What does the future hold for marketers, social media, messaging, brand awareness, and cause-related and CSR strategy? 6 experts weigh in on the next two decades of digital marketing trends.

1. SIX EXPERTS weigh in on
CAUSE MARKETING
in
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2009-13 CafeGive, All Rights Reserved.
2023

2. THE QUESTION / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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For cause marketers, a lot has changed in the past ten
years. Thanks to advancements in social media and
mobile technologies, as well as dramatic political,
environment, and economic developments, cause
marketing looks almost unrecognizable from what it
was a decade. And chances are things will change
even more rapidly in the next ten years.
So what will cause marketing look like in 2023?
That’s the question we posed to six experts in the
field, including our own Sandra Morris. More on
each participant can be found on the next page.
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3. THE EXPERTS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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JOE WATERS is a speaker, writer, cause
marketer, and the author of Selfish
Giving, a blog devoted to articles, ideas,
and products of interest for fundraising
groups. His books include Cause
Marketing for Dummies and QR Codes for
Dummies. Joe’s work has been featured
in The Huffington Post, The Chronicle of
Philanthropy, Mediapost: Causes, Forbes
and The Nonprofit Quarterly.
PHILIPS MCCARTY is the founder of Good
Scout group, a social good consultancy that
works with corporations, nonprofits, and
individual philanthropists to build brand
leaders and build a better world. Good Scout’s
clients include Williams-Sonoma, the St. Jude
Children’s Research Hospital, Visa, Unicef, and
the PBS Foundation.
DAVID HESSEKIEL is the founder and
president of the Cause Marketing Forum
(CMF), the world’s leading community of
cause marketers, agencies, and nonprofit
and business executives. Since 2002,
the CMF has provided members of the
cause marketing industry with guidance,
information, and connections. An authority
in the field, David has been quoted in The
New York Times, USA Today, PROMO,
Advertising Age, License! and PRWeek.
WIL KRISTIN is a community centered designer
and filmmaker, and part of Context Partners,
a team of designers, storytellers, thinkers,
scientists, teachers, and entrepreneurs
working together to connect organizations
and communities through community
centered design. Clients of Context Partners
include Nike, Eli Lilly and Company, National
Geographic, and the Rockefeller Foundation.
MAURA KOEHLER-HANLON is Director of
Client Services at VolunteerMatch, a webbased nonprofit that connects volunteers
with opportunities that matter to them.
Dedicated to developing relationships
between volunteers and nonprofits,
VolunteerMatch has connected over seven
million volunteers to causes since 1998.
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SANDRA MORRIS is the CEO of CafeGive, a
leading provider of social media marketing
apps designed to give back and make the
world a better place. After a career that
included executive positions at Kodak, Intel,
and RCA, Sandra founded CafeGive on the
belief that social media’s purpose is to build
communities and drive social change. Since
then, she has worked with organizations such
as US Bank, Toys for Tots, Girl Rising and more.

4. EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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Thank you all for joining
us to discuss the future
of cause marketing. Let’s
start with a basic question:
What emerging technologies
do you see taking hold of
cause marketing by 2023?
JOE: With cause marketing, I think we’re currently in between
media, in terms of our strategies. On the one hand, you have
traditional strategies that are still very successful and very lucrative,
like point-of-sale (POS) programs.
In some ways it’s interesting because these technologies are changing the process, but
it’s also forcing nonprofits to go back and do the basics a little bit more. What’s going to
get nonprofits on company’s radar screens is when they have a strong brand. And while
social media and mobile are great ways of communicating that brand, they reflect it
more than they create it, so they have to go back to basics to build that brand up more.
DAVID: I’m not a technologist, but it clearly appears that all sorts
of marketing messages are moving to more and more powerful
mobile platforms. Who knows if by 2023 you’ll be able to control
these with your eyes or your mind? Wouldn’t it be great if
technology could enable us to take meaningful action based on
what our conscience told us what the right thing to do!
SANDRA: I love David’s thoughts on this. Technology has helped
inform and raise awareness of so many issues in the world. It
would be great if consumers could instantly see how a company’s
involvement has impact on the world at the moment they are making
the decision to buy something or to become a customer of services.
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5. CHANGING GEARS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What should cause marketers start/stop doing today?
