Association executives are asking me how I like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and why I think it is so successful. $100M in less than a month. We all love to be the armchair quarterback, so I’ll answer here in hopes you will discuss at your next staff or committee meeting!
A day doesn’t pass that I don’t ask an association executive to answer the four questions below when making a marketing and communications decision. I think it works for a piece of writing as well as a campaign or event. I’ll answer the questions for the Ice Bucket Challenge this time:
Q: What’s the goal?
A: To help reach a fundraising goal
Q: Who’s the primary audience?
A: (Probably) young people (educated about ALS and not)
Q: What’s in it for them?
A: Being crazy and fun AND a way to be part of a movement
Q. What do you want them to do?
A: Donate $100 – and pass on the challenge to people they know…
The bucket challenge works for five key reasons:
1. It’s easy
2. It’s repeatable
3. Real people promote it (not the association)
4. It’s zany and fun instead of boring and dull
5. People want to be part of something.
I recently took the ice bucket challenge with my husband Dan Sight. We have met and heard of so many people touched by this disease. This awareness helps strengthen our connections with them. We did the challenge in memory of my father. He passed away 20 years ago from ALS.
We took the challenge from John Sweeney, but it means more than this. It’s a way to be part of a movement for hope, for people coming together for something good, and for a better future.
What could be a better benefit than to feel good and do good at the same time? What a masterful way to connect.
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