Charity Strategy

I have been looking at charities recently and the communications strategies that they propose in order to ultimately find lifetime fundraisers. My most recent consideration has been Marie Curie Cancer Care. Their failings are obvious, both in strategic rigour and media planning. In a nutshell, they say that they are 'Devoted to Life', which is odd as they are a death charity. They also have a daffodil as a symbol of hope, a bit twee and strange as presumably there is little hope for the dying. They also worryingly plough funds into leafleting, which proves to have very low conversion rates. They are trying to say many disparate things, in the wrong place!

As a former cancer sufferer myself (I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia in 1999), I became instantly aware of cancer charities in existence, even this one. But if someone asked me what they did and how they did it, I'd be left thinking "They raise money for research by getting old ladies to shake tins in sainsbury's". Wrong!

It turns out that Marie Curie Cancer Care do research treatments, but they mainly deal with providing palliative care. They do this, interestingly, by hosting quite 'extreme' and active events in the UK and abroad as fundraising exercises, even with Ranulph Fiennes getting involved in the mountain 'trek'.

It seems that the charity has missed a trick here. People don't know this about them, it's interesting, so let them know! We have the message, but what is the insight, what will motivate consumers?

After reading a recent Wikipedia article on the Triple Bottom Line, I realised more and more corporations are making charitable contributions part of their corporate mantra. But what is the motivation? It occured to me that the secondary charity messages such as 'This can fit in my lifestyle', 'This will benefit my community' and most importantly, 'This will do such and such for me/my business,' is what could primarily be motivating people and corporations, it is those selfish and ancillary benefits that get people going, I may be cynical and wrong, but bear with me...

The job of the charity in question is therefore to plant this seed in the consumer, suggesting that charitable contribution is a personal add-on in a way, by appealing to these various personality traits and needs. The aim with the messaging strategy would be to change the consumers' inward focus and to make them believe in the objective worth of their contribution - this is what will convert them to being a lifetime fundraiser.

It may be wrong to place the charity's overall benefit at the last stage of the consumer journey and it may be wrong to get them there cynically, but if it works in the longrun, isn't that all that matters?