Marketing And Social Cause: Is It A Marketing Gimmick Or The New Success Mantra?
It started with Idea Cellular, JagoRe - Tata tea was next and the latest one seems to be Aircel - save our tiger initiative. However, it's interesting to explore the strengths of business logic to associate with a social cause for marketing?
How many people really 'want' to save tigers? Add to it, how many want their mobile service provider to do the job?
From a marketers perspective, it certainly helps you to stand apart from the crowd. But is it enough to get customers' attention and drive sales? That is the qualifier...
While the save our tiger initiative generated a lot of buzz, it translated into very little sales. The problem with marketing through a 'cause' is it demands lot of 'on the ground' efforts. Like for example, Tata Tea recruited volunteers to reach out to people and ask them to exercise voting rights. However, the Aircel campaign is pretty much limited to hoardings, t-shirts, logos, micro-site and facebook fan page. As a consumer the whole campaign is more of 'brought to you by Aircel'.
The success of marketing through any social cause is in 'on the ground' activity, supported by all other tools, to take the initiative beyond the buzz! In its current form, marketing and social cause are way apart to be the 'success mantra'
Saturday, February 20, 2010
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1 comment:
IMHO, CSR is for companies who are THERE. Ones you have the market presence, people expect you to be socially active. Social activism is the not the purpose of your business. Customers want the product/service to be satisfactory, you can then go around saving tigers, rats or whatever you like!
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