Tuesday, November 12, 2024

News Feed Comments
You are here: Home / Choosing Lingerie

Giving Back Gets Personal

November 6, 2014 by  
Filed under Choosing Lingerie

Comments Off

The future of marketing is philanthropy and causes. As it has been for two decades. Ever since Evelyn Lauder unleashed the pink ribbon in 1992, marketers have executed a
“cause-marketing template” with a basic formula — big brands, big causes, big mass media campaigns, big results — that has remained relatively unchanged for 20-plus
years.

Until now.

Imagine instead: a woman sits on a subway tapping away on her iPhone 6 with the sudden, quick jabs of a mobile gamer. Unlike a typical
gamer who might hemorrhage money on Candy Crush, she is playing for free and the game is sending micro-donations to a breast cancer organization that she actively chose to fund. A lingerie retailer
provides the game, makes the donations and sends her offers just for playing, regardless of whether the woman buys a product. 

What if “giving back” becomes so
profitable that making the world a better place becomes common sense business strategy? What if consumers embrace and nourish new brands because they finally understand the “soul” of the
company and connect on an emotional level?

The fusion of mobility and giving is disrupting old models of cause marketing and making this future possible. People are using mobile
devices to vet non-profits on Charity Navigator, fund individual school projects on DonorsChoose.org and search for particular causes on GoFundMe. Giving is more personal, and, as the Ice Bucket
Challenge demonstrated, it works best when it is also social, viral and participatory.

With 9 in 10 global
consumers saying they will switch brands to one that supports a good cause, giving back is destined to become the heart marketing. However, cause marketing has to adapt to the new digital culture.
Consumers respect your brand for giving, but they want to participate, and they want choices.

So, I propose four new guidelines that can put all brands on the leading edge of cause
marketing:

1. Think Outside the Register: Don’t always tie donations to transactions 

Some of the most well-known cause-marketing campaigns tie
donations to transactions. For instance, every time you buy Ethos Water, Starbucks donates five cents to support water, sanitation and hygiene education programs in water-stressed countries. It works,
but don’t stop there. Cause marketing can be at least as valuable if your company links engagement to a donation. When you introduce “giving” to an earlier stage of the customer
journey, you build more trust because you give before you take. 

2. You’re Not the Boss of Me: Give consumers a choice instead of choosing for them

Typically, cause-marketing partnerships support a handful of charities, but the choices are made without consumer input. For example, the recent partnership between Toms and Target assigns
a set donation to each purchase item. But what if Target had instead let customers choose where donations go? Choice makes giving more active than passive, and it acknowledges that individuals care
more about certain causes than others. Depending on the size of your company, you can offer a mixture of local, national and global charities that allow customers to express themselves in the context
of charitable giving and your brand. 

3. Make It Habit-Forming: Ensure that giving back is fun, easy and routine

Create cause-marketing campaigns
around personal and habitual actions. Giving can be convenient. A free moment waiting on the bus or a five-minute break from work can be the context for doing good and interacting with your brand
simultaneously. We subconsciously check email, open apps and start playing games — giving can become part of our digital ritual, too. It can also become part of our daily commute if, for
instance, we drive a Prius instead of an SUV to work, knowing that we give back each day by reducing our carbon footprint. 

4. Commit to Getting Better at Doing Good: Place
data and measurement at the center

A strategy centered in mobility and engagement offers a wealth of behavioral data that has previously been unavailable in the field of cause
marketing and marketing in general. A data-driven approach helps both brands and cause organizations uncover synergies and optimize marketing partnerships to drive results for the cause, brand and
customers.

The bottom line is that consumers want to know what you stand for before they stand for you. There are more ways to invite people to participate in your social
mission — and the brands who are most effective will continue to rethink and advance traditional models of giving. Philanthropy is no longer an obligation; it is another frontier for
innovation.

Share and Enjoy

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Delicious
  • LinkedIn
  • StumbleUpon
  • Add to favorites
  • Email
  • RSS

Tags:

Texas Governor Election Results: Republican Greg Abbott Will Replace Rick Perry

November 6, 2014 by  
Filed under Choosing Lingerie

Comments Off

Texas voters took to the polls in Tuesday’s midterm elections, choosing Republican Greg Abbott as their next governor, according to the AP.

