According to a Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data, the millennial generation is expected to overtake the workforce by 2020 and will have the largest bucket of disposable income – which means brands should be paying attention.

Brand loyalty has been difficult to achieve with this group of consumers, but cause marketing is helping bridge the gap and create a stronger affinity. A Daymon Worldwide study shows less than 30 percent of millennials buy the same brand, compared to 35 percent of Generation X. While this shows it might be tough to earn brand loyalty, those who do may have a customer for life.

Millennials specifically look for brands to invest in causes and communities they care about (such as the original pioneer, TOMS), which is different from the Generation X approach. Generation X purchases brands based on name value (top of mind and big-box), as opposed to how millennials are now purchasing on community values. Fifty percent of millennials are value driven and will support, or boycott, a brand based on their perception of a controversial or social issue (2017 Edelman Earned Brand Study). Many millennial consumers see purchases as investments – they want to invest in high-quality products but also invest in companies whose social responsibilities align with their own.

Another aspect to consider is that today’s brand loyalty isn’t one-way. Brand loyalty is now defined not only as customers’ loyalty to brands but to brands’ investment and loyalty to their customer base and their values. Sprout Social’s 2018 research shows that about two-thirds of consumers consider it important for brands to take public stands on social and political issues. Millennials, the pocketbooks of the future, want to know they are making purchases from companies who support causes they care about or at least causes they can get behind.

Top Reasons to Invest in Cause Marketing:

• Establish trust with consumers
• Build goodwill
• Show your brand’s personality and values through action, not just words

From shoes and eyeglasses to gum and books, the buy one to give one model (or one for one) is prevalent in new consumer product companies. When consumers purchase one product, the brand will donate that same product to someone in need, which aligns well with millennial consumers’ desire to do good in the world through their purchases. Part of the attraction to this model for brands (aside from positively impacting the community) is building brand awareness. This business model lends itself well to social media buzz while also establishing trust and building loyalty with consumers – especially those interested in your principals.

Ways to Utilize Cause Marketing

• Fundraising – offer to match donations your consumers make for a cause aligned with your brand.
• Facilitate volunteer efforts with your employees and encourage others to join.
• Donations (cash or in-kind) can raise awareness.
• Partner with local non-profits to start a mentorship program.
• Develop scholarship programs with contests to increase social engagement.

That being said, cause marketing doesn’t work for every brand. When it doesn’t fit, consumers know. Millennials are quick to point out when brands are insincere or miss the mark (like Pepsi’s oversimplified, tone-deaf ad showing how a beverage can stop a protest, and more recently, Facebook not taking responsibility for their actions that prioritized company growth over user safety). For cause marketing to work, it requires a delicate balance between your brand’s values and consumer attitudes – not just for your bottom line – but to positively impact the communities served.

The post Cause Marketing is a MUST for Brands to Win Over Millennial Audiences appeared first on Fineman PR.

Two post-Katrina homes in the New Orleans Area Habitat for Humanity’s ninth ward

In October 2007, two years after Katrina, my agency was called upon by our then-client, outdoor deck manufacturer Trex Company, to help develop and implement a cause marketing campaign to benefit under-served communities in New Orleans. Together, with our New Orleans IPREX public relations agency partner Beuerman Miller Fitzgerald (BMF), we put an initiative together with BMF-client New Orleans Area Habitat for Humanity, an organization in the throes of reconstructing the housing and communities to which the mostly impoverished area residents were still hoping to return.

More than 150 Trex executives and staff volunteered to help build houses in the “Musicians Village” section of the Habitat development. In addition, Trex agreed to supply the community with more than $100,000 in low maintenance, high performance, outdoor decking for the community’s centerpiece, the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music, a 17,000 sq. ft. facility that would provide space for performance, education, recording studios, community gatherings, and cultural inspiration.

In 2007, more than 150 Trex Company volunteers put their efforts towards building homes for Habitat for Humanity

Last week, while visiting New Orleans, I jumped at the opportunity to tour the area and see the progressing community. It was inspirational and gratifying to witness the good that came out of our public relations efforts, even if we were only just a small part of the huge Habitat undertaking.

We walked by the houses that were built, in part, by the Trex volunteers including the house on which I worked.

The real reward, however, was my tour of the Marsalis Center for Music. The approachable and communal design was beautiful in its utility. Its exterior and courtyard were completely decked with Trex materials. I was told by the Center’s Executive Director, Michele Jean-Pierre, that New Orleans had a terrible termite problem which the Center was able to avoid because of Trex’s wood-alternative, eco-friendly composite decking. Michele, graciously, praised the work and contributions of Trex and of my agency’s work in helping put it together.

Trex decking in New Orleans’ state-of-the-art Marsalis Center for Music

The tour was emotional for me in being able to see, first-hand, some of the positive effects of my own profession. So often our public relations work is drop-and-move-on to the next thing. While we profess to the long term benefits of what we provide our clients, we rarely track the long term effects.

