I interviewed Vicki Kilmer, former Director of Cause Marketing for Best Friends Animal Society. Best Friends Animal Society is a non-profit, animal welfare organization with a 2009 annual reporting of $41,816,397.00 (http://www.bestfriends.org/aboutus/pdfs/09%20BFAS%20Audited%20FS.pdf, 2012).
L.D. - Vicki, thank you for taking the time to answer my questions about what separates cause marketing from corporate responsibility and how they can compliment each other.
V.K. - My pleasure. I'm happy to help.
L.D. - Can you define CM?
V.K. - Cause Marketing, also known as CRM, is an umbrella term that covers a range of marketing activity. The central definition is marketing partnership between a business and a non-profit entity for mutual benefit. It is not social marketing or campaign marketing.
L.D. - So, when you say it's not social marketing, do you mean that CRM is not CSR?
V.K. - Yes, those are two very different strategies. CSR is corporate philanthropy, the giving without the expectation of direct corporate gain. CRM is distinct from CSR in corporate dollars involved in CRM are not outright gifts to an organization and are not tax-deductible. Those Dawn Dish soap commercials are a good example of CSR. They are marketing themselves by showing how their product can help the wildlife in the community without directly partnering up with another corporation or any expectation of financial gain from this campaign.
L.D. - But aren't they hoping for a financial gain by this campaign? I mean, yes, it's a good thing Dawn is doing, but they will, or are hoping to, gain new customers from this. Dawn is banking on people buying their product because they are doing this philanthropic thing for the community.
V.K. - That's true they are still technically selling their product, but the difference is they are not connected to a particular entity that they will benefit from as a result of this CSR campaign. For example, if Dawn ran this same campaign but said $1.00 from ever sale of Dawn would go to a particular wildlife rescue organization, that would be an example of CRM. In turn the rescue organization would promote Dawn in some way to their donors and members, and Dawn would be making a tax-deductible contribution.
L.D. - Okay, that makes sense. Is it fair to say that even though on the surface CSR appears to just be doing good to do good? However, it majority of the campaigns seem to be strategic in nature. Like the Dawn campaign, that launched after the B.P. oil spill.
V.K. - That's a good point, and yes, most CSR campaigns are attached to something of the moment. Not all are based on trying to capitalize or attach themselves tragic events, though.
L.D. - In one of my readings for this week, Daniel Franklin, infers that big business is using CSR as a front to tell the world that they are doing good things, and in essence, jumping onto the CSR bandwagon (2008). Do you think that's true?
V.K. - Do you mean, do I think companies that are not really philanthropic in nature are trying to take advantage of CSR and use that to their advantage to appear to be responsible?
L.D. - Yes, that's what I mean.
V.K. - That's a subjective question. I mean, if the company was under fire for child labor and then suddenly started a campaign that exposed child labor camps, then yes, I think that would be a suspicious use of CSR. But, if the same company had no record of violating child labor laws, but suddenly started a CSR campaign because another, say competitor, was under scrutiny, I would think that was a strategic, competitive move on their part.
L.D. - That brings up another point of trust. In another reading, trust in corporations has gone through a dramatic change since the Enron era (Allen, 2002). Many companies like AIG tried to separate themselves from Enron by becoming transparent with their earnings and other corporate communications (Allen, 2002). Is that, in your opinion, a form of CSR?
V.K. - Yes, I think it is. The more transparent a company is, the more trust it can glean, the more it appears to serve the community. It's a different, indirect form of CSR, but I think it would still fall under the umbrella.
L.D - You've been very helpful, Vicki. Thank you for your time and sharing your thoughts on this matter.
V.K. - You're welcome, Lisa. Good luck.
From this interview I learned that CSR and CRM are related in nature but have very distinct strategies and motives. CRM is not the use of marketing techniques to impact societal behavior (e.g. stop smoking, don't pollute, don't drive drunk). CRM is a partnership where both players gain something from combined efforts. CSR is societal campaigns without the expectation of direct corporate gain. However, it would appear that both forms are not purely philanthropic. The strategies directly and indirectly are positioned for corporate exposure and, in the end, financial gain.
References
Allen, C. E. (2002). Building mountains in a flat landscape: investor relations in the post Enron era. Corporate Communications: An International Journal, 7(4), 206-211
Best Friends Animal Society. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.bestfriends.org/aboutus/pdfs/09%20BFAS%20Audited%20FS.pdf
Franklin, D. (2008, January 17). Just good business. The Economist, pp. 1-6.
Lisa, this is an interesting discussion of CSR vs. CRM. The Economist article notes that there are three different layers of CSR: philanthropy, risk management, and adding value. It seems that your interviewee largely considered CSR to fall in that first category. Do you think that is true for many people? Meaning, do you think CSR is largely perceived as philanthropic instead of creating value? Do you see a difference between CRM and the 'adding value' layer of CSR?