Wendy Davis, a Democratic state senator who shot to fame when she attempted to filibuster a controversial abortion bill in the Texas state Senate June 2013, faced Abbott, the Attorney General of the Lone Star State.

Both candidates nabbed major endorsements ahead of Election Day. Abbott received the backing of the National Rifle Association and the Dallas Morning News. Davis was endorsed by the Houston Chronicle, and received fundraising help from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and First Lady Michelle Obama during her campaign.

Polls showed Abbott leading the race in the weeks before Election Day.

Below, live updates on midterm news from around the nation:

The AP reported Wednesday:

WASHINGTON (AP) — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie says Republican victories in governor’s races across the country show voters want leaders who will “get things done,” rather that fighting over ideology.

Christie, chairman of the Republican Governors Association and a possible 2016 candidate for president, said he was gratified by GOP wins in Democratic-leaning states such as Maryland, Massachusetts and Illinois, as well as victories in key swing states like Florida, Michigan, Wisconsin and Ohio.

Christie said voters “elect and re-elect governors to get things done.”

Christie, who campaigned for GOP candidates across the country, said the winners deserve the credit, not him. He said elections are “always about the candidate.”

Christie spoke Wednesday on NBC’s “Today” show, ABC’s “Good Morning America” and Fox News Channel.

President Barack Obama will speak to the press Wednesday afternoon to address his party’s resounding loss in the 2014 midterm elections, according to White House press secretary Josh Earnest. He is expected to strike a tone of compromise and accountability following a Republican takeover of the U.S. Senate and many of the nation’s gubernatorial offices.

Obama tried reached out to Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who is widely expected to be the next senate majority leader and who also won re-election Tuesday night, and left a message, CNN reported.

The president’s press conference will take place at 2:50 p.m. Eastern time from the East Room of the White House.

Igor Bobic

In yet another major pushback against the war on drugs, Alaska legalized recreational marijuana on Tuesday, joining Oregon and Washington, D.C. — both of which legalized cannabis only hours before. Alaska becomes the fourth state in the U.S. to legalize retail marijuana, along with Oregon, Colorado and Washington state.

Voters approved Measure 2, which legalizes the possession, use and sale of recreational marijuana. Adults, age 21 and older, may possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana and grow up to six plants (with no more than three being mature) for personal use. The measure also legalizes the manufacture, sale and possession of marijuana paraphernalia, such as devices used for smoking or storing the plant.

“The folks trying to keep marijuana illegal are relying on the same scare tactics today that they have relied on for decades, but voters just aren’t falling for it anymore,” Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project, said in a statement early Wednesday morning. “The results are particularly encouraging since voter turnout during a midterm election is typically smaller, older, and more conservative. Clearly, support for ending marijuana prohibition spans the political and ideological spectrums.”

Read more here.

— Matt Ferner

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin took to Facebook last night to issue a hearty congratulations — and warning — to her GOP brethren:

Thank you, wise voters! Tonight is a big victory for We the People! Credit is due to the victorious candidates. Your message to President Obama is undeniably received, though he’ll try to ignore it.

…

The Democrats got mauled today, deservedly so. To prohibit that from happening to the GOP in 2016, it must learn the lesson from the last time Republicans held the Senate majority. This time they must not retreat, and it’s our responsibility to hold them accountable. Will they fight for reform that aligns with the limited government planks of the Republican platform, or will they return to the big government cronyism and status quo favored by the permanent political class? Will they drain the swamp or decide the D.C. cesspool is really just a jacuzzi they can’t wait to jump on into and shake us off?

If GOP leadership returns to business as usual, then this majority will be short lived, for We the People say, “once bitten, twice shy.”

Click here to read the full statement.

The Associated Press is projecting that Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) will win re-election as Alaska’s only member of Congress.

–Sam Levine

Voters in South Portland, Maine, the state’s fourth-largest city, approved a measure that removes all legal penalties for possession of up to one ounce of marijuana by adults.

