Newsletter: Cause Product vs. Purchase Triggered Donation 🤷♂️ ; How to Sell a Virtual Sponsorship to a Skeptic 🤔 ; Is the Key to Overnight Success Activism? ✊
I had a terrible experience last week.
I was out walking my dog, Charlie. As I headed up the street, one of the neighborhood kids was walking down the opposite side with a little dog I hadn't seen before. It was a cute little terrier just like Charlie, but a little bigger. I thought, maybe a new neighbor! That's when I saw the moving truck at the top of the street.
But no sooner had I confirmed my hunch when I heard a terrible scream. That same kid was running up the street screaming for his mother. The dog wasn't with him. My eyes quickly trailed down the street where I spotted his dog. It was in the mouth of a much bigger dog that was shaking him like a rag doll. I scrambled to pick up my dog and ran down the street yelling at the animal. I must have startled him because he spit the dog out and started to walk away from the injured dog. As I chased the bigger dog away, out of the corner of my eye I saw the little dog jump up and walk across the street and into my yard. That gave me hope! Maybe he's alright, I thought.
When I got back to my yard, the boy's mother had arrived. My heart sank when I saw that the little dog wasn't okay. It had been badly mauled on one side and needed a vet immediately.
I ran into my house for towels. By the time I came back out it seemed like half the neighborhood had descended on my front yard and the injured dog. Everyone wanted to help that dog.
One person gently wrapped him in one of the towels. Another got a small laundry basket to put the dog in. Still another person held the dog's mouth shut so we could put the frightened dog into the the basket without it biting anyone.
During this whole time, people wore masks and tried to social distance and respect everyone's space. No one had a harsh word for the owner of the attacking dog when she crossed the the street to check on the injured dog. She was just as shocked and distressed as the rest of us. There would be a time and place to talk about what had happened. Several people comforted the new neighbor, who a minute earlier had been unpacking boxes in her new home. Now she was asking me if her dog would live. I was honest with her. I told her I didn't know.
Friends, 2020 has been a shit year in so many ways. The triple D's. Division, despair and death.
But I learned something on my front lawn last week. People really do care about the things and people around them. And if we approached all the problems we're facing right now with the same focus, energy and compassion my neighbors did that day, there isn't a problem in this world we couldn't solve.
The good news is that after several surgeries, it looks like Chloe the Terrier - a she not a he! - is going to be alright. She still has a long road ahead of her. So do we. But we too can heal if, as Lincoln said, we choose the better angels of our nature. 🙏❤️
✍️ Partnership Notes
1. A great new campaign from Maxwell House Coffee to help homeless vets. Check out other examples of cause products.
What is a cause product? Great question! It's a product that's created specifically to support a cause. Now, if Maxwell House was just donating a certain percentage from it's regular line of coffee that's just a plain old purchase-triggered donation program. A cause product is a bigger deal because it's much a bigger commitment from both the business and to the charity.
BTW, my all-time favorite example of a cause product is White Castle's candle for Autism Speaks. Do you have a favorite?
2. When pitching prospects, you have to appeal to the heart and the head. David Hessekiel and Megan Strand share the latest numbers on the importance of purpose during a pandemic.
3. When you stay at a Red Roof property through the end of the year they are donating to three nonprofits, including Flying Horse Farms. What a great name!
4. Great advice here from Chris Baylis on how to sell a virtual sponsorship to a skeptic.
🤑 Marketing Your Cause
1. Great example of causejacking. Philly’s Fraud Street Charity Run will go from the now infamous Four Seasons Total Landscaping to the lesser-known Four Seasons Hotel.
2. Should you combat email fatigue with direct mail? "Direct mail is the anti-email. These channels are night and day, and they need to be used that way in your marketing strategy to generate success."
3. How to do an event newsletter right.
😎 Cool Jobs in Cause
1. Senior Director, Sponsorship Sales, 92nd Street Y, Greater New York City Area
2. Development Marketing Manager, Land Trust Alliance, Washington, D.C.
3. Director of Corporate Partnerships, National Psoriasis Foundation, Alexandria, Virginia
4. Cause Marketing Director, American Red Cross, Remote
5. Director of Corporate Initiatives, Girl Scouts, Detroit ($55k - $65k)
Do you have a partnership position you are trying to fill? Hit reply and share your job listing with me! I'm happy to post it here for FREE.
🧠🍌 Brain Food
1. A great case study on how a business became an "overnight success" after 24 years. Part of the secret? Activism.
2. Arlington National Cemetery reverses course, allows Wreaths Across America amid pandemic. I wrote about WAA's practices a few years ago.
3. How to inspire major donors (and corporate partners) to give at the end of a very tough year.
Have a question, comment or just want to say hi? Just leave a comment below or head over to Twitter.