WIL: Stop saying the same thing. Start finding champions and have them tell their
stories for you.
MAURA: Stop with the pledges already! Very few nonprofits want or need pledge
campaigns in order to effectively work toward their missions. Instead, start and continue
with the actionable engagement.
PHILIPS: Start thinking of cause marketing as long-term relationship building and stop
thinking about it as a magic bullet to marketing and fundraising. This really applies to
both the brand and nonprofit sides of the coin. Cause marketing partnerships should be
developed as strategic alliances that take a fully integrated approach to engagement
of all stakeholders. This is about engaging at all levels, analyzing goals, objectives,
and outcomes, refining approaches, and developing initiatives that go far beyond
in-store, consumer driven fundraising. Employee engagement, sponsorship, causerelated marketing, philanthropic giving, in-kind and budget relieving support—all are
components of a “cause marketing” partnership and should be explored and expanded
as part of the greater alliance.
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6. CHANGING GEARS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What should cause marketers start/stop doing today?
DAVID: Like Philips said, cause marketers should take giant steps forward in engaging
their employees and consumers in their pro-social efforts. They should stop being
afraid to share the details of their programs including the fact that they reap business
benefits from cause marketing.
JOE: The best thing companies can do is ask their employees and customers to give
money. Right now, corporate giving is at an all-time low: It’s under one percent of revenues.
Not only are companies cutting costs, many simply can’t afford to give back. So they have
to come up with other ideas: “How can we use OPM?” (Other people’s money.) Put that way,
there’s a good side and a bad side to it, of course, but it’s reality.
The major responsibility of companies to educate their consumers, to teach them that
more good will be done in an infrastructure where everyone gives.
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7. BIG OPPORTUNITIES / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What’s the
biggest opportunity
for nonprofits in the
next decade?
PHILIPS: Collaboration. And I would say it’s not the biggest opportunity,
but the biggest necessity. We all know there are literally millions of
charities in existence—too many that are diluting the market and actually
doing the cause they are working toward a disservice. I’d like to think
we will see a decline in these numbers due to nonprofits merging, but
I think it’s highly unlikely. So coalition building is where I see the greatest opportunity moving
forward. Not coalitions for the sake of appearance. Nonprofits with like-minded missions,
working on both causes in the same space and complementary spaces, coming together to
develop strategic alliances that pay off by approaching fundraising, marketing, and goals and
measurement as a collaborative effort. It will take putting egos aside for missions, and it will
take a group of highly influential nonprofit orgs to set the stage as the test case, if you will.
JOE: Nonprofits are going to look at metrics beyond donation. I come
at my work from the nonprofit perspective, i.e. “how much can we raise
with this program?” That’s why I’ve been so focused on POS programs in
the past, because if there is no margin, there is no mission. So in setting
up nonprofit/corporate partnerships, it’s been important to be bottom
line-focused. So many nonprofits will say, “It’s great that we got so many
Likes, we got so much awareness, but how should we really raise?”
But that being said, as nonprofits are forced to become focused on the other benefits of cause
marketing—like brand awareness—they’re going to do a better job measuring these things so
they can put a grain of value on it and say, “We didn’t raise a dime for this program, but look at
all the Likes and engagement we got on our Facebook page. Look at all the people who are
talking about this.” And as engagement grows on social media, nonprofit marketers may see
donations rise for those active times. They’ll do a better job correlating that data, and seeing
the combined results.
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8. BIG OPPORTUNITIES / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What’s the
biggest opportunity
for nonprofits in the
next decade?
WIL: Social change is a different sector and one that should not fear
competition in the manner it currently does. Organizations should
be fully transparent about their strengths and look to partner with
organizations that can complement them. For now, it still feels like
there’s a bit of a “founder’s syndrome” going on where too many people
leaders behave like they need to be the big name on a particular issue and not budge or
relinquish decision making inside their organizations. That’s problematic and with more and
more people dedicating themselves to careers in addressing social problems, there will be
more and more talent in the sector and more opportunities to work together to get tough
problems solved faster.
SANDRA: We often have conversations with businesses and nonprofits
about the nuances of fundraising. The partnership opportunities are really
great. Personally, I don’t think that technology can change the psychology
of why people or companies give, but it can make the partnership more
meaningful, long-lasting, and deeper. We imagine relationships that can
help build community in new ways—across geographic boundaries, age
segments, and other demographics. When brands and businesses share
community, that bond will become stronger.