Public consumption and display remain illegal. Maine’s largest city, Portland, legalized recreational marijuana last year.

A similar measure in Lewiston, the second-largest Maine city, failed Tuesday night.

– Matt Ferner

Business Insider’s Hunter Walker and Brett Logiurato report:

Democrats knew they were in trouble on election night Tuesday when a Virginia Senate seat that was expected to be a blowout victory began to come in much closer than expected.

“When you’re cheering for an eke-out win in Virginia, not going to be a good night,” one Democratic strategist told Business Insider.

Read more here.

CHICAGO — Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (D) addressed supporters late Tuesday night saying he was not ready to concede the election to challenger Bruce Rauner, despite the fact that the Associated Press and others have called the race for the Republican political newcomer.

“There are a lot of votes still to be counted,” Quinn told supporters. “I don’t believe in throwing in the towel when there are that many votes still to be counted.”

As of late Tuesday night, the splash page for the Quinn For Illinois campaign website said, “We’re still waiting for the final results to come in. Thanks for your support.”

quinn votes

Meanwhile, Rauner declared victory in a speech late Tuesday, promising a “new direction” for Illinois.

With 99 percent of precincts reporting by midnight Tuesday, only Quinn’s Chicago base of Cook County tipped in his favor; Rauner won the influential “collar counties” around Chicago and easily carried downstate counties as well.

Cook County, which encompasses Chicago, was the only county that hadn’t reported all its results at the time of Quinn’s announcement. Election issues rippled throughout Chicago since the polls opened at 6 a.m. on Tuesday.

Election officials alleged “dirty tricks” were afoot after “malicious” robocalls were sent to election judges as early as Friday. Chicago Board of Election Commissioners spokesman Jim Allen told the Sun-Times that the calls — which reportedly gave election judges false information about voting requirements and eligibility — prompted more than 2,000 no-shows on Election Day.

“You’re interfering with the orderly conduct of a federal election in our opinion,” Allen said.

Fire crews had to break down the door of one polling place located inside a restaurant after the owners failed to show up and open. The polling station was just one of several that stayed open beyond the regular poll closing to accommodate the late start.

Additionally, a new policy that allowed voters to simultaneously register and vote at a polling place contributed to the hundreds of voters still waiting in line when the polls closed at 7 p.m.

– Kim Bellware

HuffPost’s Samantha Lachman reports:

Republicans had been predicted to take control of the Senate Tuesday evening, but Democrats hoped to do better in gubernatorial races. That hope was more than disappointed, as even Democrats who had been expected to easily win in Democratic-leaning states were defeated.

In deep-blue Maryland, Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown conceded to Republican Larry Hogan. In Massachusetts, Attorney General Martha Coakley suffered a crushing loss. And in Maine, deeply unpopular Republican Gov. Paul LePage beat back a challenge from Democratic Rep. Michael Michaud. In all three of those states,

Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin, chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, didn’t even get the requisite 50 percent of the vote needed to win outright in his state.

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Eliot Nelson reports:

When the crowd at Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell’s election party first learned their candidate had won a sixth term to the U.S. Senate, the reaction was somewhat less than euphoric. A few yelps of excitement erupted here and there, but it seemed as if no one wanted to stand out by making a fuss. It took a few minutes, but the cheers eventually coalesced into something resembling a roar.

It was a decidedly understated bunch. Men in blazers with prep school haircuts had been mingling with demure women sporting bleach-blond helmet hairdos. Many of their children — themselves seemingly straight out of a Crewcuts catalog — noshed on complimentary bags of popcorn.

There were flashes of eclecticism, like the two young men toting a sign reading “COME AT ME BRO” featuring a picture of McConnell holding out his arms. Otherwise, the room felt less like a raucous, eardrum-shattering political celebration and more like history’s rowdiest Presbyterian church mixer.

Read more here.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wasted no time using the GOP’s new majority in the Senate in the face of potential 2016 presidential rival Hillary Clinton.

Paul posted an entire Facebook album of photos of Clinton campaigning with candidates who lost on Tuesday. Each photo was tagged #HillarysLosers.

