02 Jan When good causes are the strategy
One of the main challenges that organizations have when considering how to deal with their communication efforts is to casually define what they are going to say. Although it seems obvious, many organizations are not clear what to tell of themselves. It is as if the remedy (to be genuine), is also the disease (how am I genuine?).
It happens that organizations, whether private, public or of the third sector, are accustomed to define themselves by what they do (their commercial or helpful activity) and not by what they are (that is, their essence). Then when the time comes for them to ask themselves, “What do we tell our publics?” They often forget the previous question: “Well, what is our purpose?” And a company cannot know what is its aim in this world.
Overcome this stumbling block, the next step is to define what we mean by good cause. Behind are the traditional definitions of Vision and Mission of the companies, which summarized their prospect of future growth and their role in their industry, respectively. The good cause (or purpose) is a concept with a more complementary and holistic view of the subject, by which it can be understood to the reason of being of the organizations and the consequences that are leaving in their environment.
Fortunately, there are more and more cases of companies that have identified the communication of their “good cause” as the center of their strategy. But we are not talking only about your communication strategy, but about your business strategy. When communication becomes the center of a brand, you can only expect a brand with life.
Just to mention some examples, when we hear about Red Bull, besides logically thinking about the energy drink, we also think about adventure, sport, challenges and other values that define it. What can this only be done with big budgets? So then let’s take the example of the ALS Association, which spearheaded the global Ice Bucket Challenge campaign and made the entire world aware of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), through a basic challenge that became one of the most successful viral campaigns in the world. the last times.
Many organizations have been talking about storytelling as the axis of their communications. I would say that to “communicate well the good”, we must overcome the barrier and move from storytelling to storydoing. Because the companies that communicate through their essence, are the ones that are leading the way.
By Justiniano Vila – Intelligence Manager of La Machi.
