Marketing a cause should be an easy sell. There’s a problem, and here’s an organization dedicated to solving it. Act now. Yet it’s not that simple.
In fact, simplicity, and a serious lack of it, is often the problem.
Selling a product is often comparatively easy because it’s so tangible. As marketers, we’re even trained to add dimension by assigning brand attributes and emotion to a product. With regard to causes, this is a trap.
We recently completed a project for Columbia’s Gills Creek Watershed Association. The association wanted a modest increase in its $15 memberships. Being a university town, there’s no shortage of conservation-committed individuals in Columbia. So that task at hand seemed easily obtainable, only we had a few obstacles:
People aren’t aware of the organization
People don’t know where Gills Creek is
People don’t understand what a watershed is
Add to that the fact that the association was targeting environmentalists, developers, anglers, scientists and outdoorsmen on a variety of water-related issues from pollution to sediment. In short, there was message entanglement.
Creative team Lauren Bowles and Jason Corbin did a beautiful job simplifying the message to the most relevant common denominator, clean water. They also overcame budget obstacles by producing a poster for area retailers catering to the conservation-committed. Their work reminds me that if your messaging is not brutally simple, even the most worthwhile endeavors can fail.
This piece demonstrates multiple development scenarios in the Bulls Bay Corridor, located in the Lowcountry of South Carolina. Through the use of data-based maps, scientific data and charts, this brochure demonstrates how land use choices can impact the Corridor in a variety of ways. The cover uses a combination of letterpress and silk-screen techniques, and includes a CD that contains all maps, data, and PowerPoint presentations.
Keely Saye is a talented inbound marketing specialist and we’re happy to have her as a strategic partner. We developed a fresh, distinctive graphic identity that reflects her personality and her style of doing business. We designed a custom logotype and graphic elements: a custom pattern, vertical mark, monogram, color palette and graphic standards. Although 95% of her work is in the digital space (look for her new website soon), we felt that it was important for her to have a business card that would create a lasting impression. We turned to Copper Dog Press that printed each card by hand on a ca. 1900 Chandler & Price platen letterpress. All of this care and attention to detail is evident in the finished product(s) and is reflective of Keely’s work as well. We’re excited to help her launch this new look!
The Good Samaritan Clinic is a free medical clinic serving uninsured members of the Hispanic/Latino community in Columbia, South Carolina. The clinic provides general medical consultations, diagnostic testing and, when available, free medicine.
Those who find rescue in the Good Samaritan Clinic are escaping an overwhelming set of circumstances – a need for medical attention, a lack of means and a language barrier. The Good Samaritan Clinic helps by acting as a liaison between the Spanish-speaking community and Columbia medical resources. The clinic offers interpretation and health education services, referrals to other medical centers and community emergency assistance. The clinic also keeps a public phone line open, allowing people to ask questions and receive answers in their own language.
There is much need in Columbia. Unfortunately, as a result of physicians’ busy schedules, volunteers are few. The Good Samaritan Clinic’s biggest challenge is to bring in more working physicians, nurses and nurse practitioners. Riggs Partners addressed this issue, develolping for the Good Samaritan Clinic a strategic marketing plan and several recruitment materials.
FivePoint Solutions is an enterprise information management (EIM) company. Put simply, they provide digital document management and data exchange, as well as paper-to-digital conversion, for companies and government entities with complex (and often high volume) records management needs.
We immediately recognized a great branding opportunity for our new client. EIM is a rapidly growing industry filled with look-alike companies fixated on one selling point: efficiency. From our first meeting with FivePoint, it was clear their focus is on the people who rely on the technology.
And so we began by helping FivePoint Solutions define their process as the center point for a new branding program.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), is a fancy name for the acknowledgement that businesses, as well as individuals, have an important role to play in bettering the world around us. Our friends at the Hilton Head Island VCB have embraced the concept and are one of the first corporate destinations in the country to offer a customized CSR component to their Meetings and Groups packages.
It works like this. A company plans a meeting, or retreat, on Hilton Head Island. A community service project is incorporated as part of the event package, and the group is matched with a participating United Way of the Lowcountry organization. During their time on Hilton Head Island, the group of 10 to 100 people works together on the specified project, such as a Habitat build.
