I'm taking a 360 degree turn

So I've been doing a lot of reading lately, and one thing I've been seeing unanimously is that it's best not to be critical (Sadly, being critical is my specialty). With that in mind, I decided that today's blog post would focus on an ad or a campaign that I liked (or, if not actually liked, something I could see the positives in). So without further ado, here's an ad I came across while perusing one of my favorite sites: www.adsoftheworld.com.





These are anti drinking and driving ads that are running in Sao Paulo Brazil. These ads have a bunch of positives: 1) Big clear copy and a big clear logo 2) simple message 3) Tone is right in line with classic MTV ads. In the "area's for improvement" side of things, is really only one thing, namely the fact that, as pieces of cause marketing, these ads fucking suck and that's not me being critical, that's a fact. Just like water is wet or deserts are dry or "George Bush doesn't care about black people" (thank you kanye), these ads fucking sucking as cause marketing is an objective fact. Why do they suck? Simple, these have nothing to do with drunk driving at all. These are MTV music ads with some copy just slapped on them.

Golden rule of cause marketing: The images should tie into the copy to create a cohesive story. These images are just of people having fun with no link to the dangers of drunk driving and no real explanation of why MTV has decided to make this a cause of theirs. At the end of the day there is no message, no cohesion, and no cause marketing. It's just another boring, lazy mtv ad, in a sea of boring, lazy MTV ads (just this one is poorly disguised as promotion a socially positive cause). . . . hey, I guess this not being critical thing is easier than I thought.

I was born free

That's the video from M.I.A.'s song born free. . . I love that video and song (if you haven't seen it yet and just skipped over it to read what I'm writing, take this chance to go back and watch the entire thing. . . it's worth it. . . I'll wait)

I have been thinking about the concept of freedom lately, mostly because of what's going on in my life, specifically the fact that I'm leaving my current position as a management consultant with a big organization and putting my full efforts towards servicing the marketing and communications needs of nonprofits under my own banner (Seam). The freedom of being my own boss and being in total control of how I spend my time is great, but also scary. Scary because it comes with risk. What if no one hires me? What if I look back and I regret this decision? The price I pay for gaining this freedom is the loss of safety. That's a price I am willing to pay and a price I believe all those who cherish freedom should pay.

It is for that reason that I believe that the below ad is so disturbing

This is the ad that's been making its way around NYC as a protest to the Muslim community center that is going to go up near ground zero. People all over the country are complaining about this center and thankfully some of our politicians have grown enough of a back bone to stand up and say that this center needs to go up. I'm not taking a stand either way about whether it's good or bad for the center to go up so near ground zero, what I am taking a stand for is the rights of Muslims all over the world to practice their religion wherever they choose (I also don't mind in taking a stand in saying that this is just an ugly ad: hard to read, hard to tell what I'm supposed to look at, if I didn't know that this was the anti-muslim center ad already I would have never been able to tell - sometimes I thank the heavens that so many ads for these quack orgs are done by shitty marketers).

This ad is disturbing because by asking a seemingly innocuous question like "why there" as a means of obfuscating the fact that it is essentially asking you to add your voice to the voices of tons of people all over the country that automatically say that Islam is bad and needs to be contained. By saying that it shouldn't be there, people are essentially saying that the Muslims of NYC don't have the right congregate and worship wherever they want. That's not a sentiment I can get behind. To me the answer to "why there?" is simple. "Why there? Because I, you, they, and we were all born free"

"Those who give up essential liberty to gain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety" - B. Franklin

Sometimes reality is the best marketing

I have to admit that (shockingly) I'm not a huge fan of MTV. While watching the occasional Jersey shore-er fist pump the night away isn't exactly my cup of tea, I try to stay up on "what the kids are up to now-a-day". One of the shows that caught my eye the other day was "16 and pregnant"

What I find really interesting about the show (and its sister show 'teen mom') is that in its own weird - slightly exploitative - sort of way it's a form of cause marketing. So much so, that some organizations have taken to actively encouraging teens to watch it and have created discussion guides around it (http://www.thenationalcampaign.org/resources/pdf/16-and-preg-discussion-guide.pdf)

In a way, it's almost as if nonprofits have co-opted something that clearly was only designed to make money and capitalize on our societal voyeurism (I choose to believe it is voyeurism and not schadenfreude) and instead use it as high quality marketing for their cause. I personally think that that's the essence of good cause marketing. It should first look at the population you are trying to change, think about their interest, and then authentically match your cause to their interests.

I wonder what other materials are out there are just waiting for co-opting? Does the apprentice teach the value of education? Does inception teach the virtues of science and math? probably not, but could it? Probably so. Maybe there's a space for cause placement in movies and TV shows the same way that there is product placement? I mean, nonprofits copy other ideas from the for-profit sector. Why not this one?