Cause or purpose-driven content has no value if there's no real impact on ground, warn experts

To connect with consumers on a human level, brands often support causes and launch interesting content around these topics. Experts, however, warn that being a keyboard warrior to tackle real-life problems is an escape route for brands. They explain why a brand's narrative ought to be demonstrated by its actions

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Akanksha Nagar
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It is seen that customers value brands that have a clear purpose. With this insight in mind, and to lure all kinds of customers, brands often make efforts to come up with cause-driven content. But on the flip side, there are also those brands that are adopting this medium just for the sake of it, with no action on the ground or any real impact.

In a conversation with BuzzInContent.com, experts explained how it has now become clear that some brands are using public tragedy to boost their brand image. They said brands need to have genuine intentions with a long-term objective, including on-ground action.

Supporting a cause or speaking out on an issue just for brand positioning is not enough to convince audiences, the experts said.

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Poulomi Roy

On-ground activities and initiatives to drive a cause is more effective since it encourages a positive change, spreads awareness about the cause and communicates to users that the brand can walk the talk with their ideology and beliefs, said Poulomi Roy, CMO, RSH Global.

Activating a purpose-led brand makes competitive sense. But merely supporting a cause isn’t enough either.

Early last year, the brand had initiated a campaign, ‘Skin of Courage' for Joy Sensitive, its specially curated product for acid attack survivors. The product was developed after an extensive study, which made the brand realise that India tops in acid attacks and that the existing products for the hyper-sensitive skin of acid attack survivors are either rare, expensive or from the derma category.

As part of the campaign, it undertook multiple initiatives, including an association with the movie ‘Chhapaak’, a special screening for over 200 acid attack victims and an employment drive for survivors with the help of an NGO run by Pragya Prasun Singh, an acid attack survivor from Bengaluru. With its ‘Just Hire One’ programme, it urged other CEOs and HR heads to consider acid attack survivors when hiring new talent.

Keeping in mind the ongoing pandemic, it launched a personal hygiene range of products to meet the rising demand and distributed these products among underprivileged transgender people and sex workers.

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Karthik Nagarajan

Purpose should not be mere communication but should make a real impact. And real impact cannot be achieved if there is no on-ground initiative, said Karthik Nagarajan, Chief Content Officer, Wavemaker India. While it is true that consumers prefer brands that stand for the larger good, it is also true that they can make out if something is a fake; and so it is important to build this bond on credibility, he said.

With the advent of social media, putting out creatively magnanimous messaging on welfare is easy and cheap. You don’t even have to spend on creative production or wait for a film to be ready. But such efforts to tackle real problems can be really superficial, experts warned.

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Harikrishnan Pillai

“A person suffering in hospital doesn’t care a damn about your trivia on plasma or your solidarity post. Being a keyboard warrior to tackle real-life problems is an escape route that even brands are taking. Kudos to companies and individuals and organisations that have actually enabled real change at the ground level. It could be something as simple as setting a team to verify leads on beds/O2 cylinders or donating money to organisations, causes and individuals. Special mention to those who have done it without pomp and show,” said Harikrishnan Pillai, CEO and Co-founder, TheSmallBigIdea.

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Prachi Bali

Prachi Bali, National Head Client Partnerships and Business Head, North, FoxyMoron, believes there are multiple ways in which brands initiate purpose or cause-driven marketing. Brands can choose to directly support the cause by actively taking part in the activity.

“For instance, Paytm is urging users to donate money to the Paytm Foundation. The brand claims to match the donated amount and add it to the overall kitty for their #OxygenForIndia initiative. However, it is not always necessary for brands to be on the ground, doing the ‘heavy-lifting’ ”, she said. Take the case of CRED, which pledged oxygen cylinders to Covid-positive patients who need it. It partnered with Milaap, a healthcare fundraising platform, for a cause campaign that allowed users to swap CRED coins for donating oxygen.

Unfortunately, there are also brands that may not necessarily support the cause beyond traditional TVCs/DVCs, she said.

United Colors of Benetton is an excellent example of a brand that has been consistent with its messaging over decades. Today, the brand is synonymous with diversity and inclusion across the world.