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9. PORTLAND PASSIONS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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P O R T L AN D
Wil, your hometown,
Portland, Oregon,
has been cited as a
forward-thinking city
in terms of social
change. What do
you hope other
communities take
from Portland in the
next ten years?
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WIL: I actually left Portland five years ago because it felt like too much
of a “bubble” in terms of people only thinking about Portland. I moved to
Washington, DC and worked for Ashoka, the world’s largest community
of social entrepreneurs. After my stint in DC, I wanted nothing more
than to return to the Pacific Northwest. And having come back, my
world is much different now. The city looks and feels more open. I’m connected to important
work happening globally that is being pioneered in Portland. The bottom line is that other
communities can learn about the power of a city that has learned how to take care of itself
and its people. Portland is a town where it’s a given that every social and environmental
issue should be taken very seriously. It’s core to the ethos of Portlanders to think about other
people and the environment. There are lots of examples that other communities can look to:
everything from local food efforts to green public transportation. Mostly, Portland proves that
good things can start on a very small scale. While it’s not NYC or LA, we’ve built the world’s
greatest suburb in my opinion.
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10. BOSTON BOMBING / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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Joe, you’re based
in Boston. What
lessons did you
take away from
the recent Boston
Marathon bombing
in terms of the
way people and
businesses interact
with causes?
JOE: One of the things I’ve been writing more about is how businesses
are doing a better job empowering their customers and employees to
raise money for causes. Boston was a great example of that. After the
Boston Bombing, two Emerson college students created a t-shirt that’s
raised nearly $1 million for the victims. Normally they wouldn’t have the
ability to go into the t-shirt business, but thanks to Ink for the People, they were able to partner
with them, upload the design, and get it out there.
This is the wave of the future. Businesses are looking for more ways to empower consumers
and individuals to support good causes, because there’s a twofold benefit: Not only do the
businesses look good because they’re connected with a good cause, but you also raise more
money. There’s only so much in the corporate checkbook that in most instances companies
are better off raising money from customers.
B O S T ON
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11. THE LEADERS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What brands/
individuals should
we be watching
carefully now?
DAVID: I think we need to be watching entities at the large and small ends
of the spectrum. On the business side, we should follow how Fortune
100 companies such as Unilever are making radical changes in how
they conduct business as well as start-ups like Warby Parker that are
leveraging technology and creativity to generate profits and purpose.
Similarly on the NGO side, it’s fascinating to see how big players are reengineering themselves
to work with companies globally (e.g. UNICEF and World Wildlife Fund) and smaller groups
(e.g. DonorsChoose.org, DoSomething.org and Kiva) are breaking new ground in creating
meaningful engagement and impact.
PHILIPS: Our client Heifer International is phenomenal when it comes to
corporate alliance development. They are looking at it from all angles.
Corporate partners in the field, cause marketing at the domestic level,
employee engagement, philanthropic giving—they are taking a very
holistic approach to cause marketing which is critical for success.
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12. THE LEADERS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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SANDRA: The great thing about affordable technology is that more and
more companies can tell their stories well, and build momentum around
the great things they do. Social media and mobile technologies are now
accessible to businesses of all sizes, helping them build awareness about
their causes and purpose. It’s clear that consumers want to understand a
business’s role in the world beyond its PL; Businesses are made of up of people who are not
only employees, but are also parents, consumers, and part of a community. The opportunity
for purpose to come into play as part of all business is a really exciting trend.
JOE: Panera Cares is another great example. That’s not about Panera
giving back—that’s about Panera creating an infrastructure for people
to contribute to the homeless and the hungry. We’re going to see more
businesses become focused on that.
The “Pay It Forward” movement is deeply related to everything we’re
talking about. In Starbucks, in the UK right now, you can go up to the
register and say, “I want my coffee, but I also want to buy a coffee for someone who needs it.
So Starbucks keeps track of the coffees that have been bought for others, and when people
come in later that day, they’re asked if they would like to pay it forward as well. That’s not the
company making the donation, it’s about the company enabling the consumer.
