Manhattan Marketing Maven

The RED Campaign Sees Red

A controversy about the effectiveness and results of the RED Campaign, fronted by Bono, has marketers and philanthropists seeing red. And while the marketing ROI is unclear, it is becoming evident that Americans are not shopping their way to good deeds.

Ad Age kicked off the tempest on March 5th by reporting that $100 million was spent and a "meager $18million" was raised. Businessweek piled on in the March 19th edition

Reporter Mya Frazier outlined the incredible line-up of participating personalities (Oprah, Spielberg, Chris Rock and Christy Turlington) and the heavy duty line-up of participating brands (GAP, Motorola, American Express, Emporio Armani and Apple) and wondered how so much time, money and energy could yield so little in earned contributions. Since then RED CEO Bobby Shriver and RED Marketing Chief Julie Cordua have jumped into the fray and offered explanations ( RED isn't a campaign its a brand), alternative data ( 18 is really 25) and a dose of vituperation.

Evidently RED works on several levels. Brands buy into RED by making donations to the Global Fund to Fight Aids,Tuberculosis & Malaria. These "rights" payments go to run the charity. Participating brands then have the right to make and market RED stuff and donate a portion of those proceeds to the fund. Its this level where either sales are off or the cause and the merchandise don't have enough appeal in spite of the star talent and the weight of free and paid media.

Like most brand campaigns its hard to measure effectiveness because there is no benchmark, nobody set a clear goal either in terms of exposure or sales and nobody is really keeping track of how all this hangs together since each participating brand is using RED to serve its own agenda and the RED guys are just trying to collect as much cash from the capitalists as quickly as they can before this initiative becomes old news. 

We also seem to be seeing several cultural developments which could affect long term efforts at cause related marketing ...

1. Over the Top is Over the Top. RED might just be too big, too bold and too unwieldy for its own good.We never heard of the Global Fund before and we are inundated with big charities trying to solve big problems with big gestures. None of us can save the world on this scale and some of us are put off by all this overt do-gooding so we don't buy the act and we don't bother trying.

2. Africa is The Forgotten Continent. AIDS, Darfur, corruption, post-colonialism, poverty, racism pick your poison Africa has it. But Africa doesn't strike a chord among white folks or even black folks in white countries. We have all seen and heard the starving kids in Africa routine too many times and too many of us didn't care in the first place.

3. You Can't Shop Your Way to Heaven. Cause-related marketing has explored many avenues but in the end good deeds and consumerism cut against each other. Maybe its our Puritan legacy or some lingering sense of Catholic/Jewish/Muslim guilt but spending the wages of sin doesn't seem to motivate acts of lovingkindness. And for some of us we get creeped out along the way.

RED is a brilliant idea with heart, strung together loosely and executed inconsistently. Its not all that different from the general state of advertising and marketing, yet in this case we hope the cash flows in and the services get deliveredto the Africans who truly need it.   

WaMu's Sins of Omission

Washington Mutual – “WaMu” – a Seattle based regional bank recently started a war for new depositors that swept me up in its maelstrom. And now I know why people hate banks – all banks. And now I know why banks spend so much money on ineffective efforts to try to convince us that they aren’t thieves, usurers and double-talking sleezeballs. Ninety-seven percent of American adults use a checking account at a bank. I’d guess 96.9 percent are perpetually pissed off about it.

I had both “push” and “pull” motivation for switching banks. My old rotten bank –Bank of America –got into the habit of routinely holding my checks for 10-12 days long enough to bounce all my monthly payments and leave me without any ready cash. When I aggressively and persistently inquired about this practice, I got excuses that ranged from the Patriot Act to Banking Regulation CCC to mindless claptrap from a customer service rep with an impenetrable accent probably in Manila or Mumbai.

Everyone knows that checks clear electronically in seconds in extremely secure IT environments. Banks batch process cash transfers and do all kinds of sophisticated trafficking, reconciliation, reporting and accounting paperwork every evening. The practice of holding a valid check has nothing really to do with collecting the money.

Surely with all the data and technology banks employ they can figure out I’m not funding al Queda and not laundering cash for Columbian drug lords. And while BofA needs to make its monthly nut its hard to imagine that playing the float on my paycheck for 10 days would be a significant contribution. The bottom line is that banks fuck with you because they can.

My new rotten bank --WaMu – got a story in the Wall Street Journal on a day after I enjoyed a lively interactive interaction with a human robot. The promise of free checking with free checks and no ATM fees at competitors’ ATMs caught my attention. The hope of a different act momentarily clouded my judgment

Evidently I was an easy mark. According to the 2006 Market Pulse Survey released by IBT Enterprises and MCA Works 41% of Americans say that “no amount of money or promotion” would get them to switch banks. They must be the “fire and forget” crowd. Another20 percent would switch for a one percent interest deal, 5% would defect for an iPod and one percent would actually bolt for a toaster; obviously my grandmother’s crowd. They got me for a few free checks and 20 dollars worth of fees.

From the moment I crossed the threshold of my branch at West 96^th Street and Broadway, I was subject to WaMu’s three sins of omission

1. They Didn’t Grease the Pipeline.

WaMu planned a promotion, created and shipped collateral and signage to the branches, pitched the Journal and got free media. They didn’t cue the greeter to expect new customers to walk thru the door. They didn’t train her on the product. They didn’t staff the branch to handle a blip in volume. They didn’t streamline the enrollment process.

The net result – I wander in full of hope and promise. In nanoseconds I am brought up short by a clueless greeter who either doesn’t speak the language or is focused exclusively on a demonic image on my forehead. After a healthy amount of pantomime and posturing she fobs me off onto an over wrought clerk who can’t find the sign up kits, isn’t sure which forms to use and doesn’t understand that if I don’t take off my coat and don’t sit down it means I’m in a hurry. She is apologetic but slow. It takes 45 minutes to fill out two forms and process my cash deposit.

2. They Didn’t Disclose Critical Information.

As I later learned to my chagrin, WaMu routinely holds the initial deposits of new customers for 11 business days and holds every new deposit during the first month of the new banking relationship. This is supposedly disclosed in the booklet they toss at you, though I can’t find it after searching carefully through the fine print. No live person said anything about it when I was handing over my ID, calling off important numbers or signing in the box.

Bingo! I got from the frying pan into the fire in record time. But the kicker is I don’t find out till a week later when they mail me a postcard announcing that they’ve held a 2900 dollar check and then send me a notice notifying me that they bounced my first new checks to creditors.

3. They Treat Customers as Commodities

When I called the 800 customer service number, the agent stonewalled me. When I asked him why they hold new customers’ money he said they just did. It was standard practice.  When I asked where it was disclosed he didn’t know but asserted I was told. When I attacked him and asked how he personally could participate in such a process, he used the Nazi defense and told me that WaMu was no better or no worse than the other banks. When I asked him to make good my checks and forgive the bounce fees he told me to get lost. No empathy. No relief. No hits. No runs. No men left on base.

Evidently if they got your cash, they really don’t care about customer experience or your relationship to the brand. As a marketer, it’s hard to imagine how they can pitch me on a loan, a mortgage or another financial product feeling the way I do. But stay tuned. They don’t know how I feel. They don’t care how I feel. They just play the numbers.