Sustain purpose for the long term

If, suppose, there is a current topic of conversation or a cause such as child education, and a brand decides to support that cause and build a campaign around it, it can be termed as a cause-driven marketing campaign. But when it comes to purpose-driven marketing campaigns, the process is different. The first step is to take a deep dive and understand the brand’s purpose of existence, and in what small or large way they are contributing to people and society.

Roy said a purpose-driven campaign’s objective is to bring about a change, either in the lives of a certain group of the society, or the mindset toward a stereotypical thought, or both. And to do this, a brand needs to be honest in its endeavours and not be gimmicky. This is only possible if the campaign is long enough to get registered in the minds of the consumers and is backed up by efforts on the ground.

A purpose-driven campaign by itself is a long-term strategy that brands should adopt, said Bali.

“As long as brands see merit in a cause and support it with tangible and actionable measures, the impact of it should not be underestimated by the duration of the campaign,” she said.

She said, “The supposedly shorter duration of these campaigns hardly matters in the echo of the impact they create.”

In the case of the current Covid-19 pandemic, public tragedy and disasters have both short and long-term impacts.

The short-term need of a Covid-affected patient would be medicine or money for hospitalisation. The long-term need of a bereaved family that lost their sole bread winner would be a consistent flow of income. Pillai said, the issue is that when the camera is on and people are talking about a tragedy, quite a few put their hands in their pockets with a smile for the lens. So what matters here is that when the problem no longer gets media or public attention, are you still driving impact? But this again doesn’t mean that the short-term issue shouldn’t be considered.

He said, “We need both types of efforts—the reactive short-term solution and the thought-through long-term plans. And this pivots around the culture you build for your organisation. You can’t be running sweatshops in a country and discussing women empowerment in another. You can’t be the biggest plastic pollutant in the world and put out PR articles on your local branch’s recycling efforts. People-centricity, business ethics, community-consciousness is an organisational pillar. It’s not a sale period offer.”

When it comes to purpose, one should think in years and decades and not in months. Brands such as Tata Tea (Jaago Re), Tanishq and Brooke Bond Red Label have all invested in purpose-driven communication for the long term. That is how one builds credibility, said Nagarajan.

You cannot wake up one fine Wednesday morning and want to become the champion of the trans movement.

He said brands need to understand the confluence between the brand USP and what the world needs. And then invest in research to understand the need gap on ground and the cultural codes associated with them. Then set sail on the long journey of owning that space.

What exactly can a brand do to fully ensure it stands by its purpose?

Brands have long understood that having a purpose that they believe in can have a major impact on how they are perceived by consumers.

In most cases, purpose is known to deliver a long-lasting positive sentiment, said Bali.

“Consumers are no longer swayed by discount coupons and fancy or tear-jerking advertisements in isolation. What matters more is that brands have a voice and they intend to use it. It is crucial for them to actually work towards the initiatives they support. They can’t simply stake claim to a purpose. It is instrumental that a brand's narrative is demonstrated by its actions. As brands support a cause with subsequent initiatives, these can also be a driving force behind their long-term success,” she said.

Brands these days are forcefully getting into conversations that are not remotely related to their domain. And so, it’s important for them to know on which topics they should respond, and on which topics they should keep mum.

Roy said brands should remain true to their purpose at all times. It is critical to ensure that no tall claims are made just because that is the need of the hour, or showcase false commitment and force-fit communication, she said.

She added, “A brand needs to talk about continuous efforts towards serving its core purpose and consistency in work done to support the purpose. That’s the key to ensuring it stands by its purpose. Continuing is the key.”

Pillai suggested that brands should first define the purpose and the area of impact.

“Find out what is a pressing issue and what is a potent, long-term solution. Work with NGOs that have the ability to drive exceptional ground impact and have a clean track-record to implement it. Assign people to regularly track and monitor the impact and take corrective actions.” Most importantly, brands should not force employees to take this as an additional responsibility, he said. “If people volunteer to use their free time, let them. Else free them to focus on this. Have dedicated resources.”

He said, “Don’t do this to feed the PR machinery. Do it because you want to bring about change in your immediate or larger community. Good press should be an incidental outcome, not the core objective.”

In a nutshell, intention, voice and action are the key when it comes to defining a brand’s purpose, the experts said.

Cause or purpose-driven content