The £8 million approach

At the last count, the #nomakeupselfie trend had raised £8 million for Cancer Research UK’s lifesaving research. Whatever you think it says about us as a society, no one can deny that it’s had a fantastic outcome.  

Although CRUK will be the first to admit that they didn’t start the trend, they did react quickly to take advantage of it by posting the picture below.

Posting this picture wasn’t costly, difficult or time consuming. But it was still something most organisations aren’t set up to do or are too risk adverse to try. And it does represent a relatively new opportunity in the way brands can market themselves compared to even five years ago.

Planning and reacting

In a world where brands can speak directly to their audience and use their own channels as effectively as traditional media, marketing and communication experts are going to be looked at to spot and take advantage of news, events and trends, pretty much instantaneously.

For the best marketers and communicators, it’s not just about well planned campaigns any more – it’s about looking for and taking advantage of new opportunities every day.

This isn’t easy. The bigger the organisation, the more levels of sign-off there are and the greater concern there is about damaging your reputation. Looking at social media or catching-up on the day’s news is also a luxury rather than necessity for many people.

But the organisations that are able to react immediately and often on topics that are sensitive or controversial, will be the ones that benefit most from this sort of approach.

PaddyPower is a rather different example of a brand that is reacting to everyday events in everything from its social media posts to ATL advertising. By making its ads not what you would call ‘politically correct’ only seeks to make them more sharable and reinforce its reputation as a fun, edgy brand. They’re like your mate in the pub that makes the poor taste jokes.

Paddy Power is lucky that this approach sits so seamlessly with its brand. But far more organisations could learn from this bold, quick approach and judgment of what will work and what will be shared.

Investing time in this is difficult, because you don’t know when the benefits will be realised and there is bound to be a lot of failures. But as CRUK have shown, a well timed tweet can be just as effective as a multimillion pound marketing campaign.