Exceeding expectations in Business & Nonprofit Relationships

The Wall Street Journal ran an article last Friday about reusable plastic shopping tote bags called “An Inconvenient Bag.” This article talked about the exponential growth in retailer interest in these alternatives to disposable plastic and paper shopping bags, particularly at grocery chains across the country.

Ironically, the article notes that many of these bags are, in fact, made in China of non-woven plastic that requires “28 times as much energy to produce as the plastic used in standard disposable bags.” This means that the average consumer will need to use this bag at least 29 times (without losing it, ripping it or leaving it to rot in the trunk of a car) before they hit an ecological break even point.

Some of the national retailers leading this product transportation revolution are Target, Whole Foods, Staples and even WalMart. The challenge is to offer a bag at a low enough price point to appeal to the consumer while making one sturdy enough to stand up to repeated use.  Of course, this isn’t the REAL challenge - underneath all of this ecologically correct rhetoric is whether consumers will actually use the darn things.

The WSJ points to research by the Stanford Graduate School of Business about the road blocks facing such marketplace changes. It takes time - sometimes a LONG time - for people to change ingrained behaviors.  This is most successful when there is either a taboo or reward associated with the behavior.  I have seen some retailers offering small discounts for using these totes but not enough to create massive change.

So, the success of these bags may hinge on the “taboo” of using the old bags.  In other words, will we become embarrassed enough to change our behavior? Personally, I feel as though they might as well announce it over the loud speaker when I forget my bags at Whole Foods. On the other hand, I feel the eyes (usually rolling upward) of the next customer boring into the back of my head when I slow down the express line at Kroger using the same bag.

If doing the right thing becomes a mandate from Big Brother or is based on embarrassment, will it create change or just resentment?

Reading a magazine this afternoon, I started to notice a trend in both the editorial content and the advertising.  Something that I guess I have known for a while, but have never given voice to before…. our lives are becoming more seamless.

By this, I mean that the distinct pieces of our lives, our decisions and our daily routines are overlapping more than ever before.  Perhaps it is a simplified view of the past but I imagine, for example, a parent in the 70s shopping in a grocery store for dinner. Find the ingredients on your list, pick the best prices, drive home and make dinner.  Or this scenario from the 80s:  go to work in the morning, get your work done for the day (or stay longer if you were a yuppy), go home and watch TV.

Fast forward to today: in the grocery, you are barraged with a myriad of decisions to make that have nothing to do with your shopping list. Is it organic? How is it packaged? Does any cause benefit from my purchase? Can I clip that Boxtop for my child’s school? Did I remember my shopping tote? If not, paper or plastic? 

Now to the worker… Will I carpool to save gas and get a chance at the HOV lane this morning? How many times have I checked email today? Don’t forget to log on to Amazon and buy that birthday present. Then the return home but still the Blackberry and iphone ring, IM and email all evening. Then TiVo that show you never watched.

It seems that every move we make today says something about us and our choices in life. I don’t just shop, I make a statement about organics, local farming, sweat shop labor and cause marketing.  I don’t just go to work, work follows me everywhere that my digital universe allows.  Perhaps we should not be surprised. It is, afterall, what many of us thought we wanted. 

I wonder what it would say about me right now if I turned off the computer, the phone and the lights and took a nice long nap. Sounds good.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to talk with a great group of nonprofit leaders from Jackson, Tennessee. In the course of our conversations, we talked about prospects and fundraising plans as well as resource allocation and goal setting.

I had prepared for our conversation with powerpoint presentations and handouts. We talked about a variety of organizations and their goals for building relationships with the corporate and philanthropic leaders in the community. At some point, we hit a roadblock (not unexpected but still challenging). Although there is great research available in cause marketing, all of the proper procedures in the world are useless without a partner.

If you have never been to Jackson, Tennessee, you have missed a great small city. In fact, it’s snuggly tucked between being a large town and a small city. People are generally friendly and they have a thriving arts and education structure. What they do not have are the corporate heavy hitters that the formula for cause marketing has been built on. No retail giants, no major production headquarters, and few high level decision makers.

We talked about sponsorships and building ties but I still felt unsatisfied with the answers to the cause marketing question.  On the drive home, I hit on the point that was bothering me. Nonprofit leaders and resource guides, including the work I have done, rarely talk about small businesses and independently owned companies as CRM partners. The owners of these businesses rarely have marketing specialists and probably don’t focus on partnerships.  The articles they read in the paper (Yoplait, General Mills, Toyota) aren’t relevent - they don’t “fit.”

