Purpose Marketing Vs Social Impact
“The difference between purpose and impact is that purpose is a nice name; impact makes a difference.”
Purpose marketing has been a hoodwink-y buzz word for more than a decade. I know because I wrote a book called Compassion, Inc. in 2012 about how cause marketing campaigns are ineffective and privilege the corporation over the cause.
Worse is when companies participate in outright purpose washing, like when Coke says they produce recycled bottles but fail to mention that they produce 200,000 bottles per minute or H&M, which produces a “sustainable” clothing line but operates in the fast fashion industry that thrives on 3-6 week turnover rates and is, by definition, not environmentally friendly.
What got left out of the “Buy Now: The Shopping Conspiracy” documentary on Netflix
I recently thought I’d have a chance to get these ideas in front of a huge international audience in the Netflix documentary, “Buy Now: The Shopping Conspiracy.” Unfortunately, some of that content ended on the cutting room floor.
However, I did get a chance to discuss this at Michigan State University and on the Frugal Friends podcast, who asked me, “is there anything they did not use that you wished they would’ve?”
“When companies connect a brand to a cause it’s because some of the other larger institutions in our society don’t have the same impact on us in terms of identity creation as they used to; things like our religion, things like our jobs, things like our family [...]
So a lot of companies began connecting their products to causes and it could be anything from pink ribbons to green washing to ‘save the animals’ and most of these quite frankly are BS. They don’t live up to the values that they present and there’s very few that do.””
When it comes to ethical marketing, “Time in the market beats timing the market.”
Ethical marketing is about consistency, not jumping on the bandwagon. This topic also came up in my discussion with Julia Cha, on her podcast Social Elegance & Power. Julia wanted to know if ethical marketing ever exists.
Companies that have a long-term commitment to a cause are the ones that are having impact. Here, a key example of brand activism is Ben & Jerry’s.
“Now most brands will attach themselves to some kind of a cause... The one company that does this incredibly well is Ben and Jerry’s. It’s because it is embedded into who they are.
The founders were a couple of hippies and... they sold the company to Unilever but they said to Unilever, we will only sell this company to you if we are allowed to continue to run this the way that we want to run it [...]
They made statements about Black Lives Matter; they’ve made statements about January 6th and so on, and if you go to on to their page there’s a whole slew of things that they have done that shows their commitment and using marketing for good.”
Good Examples of Brands Using Cause Marketing
Lush is another great example of ethics in marketing. A company can use marketing to communicate their values to their consumer base and it doesn’t have to be something elaborate.
Other companies that have shown a long-term commitment to a cause are VivaGlam with their annual lipstick whose sales—not just profits--go to AIDS/HIV causes. Interface Carpet has done a huge turnaround in making their products more sustainable.
Newer companies are being built with purpose as part of their DNA. Rare Beauty by Selena Gomez has a multi-year commitment to mental health causes and Rihanna’s companies are synonymous with inclusivity.
When Cause Marketing Fails
The problem with much of cause marketing as practiced today is that it is embedded in the marketing department, where it strategically used to help promote sales. It is also a tax write off because it can now be itemized as a business expense.
Under that framework, connecting brands to causes tends to be ephemeral. Activism for profit only is a problem. It leaves causes at the mercy of brands who are here today and gone tomorrow (think Ice Bucket challenge). Brands that believe in a cause are consistent and they weather the political and cultural storms…no matter the cost.