Today’s organisations both in government, private and not for profit, strive to show how the marketing profession can be used as a force for good in the world. Social marketing has its roots in the public health communication for behavior change in the 1960’s. The art has evolved considerably, and now embraces a position in strategic marketing planning, execution, monitoring and evaluation, sustainability for effective behavior change.

Social marketing, as is broadly defined, is the application of business marketing practices and other techniques for social good. This includes initiatives in prevention of environmental degradation projects, reducing crime, promoting the benefits of exercise and responsible citizenry, education, health and sanitation, cultural heritage as examples of social marketing that have been undertaken with notable success in recent years.

Over the years’, marketers are known for researching what customers want, providing offers through innovation and new product design, communicating the offerings in ways that turn interest into actions and ensuring satisfaction and repeat business. This are the key elements of marketing that marketers are good at, and are continually honed to realize the art of the marketing concept.

Social marketing is a phenomenon that offers marketers opportunities to use their talents for positive change in their operational environment. This provides a platform to which marketers provide room for a more favorable attitude towards the profession, while on the other hand providing recognition to the importance the marketing profession can play in making the world a better place.

Social marketers often work with those whose behavior is the hardest of all to change, communities that are disadvantaged, hard to reach or socially excluded, and whose social, cultural and peer pressures create enormous barriers and resistance to change. Social marketers here understand customer psychology and motivations in ways that marketers do not always implement.

Generally, marketing is about changing behavior and acting as an engine that drives successful competitive advantage, developing a strong brand, building a relationship with customers and running a profitable and not for profit organisations. In doing these, marketing organisations potent success in the coming years as they get involved on creating impact by either public or private entities. Social marketing is destined at influencing marketing campaigns, designs to promote positive community change.

As the marketing profession move to position of influence in the society, it makes sense for governments to explore, learn from, and blend these approaches into their own in dealing with the ever rising challenges of governance, alcoholism, leadership and integrity among many more. Increasing awareness of social marketing principles will continue to shows and prove that marketing profession can lead positive social change as well as economic successes.

In today’s continued social change, governments need to take notice of social marketing, because of the way social policy is increasingly seeking the skills. The Kenya Government, for example, can now appreciate more than ever before that passing legislation does not in itself necessarily lead to changes in people’s behavior. This has been attested in the recent changes in the Kenya’s constitution 2010 and the constitutional offices created to the resultant outcomes to the desired.

This brings out the need to discovering and understanding the barriers to change, thinking carefully about how those barriers could be overcome, and asking the right questions of the target audiences. The result is likely to be a win-win situation for government, company, customer and the environment in differentiating the organisation, prudent use of resources and improving lifestyles for the targeted audiences and their action to the ultimate desired change. This deep connection with peoples’ values, and helping them change habits through innovation, builds the brand and helps retain and build desired behavior.

The government at both county and national levels, need to take cognizance of the wider cultural implications involved in addressing general social challenges at their behest; the issue is not just about ticking the box and closing time, but the ingrained culture of creating understanding and dealing with the predetermined social causes. As an example, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission, National Cohesion and Integration Commission, Independent Policing Oversight Authority, The Kenya Police Service among other agencies in Kenya, are grappling with varied strategies in tackling challenges within areas of their mandate.

To successfully achieve social behavior change, it is my call for a more in-depth strategic approach. This can be attained by the Governments beginning to recognize the potential of social marketing to influence public behavior, and applying the same to public policy. Public policy has not previously taken much notice of what’s known to marketing organisations. For the case of Kenya, we now need to ask ourselves critical questions on how marketing agencies in government would seal this gap.

As we drive the wave of change in our environment, these social challenges are important to note, because no longer is it acceptable for organisations to assert their position in business and leave it to governments to legislate on the societal consequences of a market-based economy. Whatever is important to society is equally important to organisations and the responsible player, who wants to differentiate their products, service and advance their prospects, understands their importance and relevance.

Timothy Owase is a Chartered Marketer and Communications  professional and a Creative Industries practitioner. Can be reached at timothy.owase@live.com 

In today’s business environment, engaging our diverse stakeholders in long-term dialogue is an important ingredient that informs our decision making, helps us progressively improve towards organisations sustainability commitments. In a world of business focused on 24/7 turnaround, technological integration, varying customer’s needs, regulatory environments, media and demand for profits and customer satisfaction.

In an environment where trust is hard-earned and a company’s reputation is in the hands of its stakeholders. Business proprietors require a deliberate stakeholder engagement strategy.  This is vital to a business, as it is no longer optional for businesses who wish to stay relevant in business. Organisations that ignore this, will in the foreseeable future find themselves dealing with different business realities.

