5 Things To Remember About Purpose Campaigns
I loved being at the UK Creative Festival Conference last week, even better that it brought the ad world to my home of Margate for a day or so, and there were some genuinely interesting case studies from ITV , SILLYFACE , Uncommon and others.
Having worked in purpose marketing for years, and arguably helped start it, via the UK’s first sustainable living title, pebble magazine, it was fascinating to see the same arguments being made but also relief to hear from brands that are walking the walk and finding a purpose that suits them.
Where is your purpose-led mission taking you in 2025?
Here are my takeaways and thoughts on where we are with purpose marketing
Purpose isn’t the same as activism. Not all purpose has to be digital placard waving protest. Some brands’ pure purpose is joy or escapism. And that is fine. In fact that will resonate more than trying to shoehorn a social conscience on a brand set up to deliver profit, fun, joy, convenience…and to that end…
Don’t add your voice to something that isn’t in your space. We have enough noise and consumers can see through an inauthentic, shallow message where you’re jumping on the bandwagon. We see you, those brands who rely on awareness days without doing the work to change internal cultures, or address imbalances via strategies not social media posts. Don’t do it.
Following on from that - be ready to invest in that purpose, over the long term. Purpose campaigns aren’t short term solutions to gain a new audience. They matter. And potentially damage you if you don’t commit to causing actual change. Purpose marketing isn’t ‘marketing’ - it has to be more than about an appearance, or a product push - it has to result in change, whether in society, your industry, your company, in you - and that takes time. And money. If you can’t afford to run a purpose campaign over years not weeks, don’t do it.
It was great to hear Uncommon talk about ‘social silences’ and finding those spaces to ‘own’ where the conversations are being had but not in the mainstream media. This has always been my own superpower, identifying the bubbles of trends coming up but not having broken yet - pebble was a huge case in point, focusing attention purely on the different aspects of a more sustainable life back in 2016. While it’s harder to find them now, there’s no end of niche causes / content to own if it feels right to your brand. Consumers are sick of vague promises like ‘net zero by 2035’ and want locally based, action based, measurable support from brands who are natural brand partners. Think granular, think local, think what would help the average high street not telling the world you’re going to plant 1 million trees.
There's no reason why purpose campaigns can’t be fun. It was interesting to see data to show that boring campaigns cost more to reach an audience than creative ones - it’s good practice to be as creative as possible, to gain more organic traction, eyeballs, awareness and sell it in as costing less in the long run. Don’t give up on harnessing expert brains, putting people in a room, letting ideas fly and seeing what happens. We all need some joy, some comedy and some lightness, even when dealing with the most serious of missions.
Make it human - make it real - make a fundamental change to one person. The rest will follow.