September 14, 2006 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Robin Hood Marketing: Stealing Corporate Savvy to Sell Just Causes
by Katya Andresen
Many charitable organizations shy away from commercial marketing campaigns, which they consider “glib and facile” at best, or immoral and manipulative at worst, writes Katya Andresen. But nonprofit groups, which often rely solely on the worthiness of their causes, can waste time and money with boring, unfocused marketing.
“In our haste to pour our hearts into what we say, we forget to use our minds,” she writes.
Ms. Andresen, vice president of marketing at Network for Good, an organization that promotes online giving, says charities need to become as savvy as businesses in the ways they reach out to particular types of people.
What’s more, she writes, “we have to go from being inward-looking to being outward-minded, switching from the perspective of ‘what you should do for me because it’s right’ to ‘here is what I can do for you.’”
Each of the 10 chapters illustrates a marketing principle used by companies, with instructions and tips on applying it to the nonprofit world.
She offers examples of highly popular marketing models, including the Miller Brewing Company’s use of the catch phrase “It’s Miller Time,” which appealed to a precise time and mood, the end of a long day of hard work. Nonprofit groups should likewise package their causes to make them attractive to the intended audience, Ms. Andresen writes: “Messages should be delivered to our audiences’ precise physical, mental, and emotional locations.”
She cites the case of Population Services International, which was able to slow the spread of HIV in Vietnam, in part by aggressively selling Number One condoms: inexpensive, high-quality, and above all, “well-researched and branded” products. The English name, Number One, gave it a status that appealed to Vietnamese people, and the corporate-marketing approach hit its target audience.
Each chapter ends with an interview with a successful marketing executive, from both businesses and charities.
Publisher: Jossey-Bass, 989 Market Street, San Francisco, Calif. 94103; (800) 956-7739; fax (317) 572-4002; http://www.josseybass.com; 269 pages; $24.95; ISBN 0-7879-8148-6.
