After our “Cause Marketing Gets Bigger. And Smaller.” post from last week, a couple of subsequent examples popped that were worth passing along.
For starters, we mentioned that a number of cause marketing efforts were tapping the wisdom of crowds to generate unorthodox solutions to daunting social problems. PechaKucha, who we’ve profiled before, recently brought together a worldwide network of smarties to discuss solutions to the crisis in Haiti. The presentations were offered in a “wave” (moving east to west, from eastern New Zealand to San Francisco), which was accompanied by a simultaneous wave of fundraising. This two-pronged approach really drove home the notion that an aggregate of small contributions (of both money and ideas) could produce big solutions. It’s a great model for brands who want to make a lasting impact on a specific (and significant) social problem.
We also mentioned the idea of making big differences in small places, which Odwalla recently embraced in their announcement of a tree-planting campaign to help bolster state parks across the nation. Since state parks are dependent on state budgets (as opposed to the national park system), they’ve been especially hard hit in the current recession. Even though the state parks don’t usually work together in this way, Odwalla’s using their national presence to make a difference across a variety of local communities. Sounds like someone’s gonna be a Hometown Hero!
(In case you’re wondering whether these efforts pay off from the brand’s perspective, it’s worth noting that this is actually an extension of an earlier Odwalla campaign. That effort – pictured above – offered to divvy up 100,000 trees among 11 states’ parks, as determined by visitors to the parkvisitor.com/odwalla site. Considering that the new iteration is being extended to all 50 states, Odwalla clearly feels that this campaign’s worth the effort.)
Got examples of your own? Feel free to share them in the comment section below!
