Question

Q1. Identify a brand, company, or an organization (i.e., a non-profit) that has some content marketing elements within their owned channels of communication. Describe the brand, company, or organization, if it is not well known. To help identify a brand with some content marketing elements, you can search for some content marketing examples and then go to the owned channels where the content is published to see if this is of interest to you. Content marketing is very pervasive and can be on many organization's website and social media platforms.

Q2. What are some of the brand's/company's channels for their content marketing? Just mention some of the specific platforms, such as the organization's website, their Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter platforms, to give insight as to the breadth of their content marketing.

Q3. Focusing in on one or more channels just mentioned or focusing on one specific content marketing campaign that can be across their channels, what is the mission, objective, or goal of the content marketing you are focusing on in this discussion? (i.e., building/retaining trust, loyalty, educating, creating awareness, differentiating from other company's/brands, enhancing their brand image, showing leadership in their area of expertise)?

Q4. Describe who you think is/are the target audience(s) for this content marketing?

Q5. What are the key messaging and themes you see in the content marketing, that helps achieve the goal or objective of the content marketing? Describe what the content marketing is about.

Q6. What is your opinion about the effectiveness of this company's/brand's/organization content marketing? Give some specifics to indicate the effectiveness of the content marketing, key metrics, if possible.

Answer 1

Solution –

1. The best example of a non – profit organization that has excelled in content marketing is American Red Cross. The organization was founded in 1881 and works with the US federal to provide disaster relief services in a US and around the world. This organization also services the members of the US armed forces and their families. This organization has its dependency on the contributions it aggregates from around the world to keep its activities floating. The organization has been very agile in content marketing and runs many campaigns on the online platforms to spread awareness and also provide an opportunity to its members to connect.
2. The organization has its website, presence on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Flickr.
3. The current campaign to donate blood ‘Bleed for the Throne’ is a campaign to garner blood donation and this campaign is in association with HBO’s Game of Thrones. A lot of stories are being posted on Facebook of people who scheduled their appointment to donate blood under this campaign and also enrolled themselves to win a throne poster. The Instagram is supporting posts from people and their experience on blood donation. The objective of this campaign is to create awareness among people for blood donation and also providing them with a feeling of trust that the donated blood will be going in for the right cause.
4. The target audience of this campaign is the young generation who are fit and agile and have interest in the Game of Thrones as this campaign is running in association with this HBO Series. Now this series is being preferred mostly by the young workforce and hence this campaign is becoming popular with the young generation and till now some 20000 people have registered for this campaign in US.
5. The key messages and themes of the content marketing is to be recognizable with the masses. The best way to achieve this is to relate your campaign with individual trustworthy and powerful stories of the individuals so that all the others who read it are motivated to join the campaign. The other aspect of content marketing is to have more quality over quantity and have matching visual content. Content marketing is not just about giving a message but also about connecting the users and building a strong wave of promotion which can continue for some sustainable time and the brand image of the company can reach to more people.
6. The effectiveness of the American Red Cross content marketing strategy is driven on the following points –

• Personal Message – Each of its campaign is directly related to personal individual impact and allows users to share their sentiments towards a cause or an issue for instance – ‘Volunteer to Sound The Alarm’ and ‘Bleed for the Throne’
• Motivating Stories – Each campaign is backed by individual strong stories.
• The Brand Behind – American Red Cross has established itself as a trusted brand in social welfare and hence people who associate with it feel proud of their contributions.
• The Content is personal but the causes supported are universal – The idea behind any content marketing is to promote a universally acceptable cause and bring as many people as possible under the umbrella of the brand. Each of the campaigns of this organization is based on these similar lines.
• Quality – All campaigns are governed with quality that is identifiable culturally with the associated cause. This helps people to instantly identify with the cause and connect.
• Visual Impact – All campaigns are backed by some realistic visual pictures and videos which presents a realistic image and promotes the idea.