On Twitter, Paul continued to attack Clinton, saying that the GOP’s victory on election day was a repudiation of her and President Barack Obama.

– Sam Levine

Voters approved Public Question No. 1, a bail reform measure that will reduce the pretrial incarceration of those accused of low-level drug violations. Poorer defendants who can’t afford bail, but who are not considered a threat to the community, will now be eligible to be freed while awaiting trial through an alternative release system.

Judges can still deny pretrial release to individuals who pose a clear danger to the community, to repeat offenders and to those who are a probable flight risk.

A recent report from Luminosity and the Drug Policy Alliance found that almost 75 percent of the almost 15,000 individuals in New Jersey’s jails are awaiting trial rather than serving out a sentence, and almost half of them remain incarcerated simply because they cannot afford bail. The Drug Policy Alliance backs Public Question No. 1.

– Matt Ferner

HuffPost’s Elise Foley reports:

As of next year, the Senate will be controlled by Republicans, as will the House. The fact that the Senate flipped to Republicans wasn’t necessarily surprising to advocates, but it was a frustrating reminder of the president’s decision to delay executive action on immigration. That move was meant to protect vulnerable red-state Democrats like Hagan, but most of them either lost anyway or are poised to lose.

In Colorado, executive action could have boosted enthusiasm from Latino voters to the benefit of Udall. Instead, he lost to Republican Cory Gardner, whose immigration stances are far more conservative. The only tangible effect of the delay may have been the deportation of thousands of people who could have been helped by executive action.

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Sam Stein and Ryan Grim report:

Call it a thumping. Call it a shellacking. However you want to describe the 2014 midterm elections, the point remains the same. Democrats took it on the chin Tuesday night, losing the Senate, getting crushed in winnable governors’ races, solidifying their minority status in the House for years to come, and stemming the party’s ability to continue putting its stamp on the judiciary.

The question is whether it was all avoidable. Democratic strategists will say that the party was dealt a terrible hand, forced to defend too many vulnerable Democrats in red states against too much money. It was, to be sure, a lousy hand. But Democrats never tried to play it.

Candidates across the country shunned the president, with one famously refusing even to say whether she voted for him; they ran from the party’s signature accomplishment, national health care reform; and they panicked when the White House considered doing broad-based immigration reform by executive action. Instead, a robust get out the vote operation was supposed to save the party, which rested its hopes in shifting demographic trends and fear of GOP extremists. But when you don’t give your voters much to “get out” for, what’s left?

“We gave Dems no reason to run,” said an adviser to President Barack Obama. “We ran as Dems-lite.”

Read more here.

Voters in New Mexico’s Bernalillo and Santa Fe counties overwhelmingly approved the decriminalization of marijuana Tuesday. While they are nonbinding, the questions are aimed at gauging support for such a move.

The county questions com after the Santa Fe City Council’s decision in August to decriminalize possession of marijuana and marijuana-related paraphernalia. The city’s penalty was reduced to a $25 civil infraction.

– Matt Ferner

After the 2012 elections didn’t quite go the way the GOP wanted it, Republicans responded by impaneling a team of experts to divine what hard lessons needed to be learn, and come up with a long-term strategy to get back on the winning side. That effort yielded the 100-page “Growth And Opportunity Project” report (more colloquially known as the “RNC Autopsy”). Progress on this venture has been decidedly mixed, at best.

Elsewhere, however, key GOP figures were contemplating a short-term solution, focused on the 2014 midterms. Chief among them was former Bush adviser and Fox News contributor Karl Rove. His vision: the Conservative Victory Project. Its goal: No more Todd Akins! Rove attributed key GOP losses to the fact that too many undisciplined candidates were making it through party primaries and into general elections against Democratic candidates that more seasoned, established GOP candidates could beat.

In an interesting coincidence of timing, Rove’s project launched around the same time that Iowa’s Democratic senator, Tom Harkin, announced he would be retiring. Subsequently, one of the first people to end up in the crosshairs of Rove’s new organization was U.S. Rep. Steve King of Iowa. As The New York Times reported at the time:

Representative Steve King, a six-term Iowa Republican, could be among the earliest targets of the Conservative Victory Project. He said he had not decided whether he would run for the Senate, but the leaders of the project in Washington are not waiting to try to steer him away from the race.

