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- All Subjects: Marketing
- All Subjects: Entrepreneurship
- Creators: Mokwa, Michael
- Member of: Theses and Dissertations
- Resource Type: Text
- Status: Published
Especially during the current COVID-19 pandemic and age of social unrest in the United States, there has been an increasing need for comfort, yet the idea of comfort is quite vague and rarely elaborated upon. To simplify the idea of comfort and communicate the ideas around it effectively, I am defining comfort as a subset of escapism in which a person escapes to reduce or alleviate feelings of grief or distress. As companies rush to comfort their customers in this current state of uncertainty, marketers are pressed to identify people’s insecurities and comfort them without coming off as insensitive or trite. Current comfort marketing focuses on inspiring nostalgia in its customers, having them recall previous positive experiences or feelings to comfort them. Nostalgic marketing techniques may ease mild grief in some cases, but using them to alleviate severe distress probably will not be as effective, and has contributed to several seemingly out-of-touch “COVID-19 era” commercials.<br/>When addressing comfort, marketers should understand the type and hierarchy of comfort that they are catering to. Not all comforts are equal, in that some comforts make us feel better than others and some do not comfort us at all. A better understanding of how and why comforts change among different individuals, and possibly being able to predict the comfort preference based on a product or service, will help marketers market their goods and services more effectively. By diversifying and specializing comfort marketing using this hierarchical method, marketers will be able to more significantly reach their customers during “uncertain times.”
Meanwhile, digital is still being defined, as countless people work to determine best practices and reconcile the unending amount of information available into something that can be used. Trends in digital include the concept of new media, blogging, social media and new channels of media. Overall, we are seeing a shift to user-‐ generated content, available all the time, and a proliferation of content being created and published on the Web.
Some of the ways these two industries are colliding include the rise of lifestyle bloggers, developments and usage of technology, an abundance of new e-‐commerce models, and finally, a shift in the ways consumers curate and discover products online.
Predictions for the future include a more streamlined and user-‐friendly process for search and product discovery online, increase in social commerce and personalization of products, and finally, a return to brick and mortar shopping, but with an improved, experiential model. These trends will affect industry stakeholders dramatically, and so necessary actions for these stakeholders are also discussed, such as allocating more resources to content generation and e-‐commerce, giving consumers the ability to personalize, and improving their physical shopping experiences to provide something valuable and entertaining.
First, we created two separate surveys, taking responses from over 1000 individuals at Arizona State University. These surveys focused on building trust in nonprofits, preferred marketing strategies as a consumer, and general awareness for various social issues that affect local and national nonprofits. Second, we conducted professional interviews with marketing leaders at nonprofits. These ranged from smaller, local nonprofits to nonprofits that operate on a national level. Their missions were all geared toward different causes, meaning they offered a diverse set of skills and advice on nonprofit marketing.
After obtaining this data, we created a guide for nonprofit marketing. Because there is a lack of information available on building marketing techniques in the nonprofit sector, we aimed to create a general guideline that could be applied to a variety of nonprofits and develop their marketing strategy. This includes details on how to create an executive summary, conduct a SWOT analysis, and the different strategies a nonprofit organization should implement.
Further, to test this marketing plan, we partnered with a local nonprofit in Arizona, Million Dollar Teacher Project. Million Dollar Teacher Project is a relatively new nonprofit, and focuses on educational inequality in Arizona. After looking over all our research and the nonprofit marketing guide, we were able to develop a plan for increasing engagement, awareness, and trust for Million Dollar Teacher Project. We pinpointed areas of improvement, such as social media, ambassador programs, email marketing, and follow up strategy.
The nonprofit marketing plan, our survey results, interview transcripts, as well as our marketing plan for Million Dollar Teacher Project can be found below.
First, we created two separate surveys, taking responses from over 1000 individuals at Arizona State University. These surveys focused on building trust in nonprofits, preferred marketing strategies as a consumer, and general awareness for various social issues that affect local and national nonprofits. Second, we conducted professional interviews with marketing leaders at nonprofits. These ranged from smaller, local nonprofits to nonprofits that operate on a national level. Their missions were all geared toward different causes, meaning they offered a diverse set of skills and advice on nonprofit marketing.
After obtaining this data, we created a guide for nonprofit marketing. Because there is a lack of information available on building marketing techniques in the nonprofit sector, we aimed to create a general guideline that could be applied to a variety of nonprofits and develop their marketing strategy. This includes details on how to create an executive summary, conduct a SWOT analysis, and the different strategies a nonprofit organization should implement.
Further, to test this marketing plan, we partnered with a local nonprofit in Arizona, Million Dollar Teacher Project. Million Dollar Teacher Project is a relatively new nonprofit, and focuses on educational inequality in Arizona. After looking over all our research and the nonprofit marketing guide, we were able to develop a plan for increasing engagement, awareness, and trust for Million Dollar Teacher Project. We pinpointed areas of improvement, such as social media, ambassador programs, email marketing, and follow up strategy.
The nonprofit marketing plan, our survey results, interview transcripts, as well as our marketing plan for Million Dollar Teacher Project can be found below.