How deadly are stupid nonprofit ads?

How much can stupid ads hurt a nonprofit?

Plenty.

Consider the sad case of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), an organization with an innovative mission: to supply sturdy laptop computers to third-world students.

One marketing campaign by OLPC, Give One Get One, had the cool premise of allowing you to buy one of their laptops for yourself while providing one for a child. In 2007, the campaign sold 185,000 laptops and generated $37 million in revenue. Not bad for a new organization with an unfamiliar offer and marketing that relied largely on word-of-mouth.

In 2008, they hoped to do even better: With $12 million to $15 million in donated advertising, including TV, print, and billboards, and with Amazon.com to handle fulfillment. It seems they should have had a blockbuster on their hands.

They didn't.

The 2008 campaign numbers were 12,500 laptops and $2.5 million. Ouch! That's a 93% drop. It has forced the organization to lay off half its staff and drastically scale back its mission, as announced on the OLPC blog. (You can also read about it at The Boston Globe: Fund loss staggers group giving laptops to poor children.)

OLPC believes the drop was caused by increased competition from organizations with similar missions plus the economy.

Bosh. Virtually all fundraisers survive fierce and constant competition. And the recession hurts, but not that much.

I believe OLPC was shot down at least in part by Stupid Advertising.

The campaign featured a spot using a digitally recreated John Lennon as spokesman. It got a lot of press. Check it out:

(Or here on YouTube.

First, let me say that this Stupid Ad doesn't have the dumbfounding WTF? quality that defines most of the Stupid Nonprofit Ads I write about. And, I've gotta admit, John Lennon has to be the Coolest Spokesperson in the Universe.

Produced by award-winning creative boutique TAXI NY, the spot drops the ball in nearly every possible way, other than "coolness":

• The first 21 seconds (that's out of 30) have only abstract information -- neither the audio nor the visual bring you one step closer to understanding the need or even grasping what the spot is about. That's 70% of its meager time wasted.
• There's no call to action. Barely even a suggestion of what they want people to do.
• The URL is on screen for just four seconds. Try writing it down that quickly. Really.
• There's no urgency, no specificity, no deadline -- every single element of successful response marketing is omitted.

The smallest, most unsophisticated hayseed direct marketer from any benighted flyover exurb wouldn't have made those mistakes. The 93% drop isn't so surprising. For comparison, see the ad from the 2007 campaign:

(Or here on YouTube.)

Not the greatest spot ever (unless Hurricane Katrina just hit, motivating response with a 30-second spot is a very tall order), but it has many of the response basics. So it got responses.

My advice to OLPC (and any other nonprofit):

• If an award-winning ad agency approaches you offering to do award-winning work for you, run as fast as you can the other way. Even if they offer to work for free. Change your phone number. Go into hiding. Don't let them crush your cause with their Stupid Ads.
• Start talking to an agency that practices disciplined, knowledge-based direct-response fundraising -- *cough* *Merkle* *cough* -- and get some work done that will move you forward in measureable, meaningful ways.

There's another lesson in this debacle, and we'll look at that tomorrow.

Thanks to Otis Regrets for the tip.

Technorati Tags: fundraising, advertising

Comments

[Rob]

This is what happens when a decision is made to employ a 'proper' marketing agency - which is Board member code for 'someone who only does commercial work and doesn't know a thing about fundraising'. It happens. Again and again, it happens. And the biggest not-for-profits can be relied on to make the mistake even more readily than the smaller agencies - their Board members are more confident, so they act sooner. Eventually, in the classic scenario, their fundraising staff give up hope leave and go to work for a commercial marketing company. Then, the last man out turns off the lights.