Written by Ally Lang, Head of Maple Street Creative
In the days when I worked as a Radio Producer at the BBC, I would often use an analogy for those producers who weren’t interested in communicating with the audience. I would suggest to them that they were like fishermen, who instead of employing a rod and some bait, would simply pop an empty bucket on the side of the river bank and say, ‘Ok fish, jump in there’. This same philosophy also applies to brands and the ways in which they keep the lights on during these times. Some will have to create new narratives, as has been previously mentioned in these pages. Others though, like charities, will have to illuminate their homes like never before.
The Problem: Trust
I’ve never worked in the Charity Sector, but I imagine those who do will already be aware of the declining trust younger people have in others, with a Public Health England report last year finding that only 56% of Millennials would believe something they were told on the street. This compared to 77% of Baby Boomers. Whether trust comes with age might be a thought to consider but when we recollect news stories relating to misuse of data, rigged interest rates, and emissions scandals it’s no wonder cynicism is high. And if you’re someone who struggles to come to terms with the popularity of Greta Thunberg then here’s a stat for you; over the last decade, oil spills have come at an average of around seven a year: that’s one every six weeks. All this sounds like doom and gloom I know, but we haven’t even revealed the most frightening part of it yet.
According to the Charities Aid Foundation, those Millennials born between 86’ and 94’ make up the smallest proportion of age demographics that donate to charities, with only 25% of them globally choosing to do so. What’s key for the sector is the way that figure jumps to 31% as those in the generation of 15-29 year olds pass to the next phase of their lives, but if the lack of trust stays with Millennials, then who knows what that shortfall might be?
And in the UK, where the percentage of the age group that donates is higher, we should also note that the spikes through generations are higher also, thereby making the potential losses greater. So, what can charities do to sail through this almost perfect storm? Trust is a vital determining factor when giving money to charity, but so is how close a person feels to the cause, and that doesn’t have to be an element over which one can have little or no influence, provided the messaging is communicated in the right way.
The Solution: Engagement
Writing in the annual report of 2019, Comic Relief Chair, Tim Davie acknowledged four years of hugely declining totals with the summation that TV channels could no longer empower their campaigns against the changing tides of media consumption. To those on the front line a phrase containing the words bolted and horse probably sprang to mind. Images like those which Comic Relief became infamous for are no longer enough to secure the hard-earned cash of potential donors. The same must be said for a lot of the work done by charities in OOH, where bus stops host striking images of neglected children, lonely pensioners or sad looking cats. To change things once and for all charities are going to have to get out of those traditional mediums they so strongly favour.
In advertising spend, charities buck the overall averages by investing over 80% of their budget in Direct Mail and TV, and if you were to ask someone who’d spent over twenty-five years working in audio, I’d be bound to tell you that these are not the right channels for what you’re facing. If the issues that concern donors the most are trust and proximity, then the two things you need to do are i) engage and ii) tell them how your work makes a difference.
Option One: Dip Your Toe In
Take all the data from the IPA and Ofcom about how audiences trust audio.
Add to that your own experience of a radio ad. For convenience, here’s one we made earlier…
Then test the water. National radio campaigns can be available to charities for as little as £1000 with an auctioning system like the Radio Trading Desk. Even though the ROI of the medium might not be as high as Direct Mail has traditionally been, the outlay is minimal so making it a cost-effective and efficient medium to explore.
Option Two: Wade Out
Add to what you’ve recognised about the power of audio and apply to the long-form format of a podcast, where stories can be told and where the engagement factor is so high that 12% of those who listen to them, say they’ve bought a product after hearing about it on a podcast.
Now multiply that by the enormous gains we’re seeing in podcast listening during this period. In the first weekend of lockdown one podcast platform alone, reported a spike of 750,000, and the UK market is currently growing by 5% every week.
What you have equals the one thing that charities cannot ignore right now: the need to create original content.
Your charity can get in to bed with a podcaster and have them create something for you. Feel-good broadcasting is what’s seeing the biggest gains right now and by your charity not only standing for something positive, but also enabling that positivity to be out there, you’ll transcend your core audience and reach the parts of society that other charities cannot reach. You’ll drink to that I bet. And by the way, take a look if your competitors are out there doing it yet, because they’re not.
Option Three: Dive In
Alternatively, you could make your own charity podcast, where you create your own editorial content.
Then you put it on mobile platforms (usage up 20% in the States) and you put it on Smart Speakers (UK now third in the world for Smart Speaker ownership) and you augment your brand experience by sharing your achievements and enriching the lives of others and engaging and engaging and engaging.
What did charities do when shopping spread from High Street to online? They created digital platforms and moved to the space that consumers occupied. The very same methodology should have them beating down doors to speak to new audiences in an engaging and authentic voice.
The Conclusion: Go Audio
How charities will fare in the near future might be anyone’s guess, but it isn’t entirely out of their own hands. An Oxfam report last week suggested that the Coronavirus could result in up to a billion people being driven below the poverty threshold of earning £4.40 a day. And before you think, ‘Well I’m sure that goes a long way in the Solomon Islands…’ note that this figure includes thirty-million people in Europe and Central Asia.
We already came into this pandemic with 1.6 million people in the UK relying on Food Banks three days a week, and with a recession on the horizon we have to have the courage to understand that if ever a modern world needed charitable convictions it’s now. So stand-up and tell people about how your charity changes things. Let your future donors understand how their money will make a difference. Embrace the past, present and future of audio and get out there and make some noise.