Small and independent businesses can be great partners but it takes work on the part of the nonprofit to build a strong case and make the investment worthwhile.  We need to measure our circumstances and help these business people to find what works - whether it is standard issue or custom made.

I’m sure that almost everyone is aware of the media buzz surrounding the “new” facebook transition this week. The reviews have been varied, some with great emotion, but the outcome is almost certainly that progress will continue forward.  Facebook is the leader today in social networking and continues to gain ground among participants of all ages and backgrounds.

In the New York Times last week, there was a story about Facebook, its founder, his experiences and the increasing momentum building around microblogging. Microblogging is still new to me and I haven’t quite figures out how or whether to incorporate it into my online life. Do I really NEED one more thing to check on my iphone and/or that much information about anyone else’s life? I can barely keep track of my own!

The author of the NYT piece referenced a social scientist who called the appeal of microblogging “ambient awareness.” I liken this to the popularity in the 80’s and 90’s of the marketing term “top of mind awareness.” It is that sense of constantly having a product, service, idea or person bubbling just below the surface of your thought. Wouldn’t we all like to have this place in our potential customers’ minds?

I’ve heard much of late about the potential of microblogging for business and NPO business connections. Could our CEO talk about his life? Can our event and cause application on Facebook build a following? Would someone follow tweets about how much I love Ben & Jerry’s ice cream? Perhaps, I just haven’t figured out how to use it yet.

Any ideas?

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here to join this nonprofit and this corporation. In sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, for better or worse… hey, wait a minute… what do you mean by WORSE?

What if my sponsorship partner is involved in a scandal? Insider trading? Sexual misconduct? Financial disaster? Then what happens?

The answer might just depend on whether you thought through these potential challenges ahead of time and created a sponsorship “pre-nuptial” agreement. Every good partnership hopes for the best but prepares for the worst.

Here is a good example: I am currently working with a NPO client whose work involves advocacy and sometimes legal action around a particular issue. If a company is in violation of the laws in this area, the NPO often assists other nonprofits or community groups in filing complaints against the violators.  Great work. Very necessary. Best of all, they are very good at what they do.

So, what happens if one of their corporate partners ends up on the wrong side of the law? The NPO has thought ahead and includes in all of its requests for sponsorship the caution that partnership does not imply endorsement of corporate policies or prevent them from future action if it becomes necessary. Not much of a warm, gushy enticement to give - but the honest truth.

In our rush for dollars, exposure and good will among men, we can forget these harsh truths and how important they are to our missions. Whether you speak for an NPO or corporation, you should know your organization’s ethics and your parameters. We hope to never need to fall back on these exclusions but no one ever gets married hoping for a divorce either.

Campbell’s Soup Company announced yesterday that it has created a new senior management position to oversee its corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts. Campbell’s has hired David Stangis from Intel where he held the position of Global Director for CSR.

According to the press release issues by the company, Stangis will be in charge of promoting environmental initiatives, such as encouraging sustainable farming practices and energy usage.  He has a background in environmental engineering.

This is part of an encouraging, if curious, trend in corporate strategic planning world wide. Companies are regularly adding such positions to their top echelon both to demonstrate their commitment to being responsible and to develop clear expectations and goals. Campbell’s selection of an environmental engineer is an interesting selection - one that speaks to the role of this program as an operational issue rather than a marketing strategy.  Developing best practices, it would seem, ranks higher for Campbell’s Soup than does the desire to “spin” this for the consumer public.

However, it should not escape our attention that this news appeared in various publications across the country, such as The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Charlotte Business Journal. There is no harm in maximizing the value of good works.

Okay, in the spirit of full disclosure, this post is not exactly about cause marketing. It is, however, about a topic with huge implications for business - NPO relationships: non-profit employee compensation.

A number of recent experiences have reminded me that NPOs still flip-flop in the decision to be a business or a “cause.” When I say “cause,” I mean the notion of a group of free-thinkers in a garage somewhere printing off flyers and going door-to-door with petitions. Don’t get me wrong, these types of activities are GOOD! My point is that they very rarely can stay within this paradigm and have the longevity and depth of impact that makes an organized NPO so effective.