A today’s stakeholder is more sophisticated, informed and engaged, collaborative, aware of governance and decision-making among stakeholder networks, and their expectations is that organisations aptly upright and  have the competence to instantly respond to any of their concerns. Businesses engage with many stakeholder groups in a variety of formal and informal settings across their entire business environment. The engagements may range from meetings with local, regional and national groups to dialogues with suppliers and customers.

There is always a need for organisations to actively get involved in multi-stakeholder initiatives, so that they can address pressing business environmental challenges. This can be proactively achieved by working together with external stakeholder partners, being able to identify and address issues by bringing together the expertise, knowledge and passion of organizations and individuals.

Engaging stakeholder’s is an important management function, particularly in relation to leading an organisation. In today’s modern business, you cannot run any business without engaging with your key stakeholders and there’s no doubt you already interact with them on a frequent, if not daily basis.  Stakeholder engagement goes beyond the interaction and in this context is about far more than dealing with them at the day to day level. It is a strategic decision and refers to truly putting stakeholders at the heart of your business and ensuring that everything you do across the business is designed to meet and exceed their needs and expectations.

Most organisations consider stakeholder engagement as a secondary function or even as a non-essential activity to the business vision. Programs in this line are today meant and designed to a tick the box approach with an aim of evidencing signed contracts. Stakeholder engagement should be at the heart of your strategic management processes and as an underlying principle in stakeholder engagement strategy.

It is essential that your organisation is genuinely interested in listening to stakeholder’s concerns and addressing their needs as part of the organizational decision-making processes. Some organisations undertake stakeholder engagement just because it is seen to be a fashionable thing to do and without any meaning to it, thus only racing to participating in a box ticking exercise.

What is evident is that stakeholders see through this while for leaders and managers who don’t approach stakeholder engagement in a genuine and meaningful way also do themselves and the business more harm than good.

As business leaders, aspiring owners, managers and employees, true stakeholder engagement has to mean more than daily transactions to developing meaningful relationships which serve to ensure that you understand and consistently deliver upon stakeholder’s needs and expectations.

For a long- term business relationships, consider thought leaders and influences from government, civil society, and the private sector, as they play an important role in creating and maintaining business value. This calls for organisation whether big or small to evolves and take a strategic and structured approach to stakeholder relations.

We have had insights as to why the stakeholders are a critical element of a business. Who are these stakeholders? And why are they important? Stakeholders vary from organisation to the other and include sponsors or investors, customers, employees, community, government, suppliers, shareholders among others.  

Investors or sponsors naturally want to protect their investment, and get the highest returns possible, so they generally view the business from that limited perspective. Thus it is essential to understand them in that context and create an understanding for business continuity. As a means, enable Annual General Meetings, quarterly roadshows and results briefings, webcasts, ongoing dialogue with analysts and investors.

A customer sustains and grows the business. It is common for businesses to interact with their customers on a regular basis and there is no doubt, no manager can survive for very long in a business environment without doing so. However, the real consideration here is how meaningful those relationships are in terms of really understanding their needs and continuously developing and enhancing service offering in response.

Introduce customer hotlines, local websites, plant tours, research, surveys, focus groups, feedback mechanisms among others like regular visits, dedicated account teams, joint business planning, joint value creation initiatives, customer care centers, social media engagement, surveys etc.

Employees play a critical role in your business. We already know that employee engagement is a vital success factor for business and organisations with no doubt have a variety of ways in which they interact with them. The key issue here is the quality of those interactions; for example, employees in many businesses complain that there are too many meetings which are unproductive so you should reflect upon the quality of your interactions, and not just the quantity. Is there value emanating from employee interactions? Consider; engagement surveys, senior executive business updates, town hall meetings, employee communications, individual development plans, health and safety communications programs, community and employee well-being projects, Ethics hotline;

Community depending upon the location of the business in question, the local communities have a greater or lesser impact on how you run it – if you are located in a small rural area they will probably have more influence on the decision you take than if you are based in a large city.

Regardless of location, most businesses seek to work closely with the local community and this can form part of wider corporate social responsibility efforts. Consider community meetings, plant visits, partnerships on common issues, sponsorship, lectures at universities among others.

The relationship between businesses and their suppliers has been somewhat at “arm’s length”, and in the past there has often been a general feeling of mistrust within the relationship. The expectation is that the supplier’s aim to maximize profits at the expense of service standards and quality, with the purchaser challenging the supplier on quality, weight and price and always threatening to take their business elsewhere.

Businesses must establish how to well manage the relationship and clear any possible suspicions. Create joint value creation initiatives, annual supplier conference, sustainable sourcing, supplier guiding principles, and packaging associations, branding among others as members of family.

