Best practice in community marketing

In the snappily-titled ‘Fostering Sustainable Behavior: An Introduction to Community-based Social Marketing’ the author Doug McKenzie-Mohr explores how to influence behaviour change in various communities. The book talks about the successes of using community-based social marketing to identify barriers to behaviour change and then devising strategies to counteract these barriers.

If, as the book suggests, this approach has been shown to have a much greater probability of promoting sustainable behaviour, we’re interested to explore how the same approach can also work in a brand context. McKenzie-Mohr observes that if people observe their peers demonstrating positive behaviour, they are more likely to adopt it than if they were to have this suggested to them in an advertising campaign. It’s not a huge leap therefore to imagine communities adopting new brands or products if their peers and influencers are seen to be doing so!

Watch this space for some updates on clients who are starting to use this new Yes Agency technique.

Amanda McDonald