Socially Conscious Marketing
I recently spoke (virtually) to a group of M.A. in Social Impact students at Claremont Lincoln University who are taking a course in “Storytelling and Marketing for Change”. The following details our discussion as most of the students run their own non-profit organizations and/or are seeking ways to make impactful change in their communities as leaders.
I talked about current marketing trends, tools to connect and build, and how we (more than ever) need to demonstrate care and empathy through our messaging and content. I proposed ways to engage through “socially conscious marketing”.
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Storytelling or the way we share our experiences will hardly change. We just have access to new technologies and more innovative tools than ever before--although the touchpoints have also changed. I want to reiterate that-- there’s no secret to it (storytelling). Follow the simple guideline of: “stay true to who you are as an individual, brand, organization”. But that comes with an understanding of who you are and what you want to do. And the stakes are higher as we know it.
I wanted to share this quote from Sonya Renee Taylor who is an author, poet, spoken word artist, educator, social justice activist -- because it’s how I feel, how we all must be feeling.
“We will not go back to normal. Normal never was. Our pre-corona existence was not normal other than we normalized greed, inequity, exhaustion, depletion, extraction, disconnection, confusion, rage, hoarding, hate and lack. We should not long to return, my friends. We are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment. One that fits all of humanity and nature."
We all know that everything is connected. From our climate crisis, to the Pandemic, its effects on the most vulnerable are connected, its effects on our service workers, people of color, and it obviously extends to the social inequities and racial injustices we continually face and fight against. Throughout our history, people of color are disproportionately affected by the negative consequences of climate change—apart from the social and economic disasters that pose insurmountable challenges for society.
How can we communicate the need for change?
I will defer the expertise to you all. You have your organizations, your communities, your families best interests at heart. You will be leading the way. It won’t be easy. Especially right now. Everybody is going through it-- life right now is exhausting. We have our collective anxieties and fears for the future. I find that most of us are just trying to make it through our days. Therefore, we obviously can’t just be pushing out random content to our audiences— call outs, asks to donate, etc.
For me, the most essential and important thing we can offer and provide moving forward is the care and empathy we show to others. I know you will be doing this through your work -- and it has got to extend through our marketing, our messaging, the way we do business, and the way we continue to build community-- because it will take all of us. As leaders, as social impact marketers, it is imperative for us now to tell more of our stories, to share our community’s stories, to raise more awareness and create dialogue and further collaboration. It is imperative for us to amplify the voices of those who are never heard.
How are we going to do that?
I want to propose Socially Conscious Marketing--
And I’m proposing 3 ways we can move forward in terms of community building and raising awareness about your cause and organizations:
Provide resources - I want you to be the expert in your field, in the service you’re providing and that’s going to come with a deep understanding of who you are and what you will be doing, and what you will be providing.
Build community - I know it’s hard right now to be with others, but through this quarantine I’ve reconnected with so many of my colleagues from the past through the internet, the phone, we’ve created a support system and sharing and expressing our goals and dreams for the future -- Dr. Nita Evans has been such a godsend to me!
Uplift and share stories of inspiration -- especially with the daily doom and gloom we feel, and I know, Zoom does not help with the fatigue. Anything that we can share that can lift someone’s mood-- whether it’s a quote, an email, a text message, a phone call, you can share how someone made your day, or a client success story-- anything that uplifts--it makes a huge difference in someone’s disposition and how they engage with your organization or brand.
The following are some concrete examples of the ways you can provide resources to your community and audience members.
Share information-- most importantly, from credible sources. I know we have got sucked into previous social media challenges without even knowing who started it or what the purpose is. So share relevant information, but be aware of what you are sharing. Use infographics to illustrate the facts and data you want to include. Share these through social media to your audience.
Start thinking about using email campaigns to push out a monthly or a weekly newsletter that could provide current updates and stories you want to provide your audience-- you can also compile all of the content you pushed out through social media in this newsletter.
This also ties in with building a community-- but you can start utilizing live video webinars/sessions/conferences to relay information, provide how-tos, and to just get that face time interaction with your community members.
You can also go the traditional route and create pamphlets or downloadable guides as a means of community outreach. An organization I’m a part of held a socially distance walk in memory of Emmett Till a few weeks ago and safely passed out informational flyers at the local high school and provided them to neighboring homes.
Some of the tools I think that have been useful and are easy to use are Canva (for beautiful marketing templates), TikTok (for easy and quick content creation), and LinkTree to share multiple sources online.
It is absolutely meaningful to come together as a community to discuss our collective experiences and discuss how we can move forward together.
This effort of care and empathy, of socially conscious marketing will be an ongoing dialogue between all of us, and tonight is indicative of that and our continued conversations will hold significant weight in the months and years to come.
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Do you have any uplifting stories to share?