Why then are non-profits, as a group, so reluctant to pay for what they need? If someone is a marketing guru with tons of experience and the kind of know-how to change the world, he or she must choose between being paid a fair wage for talents OR working for a non-profit.  Why do NPOs tend to hire the bargain employee instead of the best  - and then act surprised when the inexperienced employee struggles? Don’t even get me started on consulting, equipment, computers, software and marketing…

If I were queen for a day, here is what I would say to non-profits: “Value those who are talented AND choose to put their talents to use for the benefit of our communities and our causes. Pay competitive prices and wages, demonstrate quality in all that you do and your supporters will see you as such. Investing wisely is not wasting money.”

PR News posted this week a list of the finalists for their annual awards. It included a category for Cause Related Marketing campaigns.  AdAge also talks frequently about CRM and its kissing-cousin CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility). The Cause Marketing Forum presents the Halo Awards each year. AND, last but not least, fundraising publications, like The Chronicle of Philanthropy,frequently write about campaign and their impacts on NPOs.

So, what is Cause Marketing… PR? Advertising? Marketing? Fundraising? Probably, it’s a bit of all of these rolled into one. This is one reason that non-profits struggle with adding it to their toolbox - who handles it? Fundraisers are up to their eyeballs in grant applications and marketers are working the media and hoping to find the money to print their next brochure.

From the corporate perspective, CRM can be a boom-town for Advertising and PR agencies. With a clear understanding of the marketplace and an experienced consultant (hint, hint) a cause related campaign can WOW the clients and build tangible, trackable new business. It spreads the workload around and maximizes use of resources.

No wonder everyone is rushing to take credit for such a good thing.

The Who may have started singing about “My Generation” years ago but the issue is more relevant now than ever before. Both for-profit and NPOs are trying to tease apart the differences between our country’s generations but also appeal to the interests and checkbooks of the masses.

Perhaps there is really no such thing as mass media anymore?

I attended a roundtable discussion today with a group of NPO leaders about the issue of generational marketing - particularly marketing to potential donors, volunteers, and employees.  As a group, we are frankly overwhelmed. Small nonprofits are just now approaching the realms of online giving and social media. This adds another layer to our work and may shift the balance of charitable giving in only a few short years.

As NPOs continue the quest to build corporate partnerships, this “generating” generational-specific traffic through our partnerships will put successful cause marketing campaigns head and shoulders above the rest.  Just as products such as Avon and Yoplait have carefully aligned their cause partners with their key market demographic, other less obvious mergers of interest will be necessary. I am particularly interested to see the Millenials’ favorite products adapt and change to the giving climate.

Our lessons from today’s conversation seemed clear and perhaps obvious in retrospect - but not so easy to implement. First, be flexible. Realize that your clients, donors and consumers may not all see things from your perspective. Two, realize that you cannot dramatically change the population. It will be they who change us.

I was amazed and dismayed to see a flurry of news reports and blog posts today about a recent advertising effort from PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals). In fact, I cannot remember the last time I saw so many news outlets unwilling to show the object of their distaste because it was simply so terrible (I have opted for the same approach but you can visit the PETA website for examples).

Here are the basics: a man was killed by a fellow passenger on a Greyhound bus in Canada approximately a week ago.  The killer stabbed and beheaded the victim and supposedly ate part of the body.  A tragic and gruesome end for anyone.  PETA decided to use this horrible, sad event as an analogy to the killing of animals for food.  The print ad, still on the PETA website, claims that these two types of events are similar and equally despicable.  They tried to run this advertisement in a local newspaper serving the SAME community as the location of the Greyhound murder - they were denied by the publisher.

I’m not a member of PETA but I do not normally take exception to the opinions of others - even when I do not agree with them.  This case, however, is a blatant effort to shock the public and to make a point with a very large, very dull blade.  Clearly, this is an organization that does not fear public scrutiny or believes itself to be immune to public perception and backlash.  As a fundraiser, I am thankful that so few organizations take such violent stands to make a point.

Why am I talking about this here? Well, first of all it really ticked me off. Second, it reminds all of us that every decision we make as NPOs and corporations can and will impact our public perception.  Sometimes, we ask for this attention - even shout at the top of our lungs. Sometimes, we lose track of the big picture and our true goals. All of these make lasting impressions in consumers’ minds about our cause and our brand.

And sometimes, just maybe, we do things that are just plain stupid and learn a valuable lesson. One can only hope.