Spending money on brands with purpose is more important to consumers than ever. The audiences we speak to want to hear about ethics. They want to hear about what a company is doing to make the world a better place, as well as make a profit. With social media, public opinion about a brand can turn in an instant – and 58% of the 16-24 youth audience say a sense of ethics is vitally important to their buying choices.
‘Purpose’ is a world that floats around a lot in marketing spheres these days – to us, it’s pretty simple. We work face-to-face, and we want to supply our agents with a genuine sense of purpose in what they’re selling – transferring from the brand we’re representing, through to the customer they’re talking to.
It takes a certain level of openness and curiosity from our agents to make this happen. When we start representing a new client, we spend a lot of time in their service centres – finding out how the business or charity operates, who they help, and gather real stories and impressions we can share authentically with our audiences. We want to get a real sense of who we’re working with, and what they’re all about. There’s no better way to do that than experiencing their frontline.
The best marketing comes from a place of real passion and authenticity. Audiences can feel your connection to your cause, whatever marketing medium you’re working with. That sense of connection and integrity is particularly powerful when our agents are operating face-to-face. It’s about allowing our team the opportunity to feel it, get passionate about it, get excited about it – and get out there and talk about it.
With our GIG Fundraising work, we’re also educating audiences on a regular basis about the purpose of the charities we represent. In fact, this is one of the main things that seems to motivate and excite our team. It’s the opportunity to become incredibly well informed about big, globally important topics, and make an impact by talking about them with members of the public.
There’s a big focus in our work environment and company structure on self development – it’s one of our major criteria for recruitment. Through various programs, training packages and funding streams we can support a real pathway for self improvement, if it’s something our applicants are truly ready for and determined to achieve. As our team members grow as individuals, they tend to become more aware of their own personal sense of purpose. We make it a priority to assign agents to the projects and clients that they feel aligned with. When a sense of personal purpose aligns with a business purpose, there’s a huge opportunity for a level of creativity and professional development that can not only change lives, but also seriously boost our ability to get results for that client.
Many brands are clambering over themselves to demonstrate their authenticity and a newly acquired ‘brand purpose’ in order to court the younger markets. However the emotional transfer we specialise in – from brand to agent to customer – is made possible when that purpose is integrated into every level of the business.
We stand for a kind of face-to-face marketing that is built around integrity – we benefit when our agents get to represent brands and charities they believe in. The beautiful thing about the rise of purpose as a real priority for audiences is that it supports authentic, purpose-led brands to thrive, and take back space in the market from businesses that have not or don’t want to evolve.
There are so many organisations out there now creating products that are designed with a better world in mind, and organising their business models around treating employees fairly. We’re also thrilled to represent several exceptional charities fundraising to tackle some of the most pressing issues of our time. Representing companies with purpose makes face-to-face marketing a real joy, and also an incredibly effective way to spread a message.