ReplyDeleteHi Courtney,
DeleteIt was interesting to learn more about the differences. I agree. Vicki does seem to place CSR as mostly philanthropic, but I think her distinction is more from place of operations, meaning that one of the biggest differences is the tax-deductions placed on CRM, vs CSR. Because CRM includes donations to non-profits either by cash, in-kind or advertising, there is more of a behind the scenes, strategic effort. It may appear completely philanthropic, but the corporate partners stands to gain, in a CRM relationship, not only by co-branding itself with the non-profit, it also stands to gain as the contribution will be considered tax-deductible.
I think most people see these efforts as largely philanthropic, but I believe there may be an element of the consumer asking "what does the org have to gain?" Another thought may be "It's the least they can do." For example, CRS efforts by companies like Nike and Gap that were under fire for child labor laws (Franklin, 2008), are they doing to avoid being seen as evil? In my opinion, I think there is an strong element of philanthropy in CSR. However, I don't think it's done purely for that reason. If it were, the organization could donate cash, items or promote a worthy cause without attaching their name to it. However, that begs the question if consumers would pay as much attention to the philanthropic effort if a large, recognizable name were not attached, and would the message reach others who are not already in support of said non-profit (Grau and Folse, 2007)?
I do see a slight difference in the 'adding value' layer of CSR. However, because a corporation who participates in CRM is blatantly co-branding or partnering with a non-profit for gain by association (not that there's anything wrong with this method) they are basically saying, "Hey, look at us. We are paying either by sponsorship dollars, collateral materials or in-kind donations to support this specific non-profit. We are good." The added value of CSR is a much more subtle and, I believe, far-reaching effort. For example, if Budweiser were to engage in CSR for drunk driving, they are sending a general message. If they coupled that with a sponsorship of or a partnership with MAAD, I think the messaging would take on a whole differnet level, as it would be directly supporting an specific organization rather than a public-safety campaign. This is not to say that companies can't directly align themselves with that layer of CSR by creating volunteer efforts, or the like, as expressed in Lauren's post about Samsung.
Franklin, D. (2008). Just good business. The Economist Newspaper, pp. 1-6.
Grau, S. L., & Folse, J.A. (2007). Cause-related marketing (CRM). Journal
of Advertising 36(4), 19-33.
Lisa - Excellent interview. Much like you did in the interview, I would have challenged Vicki's definition/understanding of CSR. Vicki's definition does not agree with the Economist article, as stated by Courtney. This either means that Vicki is misunderstanding the terms, or that there are different definitions and schools of thought. I certainly hope the later for Vicki's sake since this definition is heavily related to her job function.
DeleteThis is a great interview! I think the main difference in CRM and CSR is how much the company who is donating wants to get recognized for it. I think touting yourself for a job well done in supporting a certain cause almost makes you look kind of smarmy. I remember after the Haiti earthquake, the company I worked for at the time had three different organizations we matched contributions to. Well, the VP of HR wanted to put out a press release about how much we donated and what we were doing to help. I did not at all agree to that--just because you do a good deed doesn't mean you need to tell the world about it. I guess my company's humble culture fits me quite well :)
ReplyDeleteHi Casey and Lauren,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comments and replies. Casey, I think the two are related, but have different distinctions. As I stated in my reply to Courtney, and relating to the Economis article, an organization can have both and layer CSR and CRM. However, the two do have a clear distincition. From what I understand, CRM is a function that involves a clearly defined partnership where both organizations have a contract that outlines what each will receive, and normally the receiving org is an non-profit. For example, if Target enters into a partnership with the ASPCA (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Anaimals), the ASPCA will recieve tangible items - cash, in-kind donations and the like. In turn, the ASPCA will put Target's logo on their site, literature, perhaps name a campaign after them...etc. This give and take relationship is clearly defined and agreed upon by both parties in the form of a written contract.
CSR, on the other hand, as Lauren pointed out is perhaps a more humble, broader effort, where an organization can support a particular organization or movement, like my Budwieser/drunk driving example. In this example the recepient of CSR does not have to be a particilar organization. It can be an effort to enlighten the general public to a cause or mission that is not attached to any certain organization. However, Like in Lauren's example, a supporting company can also attach itself to a cause it wants to promote and include layers of CRM. So, CSR can include CRM, and CRM can include CSR, by default, but CRM is a contract with clear expectations. Whereas, CSR is blanket do-good effort without pre-calculated results.
Lauren, I agree! Timing can be very important in CSR. I was actually turned off by the B.P. commercals after the oil spill. At first they pretty much took no responsibility then decided to launch a CSR campaign, I imagine from public pressure and stakeholder outrage, where an attractive woman, in a B.P. hard-hat touted their message of environmental responsibility. This seemed very desparate and transparent.
I think the question is, can an organization truly be seen as being philanthropic? Even if their CSR campaigns come straight from the heart, they do stand to gain something, by default, as they are still promoting themselves. If they do it blatently, like B.P., they are seen, to use your term, as smarmy.