The group’s plans, which were outlined for the first time last week in an interview with [American Crossroads president Steven J.] Law, call for hard-edge campaign tactics, including television advertising, against candidates whom party leaders see as unelectable and a drag on the efforts to win the Senate. Mr. Law cited Iowa as an example and said Republicans could no longer be squeamish about intervening in primary fights.

“We’re concerned about Steve King’s Todd Akin problem,” Mr. Law said. “This is an example of candidate discipline and how it would play in a general election. All of the things he’s said are going to be hung around his neck.”

Iowa ended up with Iowa state Sen. Joni Ernst as their standardbearer in that Senate race, and while she’s pushed the envelope in the wrong direction at times, she’s more or less proved to be a manageable candidate. (Though it arguably helped Ernst that the media, by and large, chose to give her multiple passes.) Over in Colorado, Rove got the sort of candidate he prefers in U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner — again, a manageable alternative to Ken Buck. Throughout the primary season, Republicans avoided elevating the types of candidates — your Todd Akins, Sharron Angles, and Richard Mourdocks — that had previously sunk ambitions.

Tuesday, in the critical Colorado and Iowa races, Gardner and Ernst both prevailed, beating established Democratic candidates thought to have superior ground operations. The GOP may still need to revisit that “RNC autopsy.” But in the short term, what Karl Rove wanted to get, he got.

– Jason Linkins

HuffPost’s Amanda Terkel reports:

Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R) won re-election on Tuesday, despite being one of the most unpopular governors in the country.

LePage won in part for the same reason he did in 2010: A crowded race split Democratic votes, paving the way for his victory.

Read more here.

For the second time in 10 years, a ban on bear baiting, trapping and hounding was defeated by Maine voters on Tuesday.

According to the Bangor Daily News, the majority of liberal voters (those residing in the more urban Portland area) were for the ban. The rest of the state? Not so much.

The pro-ban campaign was funded almost entirely by the Humane Society of the United States, which hoped to convince voters that hunting the state’s black bears using bait, dogs and traps was cruel and unsporting. The opposition claimed these practices were necessary to control the state’s population.

With 54 percent of precincts reporting, the no votes were leading, 53 percent to 47 percent.

Click here for more.

HuffPost’s Lydia O’Connor reports:

Under Prop. 46, physicians could have been tested for drugs at random, within 24 hours of an adverse event suffered by a patient under their care, and when they were accused of possible substance abuse. Had it passed, California would have been the only state requiring random drug tests of doctors, the East Bay Express wrote.

Reform groups criticized that provision as ineffective in decreasing substance abuse, unfairly punitive of doctors and a step backward in ending the war on drugs. In a statement sent to The Huffington Post, the Drug Policy Alliance noted that random drug testing “cannot be used to determine the extent of drug misuse, impairment, frequency or amount of use.” Moreover, it said, random drug-testing “often creates incentives to use riskier substances in counterproductive ways.”

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Kate Sheppard reports:

The new Senate Republican majority creates an opportunity for likely Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to force a vote on the proposed Keystone XL pipeline he’s been waiting years to hold.

By The Huffington Post’s count, the new Senate will have at least 61 votes in favor of a measure forcing the pipeline’s approval — a filibuster-proof majority.

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said Tuesday in an appearance on MSNBC that passing a Keystone approval bill would be the second item on the Republican agenda, after a budget. “I actually think the president will sign the bill on the Keystone pipeline because I think the pressure — he’s going to be boxed in on that, and I think it’s going to happen,” Priebus said.

Read more here.

Politico’s Manu Raju reports:

Harry Reid will run for Senate minority leader, and it appears he will have no significant opposition.

Senior Senate Democratic aides said Tuesday night that Reid would have the full support of his entire leadership team, despite his party incurring huge losses on Election Night.

