Cause Marketing with Sparo
Genuine reflection of shared interests can lead directly to reduced cart abandonment, return visits, and viral promotion.
Welcome to the world of cause marketing where charitable giving offers you an opportunity to demonstrate you share the same values as those of your customers. Your genuine reflection of these shared interests can lead directly to reduced cart abandonment, return visits, and viral promotion. This article provides practical strategies with which your business can demonstrate support for customers' values.
Promote the Opportunity
The charity selection widgets should be prominently displayed on your site on the home page and all product pages. We recommend a top notification bar notice and one of the Sparo promotional widgets midway on the hoe page. We then recommend a promotional widget on every category page below the content and a selection widget below the add to order section of all product pages.
To gain the most benefit from the cause marketing program, you'll need to determine where best to promote it beyond these basic locations. Take into account other dual-channel promotional elements, such as seasonal messaging, sales, banners, etc. to highlight the messaging.
Balancing Promotions
Balancing multiple programs while highlighting the cause marketing message may require adjustments to your routine copy.
For example, a message such as:
Save 10% on selected Mother's Day gifts.
Could be tweaked to:
Save 10% on selected Mother's Day gifts and we will donate an additional 10% to your mom's favorite charity.
The challenge is deliver expanded messaging while staying within character count limits.
Everyone Loves a Good Factoid
Feel free to use our collection of Philanthropy Facts in your materials.
We have gathered hundreds of facts and statistics regarding to merchant and customer relationships related to. charitable giving. These can be useful in your promotions to highlight your giving.
Promotional Assets
Websites and apps can place program highlights in several places.
- A banner at the top of your site to call out the program with a link to a page with additional information.
- A popup notice to call out the program.
- A mention on the invoice or bill.
- Mentions and graphics in newsletters.
- A text message and graphics in every email, including support, billing, and general business communications.
- Add an FAQ and a general information page in your navigation, similar to how you handle the links to your terms and conditions and privacy policy.
- Also, consider adding the program to a section of your primary About Us page.
- Author and post a press release announcing the launch of the program.
- Regularly post about the program and the impact of the donations to social media.
You can also use the promotional modules provided via the Sparo plugin.
- One set of modules displays the amount that will be donated if an item is added to the cart and for the cart total itself.
- Another set of modules highlights the donations made to a charity group or organization. It is best to activate these modules once your cause marketing efforts have generated at least a few hundred dollars in donations.
Personalized Communications
The shared value message should be highlighted in advertisements whenever possible. This is likely to be a combination of messages being added to regular promotions and then a campaign calling out the shared value promotion as a standalone message.
Here are a few other observations.
- The word "charity" performs better than the word "cause."
- Highlight that your business is making the donation and not the customer.
- Call out that the customer selects the charity.
- Highlight that your business will make the donation at no cost to the customer.
We can provide you with a variety of sample text and display ads based on your
Advertising
Your Sparo Purchase with a Purpose™ program offers an opportunity for you to personalize your customer messages.
- For customers who abandon their cart, associate the customer's selected charity upon charity selection and the donation value into their CRM record. Email the customer reminding them of the organization they selected and the amount that will be donated in their name if they complete the sale.
- For customers who complete a sale, include a call out of their charity and donation in subsequent communications to remind them of the impact they have made and the opportunity for an additional donation.
Similar personalized messages could be provided in any regular email or SMS communication.
Search Engine Marketing
We have found that the following keywords have been useful to integrate into copy and key terms for search engine marketing (SEM):
- Shop and we will donate a portion of your sale to charity
- You Buy, We Donate
- Select your charity for us to donate
- We donate a portion of each sale
- Donate|Donation|Give
- Charity|Those in Need
- Your Charity|Your Cause
Analytics - Tracking Results
It is important to add tracking tags to your ads and communications in order to gather data and analyze the program's impact.
Tag Manager
JavaScript events are triggered as the user interacts with the Sparo widgets. These may be used with Google Tag Manager (GTM), Google Analytics (GA), or other tracking and analysis tools. Contact your account manager to obtain the detail for these events.
Resources
Curious about retail donation solutions and giving technology-and why they're good for business? Read our whitepaper, listen to our podcast, browse our blogs, and more…
How It Works
Check out the features of the Sparo platform to see how it can turn shopping on your site into a whole new customer bonding experience for good.