We create ads for other organizations all the time. It’s when we are asked to advertise ourselves that the struggle begins. The issue isn’t with our talent. The issue is with our brand. What to do when your brand was designed to be invisible?
“This is a friendly reminder that your Champions for Children program ad is due on or before June 1… PROMOTE YOURSELF FOR ONCE!” (5/25/18 – 5:47pm)
And…
“We’ll need that half-page ad right away on Monday – WHICH I HOPE WILL SHAMELESSLY PROMOTE THE M NETWORK. Tie Thom up in a closet so Gary can produce the ad.” (8/12/17 – 8:23am)
These are real quotes from actual emails. They are representative of what we get every year ahead of The Children’s Trust, Champions for Children event.
The event celebrates and honors the people in our community who have dedicated themselves to improving the lives of children and families. We love this event. We love what it stands for. We love the people that it honors. We love The Children’s Trust, the organization that puts on this event. In fact, we love “Champions” so much that we sponsor it. It’s one of only a handful of events for which we do this. Our sponsorship is just one small way of investing in a cause we believe in and an organization to which we are both grateful and loyal.
As part of our sponsorship, however, we are given an ad in the event program, logo expos
ure throughout the event, and VIP tickets, allowing us to network with the other VIPs.
All of that is great!
There’s only one problem. Take a good, long look at our logo.
The M with the missing leg. That M is…well… it’s broken. It shouldn’t be able to stand. When you look at the shadow, though, you realize that there is something invisible that actually completes the M. There’s something unseen holding it up. You might not be able to see exactly what that is, but the effect is clear.
That logo is important to everyone who works here because of what it means. We see ourselves, as individuals, in it. Each of us are broken, unable to stand on our own, yet there is something unseen holding us up. It might be invisible, but the effects should be clear.
More importantly, the logo reminds us of what we want to be as an organization. We want to be part of that invisible something that helps support others, helping them to stand and to stand out. We want to be invisible to others, but provide real impact.
Do you see the conundrum?
It’s tough to be part of an invisible yet noble support structure if we’re taking out ads or running around town pressing flesh and saying, “Hey, look at us!”
More than cognitive dissonance, it’s also counterproductive.
Our job is to make our clients look good. And when they do look good (and they often look fantastic 🙂 ), it’s our job to make sure that they get the credit, not us.
It’s like that old saying in the TV and film industry: “Never show the edge of the set.”
The reason is because if the audience sees the edge of the set it ruins the illusion of the show. It lets them know, “This isn’t real.” As the agency that creates the words, the visuals, the packaging and, at times, the overall narrative for other organizations, we risk diminishing the impact of the work we do for our clients should their audiences credit those words, visuals, packaging and narratives to us.
This is part of a significantly larger series of branding question that we believe all organizations should be asking daily.
When and where should we be seen? When and where should we not be seen?
For The M Network, these questions not only apply to where we “advertise” they also inform what types of clients we accept… and which we don’t. They provide guidance as to where we take our clients, what organizations we support, what companies we partner with, and a litany of other decisions.
Is it “in brand” for us to work with alcohol products or distributors?
As individuals, many of our team members have no problem with pouring a glass of wine or the occasional tumbler of bourbon after a long week. More than the product, we know how these products are marketed and to whom that marketing focuses. Are these brands to which our company should be to be tied? What would that say about us? What would that say about our other clients?
Because of our work with groups that help children and families, as well as our work with health organizations focused on breaking addictive and/or unhealthy habits, we decided the answer, specifically in relationship to liquor companies, was, “no.” The actual and perceived conflicts simply aren’t worth the potential profits.
When a large corporation that produces medical marijuana approached us, we applied this same thinking. We felt that while beneficial to many, the policies surrounding medical marijuana, at this time, are so loose and so controversial that the line between use and abuse – of both the product and the intent of the law — was just too gray. Why risk a potential controversy? Why chance the perception?
Are we hypocrites because we work with large pharmaceutical companies?
Are we blurring the lines because we work with resorts and restaurants that serve alcohol?
Truthfully, we struggle with all of this. We sweat about it, from the big to the small and everything in between. We don’t just sweat about it for our brand. We sweat about it for our clients’ brands as well.
And that brings us back to our ad in this year’s Champions for Children brochure.
We love The Children’s Trust. We admire the Champions. Each year, though, we are conflicted about what to put in the ad space given to us because of our sponsorship.
How do we use it wisely?
How do we support our client, The Children’s Trust, and honor the Champions who are so deserving of our respect and admiration?
How do we keep the focus of the event on them and not on us?
How do we do all of that while, at the same time, honoring our clients’ repeated request of us to “promote yourself for once.”
We don’t know.
Hopefully, sometime after the event, after being amazed by the stories of this year’s Champions, and after appreciating the valuable work of The Children’s Trust, you remembered that oddly sparse ad in the program and found yourself here.
