Missed Opportunities

I recently wrote about cause marketing campaigns from a food perspective (foods you can buy at the grocery store that will benefit a nonprofit) on my GroceryFoodFight blog.

As I was checking out each website to find out more about the campaigns – I noticed huge differences in the way they each handled promotion on their websites – both on the nonprofit’s site and the corporate site. Now, I realize that the heavy promotional/advertising burden would naturally fall on the corporation that is trying to increase sales of a particular product or group of products, BUT it looks like some nonprofits are missing out on some promotional opportunities of their own.

Make-A-Wish Foundation

Krogers Collaboration
The Make-A-Wish Wish Chip Campaign appears to be a collaboration with Krogers in which Ralphs donates 25 cents per package from April – June 2011 with a minimum guarantee of $100,000. That sounds like a very sweet deal, especially when w are talking about cookies. And the Ralphs I was at had them front and center on a big display right when you walk in the store. Make-A-Wish Foundation had their logo and website address all over the cookie packages and a banner in front of the display table with their logo on it.

The Make-A-Wish Site
When you go to the Make-A-Wish site however, don’t see this particular campaign right away. It could be that it’s just not a big moneymaker for them? They are showcasing an “Eat a Dish, Make a Wish” campaign at Maggianos. They also have a nicely organized Supporters page that showcases celebrities, volunteers and donors (with photos) and include links to all their corporate partners.

On Donor Lists
I’ve talked before about listing donors on your website; quite a few nonprofits don’t list donors or just show featured profiles. I think this is great – as a donor I don’t know if I’d want my name and certainly not any amounts splashed all over the internet. I get some flack for this because a lot of old-school fundraisers think it’s important to show lots of support and that it encourages people to donate. Personally, I’m more impressed by corporate sponsors (and their corresponding cause marketing campaigns) than a long list of individual donors.

What They Did Well
1. Showing some featured donors but putting more emphasis on corporate donors.

2. Having a separate section for Promotions That Give Back.

What Needs Improvement
1. Promotions That Give Back should be under Ways to Help not Supporters

2. A prominent link on the main page should be added that goes directly to current promotions (in addition to the featured promotion in the slideshow).

3. Totally off topic – but they have to get rid of the horrible share widget on the left – it’s a memory hog and can really slow down page loading when you are navigating through the menus.

Urban Farming

Triscuit Collaboration
Triscuit is apparently a big supporter of “the home farming movement” and has planted 50 community-based home farms with plans for 15 more. On the Triscuit box they mention Urban Farming and that it’s a nonprofit but no web address mentioned for the nonprofit. In fact, there is little on the box or the website that WAS given (http://www.homefarming.com/) of HOW the partnership works – is Triscuit giving money and Urban Farming is actually creating the farms? I admit I have an inquiring mind and maybe most people will be thinking ooh – I’m helping by eating these yummy Triscuits and leave it at that.

The Triscuit Home Farming Site
And you also may not pay attention to the lack of attention on the nonprofit once you hit the home farming site which has some very cool tools for creating your own home farm. The site is entirely Triscuit branded but you do get some info about the nonprofit when you go to About the Movement page.

The Urban Farming Site
Once on the Urban Farming site, you can see it’s very minimal – a great video but not a lot of other information, although clearly from the video you can see they have lots of corporate and celebrity support. They have a “new site coming soon” notice – let’s hope it’s a little more detailed!

What They Did Well
1. The video is the biggest selling point and shows a lot of big-name contributors as well as local people talking about the urban farms.

2. They showcase their supporters / cause marketing campaigns on the main page of the site.

What Needs Improvement
1. Their supporters / campaign list seems to be missing a lot of the entities mentioned in the video.

2. Their is still no real explanation as to how the Triscuit partnership works – and for the partnership they only talk about a Home Farming Day event (which has already passed) with a link back to the Triscuit Home Farming Site.

3. There doesn’t seem to be much cross-branding opportunity for Urban Farming – the photos of the Home Farming Day show only the Triscuit brand.

The Disconnect

In both scenarios there is a disconnect between the promotions of the corporation and the nonprofit. In the first example, the Ralphs product directs people to Make-A-Wish Foundation’s website for more info but you have a hard time finding the connection back to the store. In the 2nd example you have to hunt to find the connection from the Triscuit brand to the nonprofit but you can easily find the connection back to Triscuit.

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