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13. JUST STARTING OUT / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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David, Based on
the insight and
knowledge you’ve
accumulated over
your many years in
the industry, what
advice do you have
for someone looking
to start a cause
marketing effort
now—for the cause
and for the company?
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DAVID: Whether you are starting a new enterprise or creating
programming for a large organization, cause marketing should be
thought of as part of an overall sustainable business plan. Doing good
is a necessary, but not sufficient component to creating a successful
enterprise. Way too often I see companies create “nice” programs
that lack the rigor and resources that would be applied to other serious business building
initiatives. Adding Purpose to the other marketing “P’s” can supercharge your efforts, but
you must also have strong product, appropriate pricing, adequate distribution and effective
promotion to be a success.
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14. CH-CH-CH-CH-CHANGES / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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How are you
seeing the
role of social
media change?
MAURA: While social media has opened new avenues for involvement in
the form of sharing, fundraising, liking, and being part of the critical mass
of supporters at key moments of a nonprofit’s work, it hasn’t fundamentally
changed the way that we think about most forms of traditional volunteering.
With so much attention paid to these flashy new forms of supporter
engagement, folks often forget just how much nonprofits continue to rely on volunteers in nearly
every function.
That said, one way social media has changed volunteering is that we can engage now with great
stories of volunteering. Being an immediate form of communication, we can better convey the
stories, photos, and excitement.
JOE: I’ve seen Facebook Like campaigns, but what’s most interesting is
how more businesses and nonprofits are focusing on hashtag campaigns.
Hashtags transcend platform—they’re not just stuck on Twitter or
Instagram; they’re something that can be used everywhere. If a brand says,
“Hey, if you use this hashtag, we’re going to donate a dollar to this particular
charity,” not only is it a great way to keep track of how much is given, but
the brand can also build audience interest around a topic that they’re
interested in.
You can use a hashtag that not only taps into a topic, but identifies with people’s values—
something they care about, like solving hunger, or saving the whales. You’re not just sourcing
it around a topic, but around things people care about, which is what brands should really be
focusing on.
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15. VOLUNTEERING EFFORTS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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Maura, how
do you think
companies view
their volunteering
efforts today?
Do you see that
changing over the
next ten years?
MAURA: Over the last few years as volunteering has become more universal
at companies, the sense I get is that the same old programs just aren’t good
enough any more in the eyes of companies. A lot of the companies that we
work with that do amazing work and get high engagement seem to feel like
they could be doing more… And they are searching for new and innovative ways
to engage their employees. I think we’ll see the impact of this thinking over the next ten years.
And if anything, employees are expecting innovative approaches now. According to the research
we’ve seen, employees see impactful volunteering and corporate social responsibility as a
requirement that they seek out when choosing an employer.
What can companies do to further embed volunteering at the
core of their operating procedures?
Of course there’s always more to be done! It needs to be unique to each company, depending
on how they are structured, what they do, and how they operate. For a program to be successful,
you have to look at what will fit with the company’s culture—whether it be building a grassroots
program, building competition into the volunteer program, making it part of the professional
development track, et cetera.
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16. THE GREAT UNKNOWN / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What’s cause
marketing’s biggest
unknown in the next
10 years? What are
you afraid of, or
excited about?
PHILIPS: If I knew that, it wouldn’t be the unknown! (Laughter) I think the
biggest unknown is how consumers will continue to respond to cause
marketing. Cause marketing in the traditional sense is, in my opinion,
getting tired. I think consumers will tire quickly. They already have in
many ways, and expect authenticity at all costs when it comes to cause
marketing campaigns. But I know this—consumers are savvy, smart, and have set the bar of
expectations from brands and nonprofits. They will accept nothing but effectiveness moving
forward. The unknown is at what point will they say “enough is enough” in the use of cause
marketing to raise funds for causes and nonprofits.
MAURA: Surprise! I think it’s probably the nonprofits. Just as corporate
approaches are evolving, so too are many nonprofits today innovating,
changing their business models and collaborating in new ways. And with
that, the kind of support they’ll need will change too. Hopefully these
nonprofit needs will be in alignment with corporate expectations.
JOE: We could definitely blow it. There could be a really spectacular failure that would cause consumers
to turn their backs on cause marketing. They could say, “I don’t want this in my products anymore. I
don’t want anymore people asking me for money. If you want to support a good cause, you take it out
of your pocket and you give it yourself. I’ll worry about supporting causes at my own discretion.” I worry
about that. Will there be too many cases like the disastrous Komen/KFC partnership from 2010? When
customers say, “I don’t trust you to handle my money, my donation,” We’ve blown it.
