KPIs and ROI aren’t exactly emotionally engaging topics. So, for Lift Philanthropy Partners’ first marketing campaign, the Vancouver-based not-for-profit decided to use a little humour and some big hair.
Lift’s mission is to bring a business mindset to the non-profit or “social purpose” sector. Instead of just giving money to non-profits, the organization invests in their business structure to help them grow.
“We take what we call a venture philanthropy approach, which means we don’t just give them cash that they would spend on program delivery,” said Lisa Dooling, director of communications at Lift Philanthropy Partners. “We give them a combination of financial and non-financial resources to develop a plan for growth… It’s kind of like venture capital, only for the philanthropic sector.”
At the centre of the campaign is a video called “Anthem,” which spoofs charity power ballads like “We Are The World.” The lyrics, sung by performers in full 80s garb, convey Lift’s mission to helping charities perform better. The opening line, for example, is: “It’s the time for ROI, not just KPIs, FYI. It’s the time to be measurable, scalable, accountable. Let’s all come together.”
“It’s different than other charitable campaigns in that we’re not using an emotional appeal,” said Dooling. “[We used humour] because we needed to break through, but also because we aren’t like other not-for-profits. We are talking about concepts like performance measurement and return on investment and things that are more business like, so we wanted to be different and break through the clutter.”
Dooling said the objectives are to educate people about venture philanthropy and raise the profile of the brand to support its fundraising goals. The end of the video has the tagline “making good causes a great investment” and a link to the campaign page www.liftpartners.ca/makegoodbetter. Lift is aiming to raise money to help 30 non-profits over the next three years.
“It’s the 30-year anniversary of Live Aid and We Are The World… so we thought, why don’t we put a spin on those cause videos so we can get away with talking about KPIs and words that would otherwise be dry,” said Pat Pirisi, chief creative officer at Toronto-based Public Inc., which created the video. “[The idea] was to make a complex message ripe with dry vernacular really fun and sing-songy, so viewers will not only be engaged, by the end, gain an understanding of what Lift does.”
