Giving Back Represents the Best Way to Move a Brand Forward

Creating Authentic Social Impact When Our Online World Seems Fake

It’s 2022, and it’s very easy to think of all brand spokespeople as inauthentic corporate shills, and brands themselves as enemies masquerading as friends. We’re constantly inundated with #ads and sponsored posts, and even the bad guys spend millions of dollars to make us think they’re the good guys. 

As a marketing and advertising executive with 15 years of experience creating branded content, I’ve always wanted to create campaigns that gave back, but never knew where to start and how to ensure the message was authentic.

At first glance, it’s easy to be overwhelmed at the prospect of how to make this all come together, but the formula for an authentic and meaningful social impact campaign is actually very simple:

Cause + Content + Call To Action = Social Impact Media

A great example of social impact media in action is being executed at this very moment- the American Cancer Society and the NFL working together to give one lucky fan a VIP experience at Super Bowl XLVI on Sunday. Through the league’s Crucial Catch program dedicated to fighting cancer and promoting early detection, fans can enter a sweepstakes by donating at least $10 to the American Cancer Society, with one lucky winner getting tickets to the big game, roundtrip airfare, lodging, and a meet-and-greet with a huge star. 

The surprising twist? That star is TikTok legend Addison Rae. By enlisting Rae to promote the cause, the NFL and American Cancer Society are appealing to a younger generation of fans that may not otherwise have early cancer detection on their minds. Boasting over 5 billion likes and 86 million followers on the platform, she provides an avenue to a huge swath of followers to promote the NFL’s cause, and offers an authentic voice in the fight against cancer. Early cancer detection is something very near and dear to Rae, as her grandfather, affectionately called PawPaw, battled and overcame a bout with cancer when she was a young child. 

How did this campaign follow the simple cause + content + call to action formula?

1. The NFL identified a cause they cared about, early cancer detection. 

2. They then partnered with the American Cancer Society in order to create a call to action, encouraging donations to be entered into a sweepstakes in order to win a VIP Super Bowl experience. 

3. They created content by partnering with a social media star who can authentically speak to their cause, amplifying the message and taking the campaign to new heights. 

The result will be undeniable: a greater donation to the cause, a brighter light being shined on the NFL, and a more meaningful impact-based campaign.

We’re in an era where brands are forced to navigate how to give back in a climate that is many times fraught with inauthenticity and corporate posturing. As a result, it’s easy for media planners to experience paralysis by analysis overthinking what causes and advocates are authentic to their mission.

As this NFL x American Cancer Society x Addison Rae execution shows, as long as a cause is authentic and a brand wants to make an impact, creating a meaningful campaign is many times much easier than we think.

Jon Widawsky

Director, Client Development

Cluster for Change

People are more likely to trust—and buy—purpose-driven brands

image source: Fast Company

By Adele Peters | Featured in Fast Company | 2/17/2021

When someone sees a logo of a brand they know is purpose-driven, they automatically associate it with words like “responsible,” “compassionate,” and “ethical.” And when someone considers a brand purpose-driven, they’re also more likely to remember it, buy it, and want to work for the company that makes it.

Those findings are part of a new analysis from the communication firm Porter Novelli that used implicit association—a type of testing often used to uncover unconscious bias—to evaluate how 1,200 consumers reacted to different brands. The process involved showing participants logos and then asked them to instantly associate the brand with particular words. “It helps tell us subconscious associations that consumers have with brands and their attributes,” says Andrea List, vice president of analytics and research at Porter Novelli. “Because this methodology only allows you 800 milliseconds to make a decision about whether you associate a brand with that attribute, you don’t have time to think it through—it’s automatic.”

People judged brands based on what’s known as “system one” thinking—automatic, intuitive, and unconscious—rather than “system two” thinking that’s more controlled and analytical. (These are the modes of thinking that Dan Kahneman explains in the classic book Thinking Fast and Slow.) The test compared how people reacted to competing brands, one conventional and one considered purpose-driven, in a handful of categories. There was a clear association with the purpose-driven brands and purposeful words like “trustworthy” or “transparent.”

That association matters when people make decisions about what to buy. In another part of the study, the researchers gave participants a series of purpose-driven attributes and then asked what actions they’d take if a company had those qualities. More than three-quarters said they were more likely to trust the company. Seventy-eight percent were more likely to remember a company with strong purpose; 78% were also more likely to want to work for the company. Seventy-two percent were more likely to be loyal to the company, and 72% also said that they’d be more likely to forgive the company if it made a mistake. Two-thirds said they’d consider the company’s purpose when deciding what to buy, and 71% said they’d buy from a purpose-driven company over the alternative if cost and quality were equal. Sixty-two percent said that they thought it was important to consider purpose even when making an impulse buy.

“Based on what we know about ‘system one’ versus ‘system two’ thinking, system one thinking is actually much more powerful in terms of driving actions that consumers are taking,” says Whitney Dailey, senior vice president for marketing and research at the firm. “So while we have to think through function rationally, purpose is just kind of deeply embedded into our psyche and the decisions that we’re making.”