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17. THE GREAT UNKNOWN / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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DAVID: At the same time, it’s so exciting to see so many businesses being
started these days that have giving back rooted in their DNA. That’s a big
change from established companies that have needed to add programs
designed to do well by doing good into their business practices. One
of the big unknowns is whether many of today’s socially conscious
businesses will be able to go to scale and generate significant financial and societal benefits.
WIL: Changes in digital storytelling and design are making it easier for
more and more people to contribute their voices to the causes they care
about most. Individuals have great examples in their personal networks of
content creators that are designing and publishing media in every format
imaginable. That’s a huge difference from a time when the bulk of stories
come from major media outlets and publishers.
SANDRA: You can’t imagine the number of people I talk to who say they
want a more fulfilling purpose aspect of their work. We have a generation
of people who are demanding more from their employers, too. I think this
will define a new way for companies to embed purpose in their business
strategies. Cause marketing will expand, in my view, to include this.
Ultimately, authenticity will come from deep inside companies—from
employees who are testing and living it.
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18. THE STARS / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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Phillips, how
would you
describe the
role of celebrities
and entertainers
in aiding good
causes? How will
it change in
the future?
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PHILIPS: Authenticity is the most critical factor to engaging consumers in
cause marketing and pro-social initiatives, and this could not be truer than
with celebrity utilization in these programs. Celebrities and talent must have
an authentic tie to the cause to have a long-term effect on donor engagement.
Donors tell us all the time that they’ll pay attention to a cause because of a
celebrity, but they will not activate for the cause just because the celebrity asks (or tells) them
to do so. Celebrities can be important in the branding of a cause or nonprofit, and we counsel
clients to engage with celebrities if the fit is right and if it is authentic—meaning there is no
financial expectation by the celebrity and the mission fit is there. But in the end, it’s up to the
organization to make its case and engage effectively with the donor once the donor comes
into the fold to learn more from the celebrity “ask”. I think we’ll see this change in the future as
nonprofits and causes become better storytellers. There is nothing better than an authentic story,
and the better storytellers we have working for causes and nonprofits the less reliance we’ll
have on celebrities and other personalities to do this. In the end, it’s best to hear firsthand from
beneficiaries and mission-affected people.
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19. PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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What are you
doing today to
prepare for the next
decade? What do
you see yourself
working on?
WIL: Building storytelling capacity for causes that need it most.
PHILIPS: Quite simply, we’re hiring a team that is smarter than my
generation. (laughing) Seriously, we are remaining focused on our core
businesses of corporate alliance strategy, cause platform development
and pro-social organizational development. We’ve worked primarily in the
nonprofit/NGO space in the past. Now, we’re taking our knowledge and
expanding into the brand and entertainment spaces. We’re also building
incredible alliances with complementary agencies and consultants that
bring new thinking to the table for our clients. Preparing for the next ten years means staying
ahead of our clients, yet understanding that many need to take methodical steps in creating
change. This pro-social/social good space is all about change—it’s constantly evolving. So we
have to do the same without losing focus of our core expertise.
DAVID: Cause marketing involves numerous types of players (large and small businesses, nonprofits,
agencies and suppliers) engaged in very varied types of activities (e.g. consumer-focused programs,
employee engagement, transactional programs, message-focused programs, corporate social marketing).
We want to refine and segment our offerings to serve the interests of these very varied practitioners.
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20. PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
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JOE: I can see myself shifting more to focus on how individuals access services. It’s a story about the
individual. How can we take “cause” and integrate it into every facet of people’s lives. That’s the way we
can really raise money and solve some problems. Imagine what it will be like when anytime people use
their credit cards at a store, they donate to a cause. When they go to work, they’ll volunteer on projects.
They’re going to ask their companies to be responsible with the environment, work practices, and so on.
We’re looking at all the ways we can integrate cause into our lives. It won’t be about “cause marketing” anymore, it will be
about supporting good causes.
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21. Ready to launch your cause
marketing campaigns into the future?
Contact us to get started
on your next campaign.
www.cafegive.com
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