Importance of Authenticity in Cause Related Marketing

By Kyle F. Reinson, Guest Contributor

Kyle F. Reinson is an Assistant Professor of Communication/Journalism at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York.

In his 1969 work “The Ideological Genesis of Needs” French theorist Jean Baudrillard described “consumption as a logic of significations.” He paints the empirical object as a myth – “nothing but the different types of relations and significations that converge, contradict themselves, and twist around  it.”

When it comes to associating colors and objects with causes, the same is true. Globalized marketplaces are ideally-positioned to create what the more popular luminary Dr. Seuss described in The Lorax (1971) as Thneeds, or “Fine-Somethings-That-All-People-Need.” But do we need to buy a yellow ribbon to show “we support” our active-duty military, or a pink bear to support our sisters, mothers and grandmothers who get breast cancer? All of this product worship might just be a serious symptom of hyper-capitalism; and our current economic malaise certainly suggests there may not be an easy cure for that.

Barbara Ehrenreich’s insightful 2001 piece in Harper’s Magazine entitled “Welcome to Cancerland” is perhaps the definitive update to Baudrillard and Seuss as a valid critique of consumption for the sake of any reason at all. Ehrenreich, the author of Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America (2001), blasts the Susan G. Komen Foundation for its Web site featuring an array of “breast-cancer-related products to buy.” The important argument here is that all of these things we buy (the thneeds of Suess) divert money and attention from what’s important: cures for the many forms of cancer.

Ehrenreich’s objections aside, these novelties are increasingly created by savvy marketers to tug at the heart strings of American emotion. They are all the rage, in fact, and in a down economy they make even more sense to large and small corporations choosing to replace decisions of goodwill with those of “return on investment.” The Web’s Cause Marketing Forum reports that 2008 spending on cause sponsorships was $1.52 billion, compared to just $922 million in 2003. Why not build a brand on the misery of others? Of course, not everyone sees it that way.

In an age where traditional advertising and its one-to-many approach is wilting against the heat of social media and viral marketing, one wonders how long it will be until corporations and organizations are stripped of their prowess to convince good people to “go green” by buying cars that still use fossil fuels, but less of them – or to wear wristbands made for pennies in China to stand in solidarity or affinity with American survivors of cancer.

Marketers should just stop trying to be the “nice guys,” pushing upon us what we do not need. Instead, they should make authentic efforts to support causes with the bulk of their resources and transfer their big marketing budgets into larger donations that don’t drive the economies of developing nations. They will find their brands can grow as much or even more by the publicity they will glean on the Web than they ever will through handing us the consolation prizes and trinkets of late capitalism.

Illustration by LesKZN from Stock.Xchng

Related posts:

1. How to Blog for Corporate Marketing "Trust is what drives profit margin and share price," says...