Three Pillars for Social Impact Relevancy

The marketing playbook for social impact has long been about engaging with the brand’s community by pushing out a TV ad or a few online messages about a trending cause and strategically fading back into business as usual. Such short-lived efforts have been about engendering goodwill with consumers during a tough time, and, consequently, driving sales. In the past, that bottom-line-minded combo has been OK. Not quite the case anymore. The COVID-19 crisis, Black Lives Matter and other social justice movements like LGBTQ rights have made it abundantly clear such a playbook is no longer authentic enough. It’s time for altruism, instead of brands trying to “win hearts and minds” by acknowledging their own social impact efforts with marketing. Social impact needs to entail one or all of — what I consider to be — the three pillars of charity: money, time and knowledge. If you are not giving back with one of those elements that can actually help and support the cause, you need to reevaluate what more you could be doing to participate. In a recent chief marketing officer survey, marketing leads said “building brand value that connects with customers” was their number-one objective. Let’s look at brands that are actually

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