The Marsalis Center for Music includes an impressive 170-seat performance hall, state-of-the-art lighting and sound, recording studios, computer center, listening library, dance studio and teaching facilities. Each year, more than 200 neighborhood children are instructed in music, dance, academics, and social and cultural responsibility in a safe and positive learning environment. The surrounding community is especially tailored to facilitating an approach of having older musicians mentoring the young. According to the Center’s website, “72 single-family homes, five senior-friendly duplexes, and a toddler park were all built by approximately 70,000 volunteers, donors, sponsors and low-income families.”

Marsalis Center for Music in New Orleans “Musician’s Village” built by Habitat for Humanity after Hurricane Katrina

I saw children in the classroom, hands-on caring and dedicated teachers and executive staff working with great pride in fostering achievement. A gifted sound engineer and teacher at the facility, Daryl Dickerson Ed.D, told me that his objective was – beyond performance – “to help the kids build a skill for longevity” and that the long term career skills were often learned “behind the scenes” of performance. And, of course, highly visible throughout was the handsome Trex decking, now an essential part of the facility that makes these efforts possible.

This kind of initiative is certainly not the only time in which I have seen and participated in public relations implemented for a greater good, but it is another heartwarming and inspirational example for all my fellow practitioners to keep in mind in working day-in and day-out for the good of our respective organizations: our counsel can bring real and palpable benefits to business, communities and families.

The post Revisiting New Orleans 9 Years After Trex & Habitat for Humanity Collaboration appeared first on Fineman PR.

Well, here at Fineman PR, we’ve been working for the last few months with an incredible group of people who are determined to do what the rest of us might think impossible, and in the process turn our discouragement into optimism.

Meet Agnieszka Winkler, David Grusky and the more than 20 other academics, practitioners and foundation heads from the U.S. and Mexico who will come together for the Mazatlán Forum 2015. For two days they will discuss radical yet practical ways to eradicate poverty once and for all.

Yes, that’s right. These people want to eliminate poverty. Period.

In developing Mazatlán Forum press releases and pitches for the U.S., Hispanic and Mexican markets, I encountered some push-back. After all, the goal seems utopian. Yet, while the objective is undeniably enormous, if you abandon for a moment any jaded assumptions about poverty, you’ll be able to see the issue from their perspective.

First, poverty is a human phenomenon, not an immutable force of nature, so if society has created it, it is within the power of human ingenuity to transform it.

Second, for the most part, we still address poverty from a 1960s “War on Poverty” perspective. However, much has been understood about poverty in the half century since then, so it is time to step back and re-examine the assumptions that led to the War on Poverty’s failure to bring about poverty’s demise.

Third, most anti-poverty efforts are designed only to alleviate local situations or to target just one aspect of a poor population’s life. The shortcoming of such approaches should be evident.

The alternative is to design plans that, while responding to local needs, are linked to regional and global strategies that will ultimately eradicate poverty once and for all, worldwide.

Finally, poverty doesn’t affect only the poor; it is a moral, social and economic problem that affects every one of us. Simply put, poverty is unacceptable and very bad business. We must stop tolerating it and treating it as inevitable. It will do us all good.

From the airplane that is taking me to Mazatlán at this very moment, I invite you to cheer for this amazing group of people – warriors, not utopians – and follow the Forum on Twitter using #MazatlanForum2015.

For my part, I’ve left my former discouragement on the ground behind me and have my hopes high – right up here with me at 35,000 feet!

Learn more about Mazatlán Forum here.

The post Cheering for those who are trying to make a difference appeared first on Fineman PR.

Giving back is especially important to today’s consumers, namely millennials, who support brands and make purchasing decisions based on cause-related elements. According to a 2014 study by Web consulting company Instart Logic, at least 70 percent of millennials have purchased a product that supports a cause, and they’re more willing to pay extra for a product if it supports a cause they share.

Tom’s is one brand that has done an excellent job of building a loyal millennial following using a one-for-one-model. Giving back doesn’t have to be as complicated or costly as companies may believe. And the goodwill that is built in doing so is priceless.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving and giving back, it seemed a good time to reflect on the positive impact our agency-generated programs have had on hundreds of thousands of needy individuals in the past few years alone. PR can make a HUGE difference in the lives of others. Below speaks volumes of just how much of a difference.

• Our client’s Food 4 Thought program that we developed from the ground up and brought to Stanislaus and Mercend counties has helped provide more than 3,700 Central Valley elementary students with more than 1.1 million pounds of groceries in exchange for their work in after school academic and extracurricular activities and continues to provide more than 25,000 pounds of groceries each month.
• In partnership with food banks that we forged on our client’s behalf, more than 20,036 turkeys – or roughly 363,648 pounds – have been donated to feed more than 363,648 people.
• Through the 2014 summer Pass the Plate program, which we built from the ground up with seven West Coast food banks, 7,500 people (1,875 families) received 24,000 complete chicken dinners throughout the summer.

Doing good is also ingrained in our agency culture. Several of us serve on boards of non-profits and the company supports our volunteerism in giving back to our communities. We’ve done good and we’ve helped our clients do good, and for that I am extremely proud…and thankful. Happy Thanksgiving.

The post Doing Well By Doing Good appeared first on Fineman PR.