Our assignment was to package, and promote, The Hilton Head Difference.
The Hilton Head Difference direct mail, sent to meeting planners
There are so many reasons to register to be a part of the first Virtual March in support of responsible reproductive health policy in South Carolina:
South Carolina is considered an HIV “hot spot” by the CDC
STIs and STDs are spreading at alarming rates, with half of all new cases affecting young people between the ages of 15 and 24;
Teen pregnancy rates are on the rise (three in 10 girls will become pregnant at least once before the age of 20);
Woefully inadequate female representation in our state government (SC ranks dead last)
Here’s the kicker. We know how to solve this! And 80 percent of South Carolinians agree on the solution: policies that provide for comprehensive sex education and prevention programs. We just have to let our legislators know.
If you want to be a part of the solution and are willing to send an email to your state representatives (it’s that easy), register for the Virtual March.
Riggs Partners is honored and excited to be working with TellThemSC.org in getting the word out. We think there’s no greater issue facing our state today.
Hot off the Press: 2009 annual report for Central Carolina Community Foundation. The design complements the new brand identity we developed for CCCF in 2008 and takes it a step further with a strong emphasis on typography and hand-drawn lettering. A short-fold cover allows the logomark to be visible while reading the first half of the book — we used the extra space on the press sheet to create bookmarks, which will be used to raise awareness of specific areas of need: Dropout Prevention, Homelessness Prevention and Illiteracy.
Thanks to everyone at Central Carolina Community Foundation and special thanks to Tonia Cochran and JoAnn Turnquist for being such great collaborators.
Opera is a dramatic, heart-wrenching form of entertainment, full of complicated love triangles and murderous villains. The Palmetto Opera has spent molti years working to share its love of opera with the people of South Carolina.
Founded in 2001 by a group of motivated enthusiasts, the Palmetto Opera started small until its first big break: a sold-out, full-length performance of The Marriage of Figaro. The organization’s wish is to garner enough community support to fund the presentation of a full opera performance every year.
Enter CreateAThon.
We developed a strategy for the Palmetto Opera designed to introduce a new, younger, previously untargeted audience. We designed a modern, interessante new identity. (Huge thanks to guest designer Jason Smith!) We also created a beautiful new design for the website.
To introduce the new identity, we designed invitations for the Palmetto Opera’s annual fundraiser dinner, An Evening in Italy, and we developed a new program to introduce opera to the new target audience in a comfortable, approachable atmosphere. More details to come in Part 2. Ciao!
Thanks to the creative team: Katy Miller, Cathy Monetti, Jason Smith, Lauren Bowles, GP Worrell, Zach Lepine and Sammy Rutkowski.
In Part 1 of the Spartanburg Soup Kitchen project, the CreateAThon team addressed the objective of reintroducing the Soup Kitchen and the relevancy of its work by developing a new identity and outdoor campaign. Next, the team integrated the new identity into a plan for launching the public phase of its capital campaign.
To drive donations from the general public, we developed two exciting incentives. First, we designed custom melamine dishware sets, called Soupware. It was great fun creating the design, which incorporates the “S” from the new logo. We suggested that a new design be created each year, so annual donors can collect different sets over time. The dinnerware sets will be sold on a tiered pricing model, ranging from a hundred dollars for two sets to a thousand dollars for eight sets.
Second, we designed a series of new t-shirts, called Soupwear. These items provide incentives for lower-level donations.
The CreateAThon team developed a brochure to present these fundraising incentives to the community. To further promote the campaign, we created a master design system for a new website, helpthekitchen.org, so people can make donations online.
It has been a great pleasure helping the Soup Kitchen in their mission to feed the hungry. Keep serving up those plates full of goodness!
CreateAthon Spartanburg Soup Kitchen Team: Teresa Coles, Lee Price, Julie Turner, Tim Floyd, G.P. Worrell
There is a rising consciousness that we are all connected, one to another - human beings, nonprofits, small businesses, corporate America. This blog is devoted to the study of the intersection between people and the thoughtful brands with which they identify.
