We’re approaching Labor Day Weekend. The Labor Day holiday is more than just the signal to the end of summer and a relaxing three-day weekend. The Labor Day Holiday, the first Monday in September, is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. You may be familiar Goodwill as a place to shop, but the nonprofit does much more including helping people find jobs. In honor of Labor Day, Goodwill launches the #LaborofLove Campaign this week. I interviewed Beth Perell, VP of Communications and Information Management to learn more about the campaign strategy and goals.
1. Many of us know about Goodwill as a place to donate goods or shop, can you give us an overview of your other programs and services?
Goodwill’s mission is to help people find jobs, earn paychecks and care for their families. When people donate to or shop at Goodwill’s more than 3,200 stores, they help provide job placement and training programs that support people facing challenges to employment, including veterans and military families, people with disabilities, youth, older workers and many others. These Goodwill services include career counseling, computer training, English as a second language courses, resume or interview preparation, mentoring, transportation, child care and more. We also train people to work in a variety of fields such as automotive services, construction, health care, information technology, manufacturing, hospitality and retail.
There are 164 local and independent Goodwill nonprofit organizations in the United States and Canada. Last year, Goodwill placed 312,000 people in employment in the United States and Canada. Nearly two million people worked to build their career and financial assets by engaging with Goodwill team members. In addition, more than 35 million people used computers and mobile devices to access Goodwill education, training, mentoring and online learning services to strengthen their skills.
2. What is the #LaborofLove Campaign?
The #LaborOfLove Campaign urges people across the nation to pledge to spread awareness about Goodwill and the importance of job placement and training programs. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national unemployment rate was at 4.9 percent in July. Every day, Goodwill helps more people enter the workforce. This Labor Day, as our nation honors America’s workers, Goodwill is challenging everyone to take the #LaborOfLove pledge to support Goodwill in helping Americans get the job training that will prepare them for employment in industries like automotive services, construction, health care, information technology, manufacturing, hospitality and retail. Visit http://bit.ly/LaborOfLove2016 and learn more about Goodwill and how individuals can support Goodwill’s efforts to put people to work.
3. What are your campaign goals?
Goodwill is encouraging people to sign the #LaborOfLove pledge to spread awareness about Goodwill and the importance of job placement and training programs. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 5.6 million job openings on the last business day of June this year.
We also hope to:
Raise visibility of Goodwill programs and services.
Draw attention to innovative programs that Goodwill provides to help individuals secure employment.
Drive awareness of the impact of donations to Goodwill, shopping at Goodwill, and volunteering/mentoring at Goodwill.
Emphasize how donations create jobs and transform lives.
4. Who is the audience?
Our target audience includes people interested in doing social good and helping people in their communities between the ages 18 to 35, the media, general public and donors.
5. What are the highlights of your digital strategy? How are you using both social media and mobile as part of this campaign?
We will use both Twitter and Facebook to promote the campaign and encourage people to take the pledge.
Our CEO, Jim Gibbons, will write a blog post for the Huffington Post, which has more than 38 million unique visitors.
We are also asking our local Goodwill organizations and their teams to promote the campaign and amplify the message on their social channels with their program participants, their partners and community partners. We are creating materials like a news release, social media graphics and social media messages for their use.
We plan to engage our external spokespersons and influencers, people we know are passionate about Goodwill’s mission of helping people find jobs. These influencers will promote the campaign with their social networks and contacts as well.
6. Given that Goodwill has store locations, are you doing a Pokemon Go tie-ins or other location based marketing strategies?
At this time, we are not integrating any location-based mobile strategies at store locations. We are engaging our 158 local Goodwill organizations in the United States and primarily promoting it on social media
There are some Goodwill organizations leveraging the success of Pokemon Go to drive foot traffic to Goodwill stores. However, it is not a tactic for the #LaborOfLove campaign.
7. What are your top tips for other nonprofit marketers to ensure the success of a digital campaign?
We have clear objectives and plan our strategy around our goals.
The messaging of our #LaborOfLove campaign has a more personal tone. It is important that people can connect with Goodwill’s mission in order to support the cause.
We make sure our local Goodwill organizations have the support and materials they need from us to make sharing the campaign easy to execute on their local social media channels.
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