'Influence' blog: Health brands have social purpose built-in, but are they doing enough?

This blog post by Evergreen PR founder, Leigh Greenwood, originally featured on Influence, the CIPR-powered website for switched-on public relations professionals. You see the article on the Influence website here.

It’s more than 10 years since Simon Sinek published his seminal book ‘Start With The Why’ and yet it’s only in recent years that the drive to put authentic social purpose at the heart of corporate strategies has really gone mainstream.

Consumers’ expectations of brands have risen sharply since then and so it’s no surprise that businesses that are recognised for having a high commitment to purpose are now growing at twice the rate of others, and also benefit from stronger reputations and more motivated staff.

Authenticity is hugely important though and so brands that are suspected of pursuing causes purely for marketing reasons – recently dubbed ‘woke-washing’ by Unilever’s CEO – can unwittingly damage their reputation as today’s sophisticated consumers can see right through it.

This discussion is particularly relevant to the health sector, whose businesses arguably have a built-in purpose to help people to manage their health. The question for brands in this space though is are you doing enough with the knowledge and resources you have?

Many health brands work with academics, scientists and technical experts to ensure that their products and services meet best practice standards. These individuals can add real value in the quest for a healthier world and the latest Edelman Trust Barometer revealed that society trusts them more than anyone else. According to the report, consumers also prioritise brands that demonstrate their effectiveness alongside their ethics, so leading the way really counts.

Today’s leading health brands are almost duty-bound then to use their expertise and influence to create a healthier society, over-and-above promoting any products or services they might sell – and the pay-off is the value it adds to their reputation.

Activity-wise this could involve a gym brand reviewing how inclusive different groups find the workout environment and taking steps to address it, an optical business shining a light on the number of schoolchildren who can’t see the board and working with schools to tackle the issue or, in the current climate, a corporate health brand producing free flexible working policy templates to help smaller employer’s manage disease-spread.

If it’s a genuine purpose though it needs to run much deeper than individual activity. Today’s excellent health organisations are combining expertise and ethical purpose at the heart of their corporate strategies.

I was lucky enough to spend almost 10 years in senior communications roles at Slimming World and saw first-hand how an authentic purpose and the sharing of genuine expert knowledge creates a sense of pride among employees, goodwill among stakeholders and improvements in reputation. That Slimming World has grown from a best-kept secret to a household name is no coincidence – and we so happened to win a number of PR awards along the way.

In this increasingly online world, more and more people are looking for brands and causes they can align themselves with and define themselves by. The benefit to health organisations is that authentic campaigns that do social good and that tap into something greater than themselves can really capture the imagination.

This month my agency launched a campaign for more funding for tinnitus research on behalf of our client the British Tinnitus Association. The combination of social purpose, expert-evidence and an engaging storyline saw us win the attention of the media, politicians and the public, earning blanket tier 1 media coverage, 100,000+ petition signatures, a debate in the House of Lords and meetings with research-funders.

This sort of campaign enables brands and organisations to connect with the public on a deeper level, foster a more engaged and proud workforce and develop a reputation as genuine experts. For commercial health brands it can allow them to grow their business while also improving the world around them. It can help them to do well and to do good.

Shouldn’t that be the aim for all of us?

Leigh Greenwood is the owner of specialist health PR & comms consultancy Evergreen PR.