Tag Archives: Consumer Behavior

Find Your Super-consumers and Build For Them

We’re in an era of the super-consumer. Consumers are attuned to the companies and supply chains behind the items they buy. While today’s consumers stil boycott, they buycott more. I love Amazon but spend my dollars with Better World Books when I have the option. I’m not boycotting Amazon, I’m buycotting Better World Books. As […]

To Tap Cause Marketing’s Huge Potential, Do Less Of It

This piece was originally written for and published on Reach Students. If 94% of Millennials condone cause marketing why do only 53% report buying a product that benefits a cause in the past year?  The first finding is compelling, the second certainly is not, particularly given that in many stores you’d have to struggle not to buy […]

Mobile Giving Meets Mobile Marketing, But Are Americans Ready?

Sure, Americans love their mobile phones and use them handily, but there’s still stunted confidence for mobile financial transactions, whether it’s a payment or a donation. Part of the reticence comes from the clumsiness of many mobile commerce and mobile giving sites and part of it’s a lack of incentives. Benevity Social Ventures and Obopay […]

Retail Philanthropy Is In High Demand: 4 Steps To Doing It Right

Neither nationwide purse-tightening nor cries of Slactivism! Greenwashing! and Fad! have shaken cause marketing. Eighty-three percent of consumers “want more of the products, services and retailers they use to benefit causes,” according to Cone Inc.’s 2010 Cause Evaluation Study. But how do you do cause-related marketing (or cause branding) right? Pick a cause you care about. […]

What Does the Empathy Differentiator Mean For Social Business?

How does a physician with sufficient medical knowledge and analytic ability distinguish himself? He measures high on the empathy scale.  Once a physician gets past a certain threshold of analytic ability, he’s proven himself to be an okay doctor on the functional front, so the point of differentiation becomes his empathic abilities. When the Jefferson […]

Will B Corp’s New Campaign Be The Death Knell For Cause-Washing?

Rather than doing the industry in, cause-washing might just save corporate sustainability. Although consumer trust is worse than we thought, the anecdote has the potential to alter the way companies do business and consumers shop. Less than one percent of people (surveyed recently by BBMG in partnership with B Lab) trust company advertisements or statements […]

I Like Companies That Make Me a Better Person (the smart companies know this)

In the last four days that I’ve been back in the states I’ve had to pay for bags three times (at CVS, Ikea and Trader Joe’s). It’s a surprising and welcome development, particularly as I’m not in California or Boulder, but in Washington, D.C. My reaction to the pay-for-bag-system has also evolved in step with […]

Trouble Brewing For Green Mountain Coffee: Do 3 Billion Plastic Cups Negate 30 Years of Sustainability?

Does a history of progressive social and environmental responsibility compensate for recent environmental abuse? Green Mountain Coffee is staring into the face of this question now with criticism of its environmentally noxious single-use coffee pods that work with its Keurig brewing system.  Last year, more than 80% of Green Mountain’s $803 million in sales came […]

How will what you want me to do change my life?

Are you letting me know why I should make a donation, sign a petition, cast a vote or buy what you’re selling?  It’s an obvious statement, but one that’s not always executed on, despite perception. Kiva.org has faciliated more than $100 million in loans in a few short years. Really outstanding, except it could be […]

Why It’s Good Business For Levi’s To Care About What You Do With Your Jeans at Home

Your next pair of Levi’s might come with a clothesline or shoebox-sized dryer.  After a recent lifecycle assessment, Levi’s realized that 60% of the climate impact of a pair of jeans comes after the jeans are made and sold; nearly 80% of this is from drying the jeans in a dryer.  The presumed and easy […]