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The Nike Effect: Part II
The other day, I talked about Nike and its brilliant marketing campaign in the early nineties. Nike stood out amongst the competition in the athletic shoe industry by selling us a perceived need—inspiration—but delivering a real need—belonging.
Now here’s the question I’m posing: Do you think Nike would have been successful if they’d done a commercial without Jordan and instead used a slogan like “We make you feel like you belong”? No. It would have been a crash and burn because people wouldn’t have connected with it. Think about it—people don’t realize they need to feel like they belong, so blatantly selling belonging won’t work. You’ve got to wrap it up in something else that will connect with them.
Nike was able to grab you by making you feel like you belonged to something bigger than you. They drew you in with inspiration—something that knows no boundaries. Challenge knows no boundaries. Challenge me to go to the next level and no matter what level I am on, I will understand the calling.
What this means: don’t sell belonging by advertising and promoting it. People don’t consciously think about their need to belong and most are not aware of it until after it’s been fulfilled. For example, having a tagline like “a church where you belong” is like someone responding to an altar call without hearing the message first. We know that belonging is a human need—but most people don’t recognize that. This is something to keep in mind with every area of your church’s communications.
My question for you today is…how are you communicating to the needs of your community? What does your church provide that the community thinks it needs?
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Stan
So in an effort to sell "Connecting", it's not good to have a brand statement that says, "Connecting People to Christ and to Each Other?" I'm asking because I'm in the process of reworking our church's vision and 5 year plan. Read this and was inspired to think a little harder about it. Any ideas out there on ways to sell connecting without saying "connecting?"
Posted on Tue, Feb 24, 2009 @ 9:48 AM CST