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Dana Liebelson reports:

Republican victories in Tuesday’s Senate elections push out a Democratic old guard and usher in a new crop of hungry GOPers, some just getting their feet wet in politics.

Republicans won control of the Senate partly with the help of newcomers who ousted Democratic incumbents and whipped rivals for seats vacated by retiring liberal lions, whose political service spanned decades that included some of the biggest moments in modern U.S. political history. These departing senators have chaired powerful committees, authored landmark bills, exposed torture in Vietnam, debated CIA interrogation methods, and voted on the Iraq war.

Politically inexperienced Republicans fought to victory by linking Democratic opponents with President Barack Obama and by emphasizing business or military experience, rather than Washington savvy. A Republican outsider also snagged a seat held by a retiring Republican heavyweight: Businessman David Perdue, who will take the seat of departing Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.).

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Matt Sledge reports:

California approved a major shift against mass incarceration on Tuesday in a vote that could lead to the release of thousands of state prisoners.

Nonviolent felonies like shoplifting and drug possession will be downgraded to misdemeanors under the ballot measure, Proposition 47. As many as 10,000 people could be eligible for early release from state prisons, and it’s expected that courts will annually dispense around 40,000 fewer felony convictions.

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Laura Bassett reports:

Tennessee voters on Tuesday approved a controversial ballot measure that ensures the state constitution does not protect a woman’s right to abortion under any circumstances. Nearly 54 percent of voters approved the measure, with 46 percent opposed, according to Politico.

Amendment 1 overrides the Tennessee Supreme Court’s 2000 decision to block a 36-hour mandatory waiting period before abortions. The court had ruled the state constitution protects women’s right to privacy, which includes the right to have an abortion.

Read more here.

HuffPost’s Howard Fineman reports:

In his Capitol Hill office, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) proudly displays an oil painting of his state’s most famous senator, Henry Clay, “The Great Pacificator” and unifying statesman of 19th century America. But as the 72-year-old McConnell prepares to take over as Senate majority leader, a job he’s spent decades plotting to win, it’s not clear whether he can be — or wants to be — another Clay.

McConnell has said recently that the past majority leaders he most admires are two Democrats — Mike Mansfield of Montana, who moved most of President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society legislation, and George Mitchell of Maine, who was noted for his diplomatic and collegial style.

On Election Day, McConnell staffers referred me to a speech their boss had made in which he vowed to run a more bipartisan and consultative Senate than now exists. He would be Clay, Mansfield and Mitchell all rolled into one.

Many of his critics scoff at the notion.

Read more here.

NECN reports:

Ted Kennedy Jr. has won his first political race and a seat in the Connecticut state Senate.

Kennedy is the 53-year-old son of the late U.S. senator and a nephew of President John F. Kennedy. He beat Republican Bruce Wilson Jr. on Tuesday for an open seat in a district along Connecticut’s shoreline.

Kennedy had been mentioned in 2012 as a possible Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in his family’s home state of Massachusetts. But he decided to seek office in Connecticut’s 12th District, where he has lived for about 20 years.

Read more here.

The reformation of marijuana laws across the nation took another step forward Tuesday when voters in Oregon approved a measure to legalize the drug for recreational use.

Voters passed Measure 91, which legalizes the possession, use and sale of recreational marijuana for adults 21 and over, according to The Oregonian, NORML and a Fox affiliate in the state. Oregon becomes the third state in the nation to end the prohibition on cannabis.

“People are no longer being fooled by the anti-marijuana propaganda that they’ve been hearing their entire lives,” said Mason Tvert, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project.

“This is another example of voters standing up and saying, ‘Enough is enough.’ Marijuana prohibition has been a massive failure and voters are ready to move on. This is a particularly impressive victory because voter turnout for midterm elections is typically smaller, older, and more conservative. Clearly, support for ending marijuana prohibition spans all age groups and the ideological spectrum.”

Read more here.

– Matt Ferner

Share and Enjoy

Tags:

  1. Pages:
  3. 1
  4. ...
  5. 1089
  6. 1090
  7. 1091
  8. 1092
  9. 1093
  10. 1094
  11. 1095
  12. ...
  13. 1675