Lastly, often the government is overlooked as a stakeholder in a business, but as you are well aware the national government or local government can directly impact on how you operate your business without you having too much to say in the matter.

In terms of the engagement issue, we must focus on the arms of government and those agencies that directly support the industry you operate in. Create dialogue, partnerships on common issues, and memberships of business and industry associations, foreign investment advisory councils, recycling and recovery initiatives, chambers of commerce among others.

As I conclude on this topic for now, businesses need to be committed to an ongoing stakeholder engagement as a core component of business and sustainability strategies by actively working as members of the communities where we live and work, and strengthen the fabric of our communities so that we prosper together.

Timothy Owase is a Marketing and Communications  professional and a Creative Industries practitioner. Can be reached at timothy.owase@live.com 

This week, Daystar University hosted its annual film week. Over the years I have participated at various film festivals and this one was not different. The Daystar film week reminded me reminds me of the numerous film festivals over the years across the world.

So, why film festivals? I learned through experience on the benefits of such an event and as to why it has to be shared for understanding among key stakeholders. It is necessary to highlight the advantages so people in my country, and others, can understand what the big deal is with festivals.

With so many film festivals in existence across the world and more coming online daily, how do you as a filmmaker decide where to spend you energy?  Is it worth to submit your film to an unknown festival?  This can only be concluded that, it varies depending on who you are and how you participate, your project or audience.

To the filmmakers, festivals present a significant way to market their film, project concept, seek financing, and create networks at a reasonable and viable position. There are no doubt festivals present opportunities to network within the industry, get feedback from your target audiences, film critics to shaping your project direction and enhance film business relationships.

As we reflect about this topic, it is worthy to note, festivals offer room to share professional tips and information on topics from technical aspects of filming, collaborations are born and developed into co production relationships, enables film festival directors to collect films from far and wide and bring audiences together for a common agenda.

To underscore the significance festivals in the industry, we’ll focus on the benefits to the filmmakers. This relates to their work and story.  While on the other hand, goes to benefit the audience who support the work of audiovisual artists. It is therefore worth to note, festivals offer a two-way traffic, and the filmmakers need the audience while the audience needs the filmmakers.

Let us now unpack why festivals are important.

Marketing talent: – The best way for filmmaker to get his or her name out there is to submit a film and gain acceptance into film festivals. Whether the film passes muster or not with the audience, the filmmakers get recognition simply for completing a work and getting it screened. Festivals provide skilled professionals to showcase their talent and win over their audiences.

Promoting local content: Festivals give preference to filmmakers local to the jurisdiction when selecting films to screen. This encourages and supports the local filmmakers and gives them a platform from which they can leap to the next level. This helps in bolstering film sales from the audience of crew members, actors, friends and family who don’t have to travel far to support the film.

Relationships building through Networking: These festivals give filmmakers a chance to interact with fellow filmmakers, supporters, media and other stakeholders. I have personally made important contacts and friends from networking at festivals. It establishes mutually beneficial relationships and leads to many collaborative possibilities.

Promotions of tourism: Film festivals attract tourists from both in and out of the country. A filmmaker will usually travel across the country to attend and promote a screening of their film. It also attracts media and film fans who, on return home to talk about the festival and the city hosting it.

The Interests of locals Community:  Most film festivals favor a niche and will include films based in the region or focus upon a subject many locals will find relevant to their culture and interests. This helps bring particular fans to the festivals based on its niche.

Local Cinema:  As much as the connection between the festival promotors and the cinema halls hosting the festival may vary, the theater enjoys fringe benefits such as a potential boost in concession sales and positive word of mouth.

Community Collaboration: Festivals bring communities together and foster an atmosphere of town pride and friendship among the participants. This is enables networking in which friendships are formed and new creative/business opportunities established.

Recognition: Awards benefit the promotion of the festival as well as the filmmakers. No matter the size of a festival. The filmmakers can add “Award-winning Filmmaker” to their resume and the festival can claim their first award and first big break in the industry.

Education to participants: One benefit many do not realize about film festivals is the educational opportunities it presents. Most festivals hold workshops facilitated by respected film professionals in all fields. Festivals hold special screenings and programs for children teaching them about a specific aspect of filmmaking, particular social issues, economic or art.

Filmmakers bring life, culture, and art to the eager eyes of their audiences, and as the audience we have a very important job, enjoy and learn. The audience, in fact is the most important element, especially for any film. Film festivals bring out the best aspects about film and breaks boundaries. A film festival takes a lot of work, but the outcome is not only beautiful, but groundbreaking for the audience, upcoming and mature film professionals.

Timothy Owase is a film industry professional and a Chartered Marketer. Can be reached at: timothy.owase@live.com