October 28th, 2009

CSR is Inside Baseball – Take the Quiz

This is the first of our guest posts here at SDialogue.  We promised to continue the dialogue about how social media is advancing the sustainability dialogue after the launch of our  paper on the topic.  This post is from Deron Triff, CEO at Changents.com – a great organization which is indeed furthering the sustainability dialogue.

CSR is Inside Baseball

Take the Quiz and Prove Me Wrong

I often use the expression “inside baseball” to describe corporate social responsibility.  Too many of the best companies using business as a positive force for change talk about their incredibly cool CSR projects in gauzy details only an insider could love.  Almost all stumble in their well-intentioned efforts to really connect with mass audiences around shared values.   Is this a big deal?  You bet it is!

Like no time in history companies are investing hundreds of millions of dollars to do “good” in the world.  Their ethical business practices and truly innovative approaches are bringing about social and environmental change in ways that drop right to the bottom line.  But instead of connecting with consumers through pop-culture channels, the good work, the cool projects, the amazing engagement opportunities get stuffed away in a 100-page dust magnet called the CSR Report. Consumers want to purchase from responsible corporate citizens.  Why make it so hard to tell the story!

To prove that CSR is about as inside baseball as it gets, I challenge you to a 5-question CSR quiz matching Fortune 100 companies with their blockbuster CSR achievements.  To make it worth your while, I will award the winner with 100,000 consumer impressions by placing an ad of their choice (benefiting a company or a favorite non-profit) on the homepage of Changents.com.

If answering the questions felt like throwing darts, you’re not alone. Last week Grail Research rolled out a study revalidating a proven point: most consumers have no idea companies like HP, Cisco, The Gap, Microsoft, Nike and General Mills are socially and environmentally responsible companies.

For years, however, studies by Cone, Manning Selvage & Lee and AMP Agency have shown the positive relationship between CSR and consumerism.  Despite this well understood fact, companies have a hell of a time creating values marketing experiences that are exciting, interactive, easily understood and ‘connectable’ through social media.

Case in point.  Intel’s CSR achievements are among the most notable in the world.  Trust me, snuggle up with its CSR report (which I am not advocating:) and you’ll be blown away. However, the punch line is on page one where CEO Paul Otellini states “…I am proud of the many recognitions…including our number one spot on Corporate Responsibility Officer magazine’s 100 Best Corporate Citizens list….” Don’t get me wrong, Corporate Responsibility Officer magazine is great for us inside baseball players, but c’mon Intel, you have a story to tell to the masses!

Now, there are some great examples of companies bringing their “good” to life on the Internet. For example, in 2009 the American Express Member’s Project caught lightening in a bottle with 400,000 people registered and 1.8 million unique visitors. AMEX masterfully used the Web to crowd source people with exciting projects for change under the company’s brand. They leveraged the best of our increasingly “ego-altruistic” culture and engaged the public. It worked not only because AMEX offered sizable financial support to the winners, but also because it understands Seth Godin’s paradigm that explains how agents of change are turning to the Internet and connecting one-by-one to form groups – which catalyze into movements – that take responsibility for creating change.

A company’s ability to help consumers connect the dots between commerce and values is a challenge, no doubt about it. With that said, the level of creativity, content and entertainment value in the values marketing space is beginning to rival that of product marketing.   Perhaps Fast Company said it best when describing Timberland’s CEO Jeff Swartz as a visionary business leader who is “using the hard financial metrics of profit, return on investment, and, oh yes, shareholder return, to try to prove that doing good and doing well are actually self-reinforcing notions.”

Deron Triff, CEO, Changents.com