine for a time with limited competition and a public eager to explore all things new.
That’s hardly the case today, yet I see too many well-intentioned organizations still in teaching mode. These initiatives state the obvious, highlighting problems that were decades in the making and communicating equally tired solutions that have failed to address them. People know they need to lose weight, quit smoking, get help for substance misuse, recycle, drive EVs, vote, give to charity, and on and on. The righteousness of your cause isn’t enough to be memorable or compelling by itself, therefore the messaging isn’t actionable. Say hello again to the status quo. We’re not bathing in the creek anymore, so if you’re still telling people what they already know, it’s time to modernize your marketing.
When things got interesting:
The Emotional Brand
The creative revolution that established the subplot of Mad Men also provided the foundation for the nostalgia I so enjoy. From the 1950s until well into the early 2000s, the prevalent strategy was to highlight a brand’s benefits and correlate them with consumer aspirations. The phone company connected teary-eyed mothers with sons through long-distance calls and airlines made our dreams come true through reunification and romance. These messages made us laugh, cry and most importantly – consume.
Sophisticated nonprofits played along. Sometimes it was incredibly memorable. The United Negro College Fund’s “A mind is a terrible thing to waste” comes to mind, as does Partnership for a Drug-Free America’s “This is your brain on drugs.” These messages did great work, but they required decades of national media buys. We committed their maxims to memory because they struck potent emotions and were repeated at a rate few modern brands can sustain.
If your message has a high EQ, that’s fantastic, but it’s not always a guarantee of success. Emotional messages can risk hijacking all the attention from your organization. Adorable puppies and hungry children are evocative and memorable, but the causes associated with them aren’t always as salient. If your marketing aligns with this strategy, that’s good, but if your outcomes are lagging, it might be because the feelings aren’t tied closely enough to the facts.
Where we need to go:
The Scientific Brand
This is where behavioral science comes in, the work of pioneers like Daniel Kahneman, Cass Sunstein and Richard Thaler. They provided us with more modern tools to understand human behavior and consumer choices. Their work involved a set of cognitive biases that influence our thinking, like anchoring (a $1.25 can of Coke seems expensive when I once bought one for 50 cents) or in-group bias (the in-crowd thinks that they are superior to the rest of the student body).
Understanding these biases and the beliefs and behaviors they cause is key to building brands that prompt behavioral change. These brands tend to be emotional AND build a form of kinship with their users. They share common values with their audience. Think about Ben and Jerry’s environmentalism, or Dove’s challenging beauty standards with their “Real Beauty” campaign. This is where cause marketers need to head.
Proctor and Gamble started it all with a bar of soap. Today, their approach uses science to understand habit formation and create products that fit into our routines. For example, daily brushing with Crest has expanded to include more than seven lines of toothpaste as well as Crest’s own brand of floss, mouthwash, and tooth whitening strips.
But social impact marketers have largely been tardy for science class. Imagine the power of deeply understanding the mindset and behavioral motivations of the people you are working to help. It’s not just about education or emotion anymore, but about a meaningful resonance that connects your cause with a shared vision for the future or evokes a common nostalgia. That nostalgia might even take the form of a silly ‘70s game show. It might even win you a new car.
Cue the tears,
Kevin
