Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Purpose-driven content marketing is a way for a business or brand to bond with a target audience based on their shared needs and interests — including interest in supporting a worthy cause. But while most organizations recognize the importance of “giving back,” they aren’t always accustomed to creating content around their efforts in a way that will both engage their audience and drive them to participate. Success in this arena is all about developing the right strategy and executing it in an authentic, organic way that brings mutual benefit to everyone involved.

“The public broadcasters do a great job: NPR, BBC, etc. As journalism-driven enterprises, they’re natural content producers, unfettered by concerns around selling advertising,” says Rebecca Lieb, an analyst at Altimeter Group. “PETA has done some high profile and groundbreaking campaigns. I love American Express’ efforts around Small Business Saturday.”

To get some additional perspectives on the topic — and some best-of-breed examples — CMI asked a group of blog contributors, Online Training instructors, and Content Marketing Worldspeakers for their answers to the question, “What companies do you know of that are doing purpose-driven marketing well?” Following are some of their answers....

The recent videos of 68-year-old bus monitor Karen Klein being bullied by tweens and teens have generated a lot of talk across media outlets.

What started as a YouTube video pulled from Facebook has transformed into a powerful online community, leveraging the power of online crowdsourcing to help rectify the wrong doing towards Klein with emotional and financial support.Although normally our news headlines are filled with intense issues such as violence, war, missing people and politics; this made people pause, listen and act. These same key lessons can also be applied when developing a cause campaign....