More than ever before, consumers consider the brands and businesses they patronize as an extension of themselves and their values. This means that as a business, while you may be unable to impress people with your business strategy, you can pull them in if you succeed in aligning your values with the values of your target audience.
A lot of large businesses like Ben & Jerry's, Seventh Generation, Cabot are already reaping great rewards from implementing social good into their marketing and PR campaigns.
But you don't have to be a large corporation. If you’ve been considering how to reap similar rewards for your own business, here’s how you can start:
Know Your Values First
Thanks to the value-driven millennial generation, businesses are required to be more value-driven than ever before. With this segment of the population accounting for more and more spending dollars, your business cannot afford to be gray on what it stands for and what its values are.
Whether it is your city, women’s rights, sustainability, better education, increased equality among demographics, or simply charity work, as a business leader it pays to be clear on what is important to you. Even if these values don’t relate directly to your business, they can become core components of your marketing strategy.
Use Social to Your Advantage
Social media has made it easier than ever to give your brand a voice. You can super charge your brand voice by weaving your values into the posts and updates that you share over social media.
Instead of slapping on a hashtag on your posts and calling it a day, you can rise over and beyond by interacting with your followers who are driving social change and sharing, reposting, and including them in your posts.
This makes your brand stand out as more authentic among the sea of social media noise, and will gather an engaged community around it.
Align with Other Brands
Collaboration will take you farther than competition will. Whatever your values are, the chances are high that there are other brands that are committed to them as well. By joining forces with these like-minded brands, you can tap into a much larger audience than that of your own.
Before partnering up with another brand though, make sure you do your due diligence to make sure that brand has no history of posting problematic opinions that misalign with your own brand. If a brand’s activity can be interpreted as problematic, you are better off steering clear of them.
Practice What You Preach
You don’t want to be identified for failing to walk the talk. Many brands champion a lot of causes with their mouths and on social media, only to be seen violating the same principles later. There’s hardly anything that will harm your business more or faster than being discovered to be inauthentic
You can start small, decide what exactly you stand for and then look for brands that stand for same. See how they weave these values into their market and gain some inspiration.
If you would like some professional help, however, we would be glad to help. Reach out to Eternity today.
