How businesses around the world are raising awareness for key issues
Photo by Kelly Lacy from Pexels
Over the last few years, we have seen a trend throughout the business world. More and more companies are taking on activist roles in raising awareness for certain issues and causes. There are various reasons behind this growing trend, but one is that businesses have realized they have a large audience to influence. Owners are starting companies based on specific issues, making it a key part of their business strategy to raise awareness.
From sexism to racism and climate change to veganism, there are many causes and issues that businesses are trying to bring into the public eye. Some are doing so very successfully, and we’re interested to know how they do it. Through conducting some research into things, it’s clear that a combination of active and subtle ideas is the way forward.
Marketing campaigns
A lot of businesses are running fully-fledged marketing campaigns focused on a particular social issue. This is different from normal campaigns in that they are not looking to sell a product or service at all. Instead, they’re using their money and influence to create advertising and marketing materials around a particular topic. It ensures that the topic gets out there to as many people as possible, raising awareness.
A good example of this is the company Brewdog, which runs a lot of campaigns relating to climate change and reducing carbon emissions. They have recently announced that the business is carbon negative, removing twice as much carbon from the air as they emit. Their advertising campaigns do a fantastic job of raising awareness about the need to reduce carbon emissions, educating the public on why it’s important and what they’re doing to solve the problem.
Promotional materials
One of the more subtle ways of raising awareness is through promotional materials. Companies can acquire apparel and other promotional items to get their staff to wear – or to hand out to customers. As you can see on indigenouspromotions.com.au, a great example of this is companies raising awareness about specific groups. In this case, it’s the indigenous population of Australia, which is often marginalized and forgotten about. Companies can buy items that use colors and patterns relating to the population, drawing the eye of consumers and members of the public.
The idea is that people see the promotional items and it sparks questions about what they are. This then gives companies a chance to explain more about the causes they’re supporting, further raising awareness on the topic.
Specific products
Similarly, some companies will make and sell specific products designed around supporting causes. They can often come with a caveat that a percentage of sales from the product will go to a charity or organization that supports the issue.
Adidas is an example of this, releasing a collection in collaboration with Parley – an organization that’s all about cleaning up plastic waste from the world’s oceans. The collection features products made from recycled ocean plastics, and it helps to raise awareness about this particular issue.
Businesses have a massive influence over what the public does and thinks. It’s good to see more companies exercising this influence for the greater good, raising awareness over significant social issues. We’ve seen how they do this, and it works wonders in educating the masses.
