I Spark Change Podcast: The Role of Brand Strategy in Social Impact with Eric Ressler

There is power in valuing and respecting your community as you develop a brand strategy. As a guest on the I Spark Change podcast, Eric shares insights into how building trust and credibility with your social impact community can support your long-term goals for your organization.

The foundation of brand building really starts with social impact organizations taking a moment to reexamine some of your brand’s core fundamentals; brand strategy, mission, vision, niche, and positioning differentiators. Taking a second look to see if you have each of these elements has been fully articulated so that you can effectively tell compelling impact stories, build brand awareness, and inspire action.

The host Rick Ornelas and Eric also dive into a conversation about continuous learning and how it can inform your journey as a social impact leader. Eric emphasizes the importance of balance, remaining focused, calm, and open to new experiences to stay creatively fueled in the pursuit of meaningful change. 

“If people can feel empowered and feel like they have the ability to make an impact. That's the starting point for any successful impact story that we've ever seen. That's ever been documented, right? It all starts with that belief. So I think that mindset, although really hard to cultivate, especially when things aren't looking up in your life or in the world, could be really difficult. So easier said than done, but practicing tapping into that, I think is just absolutely critical.” [00:39:00]

Episode Highlights:

• Exploring branding strategies for organizations focused on social impact.
• Emphasizing the importance of continual personal and professional development in the social impact sector.
• Addressing the difficulties organizations face in maintaining focus amidst expanding their mission.
• Advocating for a comprehensive approach to driving social change, beyond just marketing tactics.

Quotes:

“I think when I stay in that mindset of continuous learning and creativity and curiosity, as soon as I feel like I know what I'm doing. That's a problem because I don't, and no one does like you're always learning and things are always changing. Right. So you might know what works today, but if you just keep doing those same things, six months, a year, two years from now, that might not work anymore. So this journey of continuous learning, I think is something that I personally find to be really important.” [00:05:00]

“There are differences around how you do branding and communications and marketing and storytelling when you're working with an impact based organization versus, you know, standard corporation.”  [00:15:00]

“How can Branding, design, marketing, storytelling, supercharge that mission? The answer to that is very different depending on the type of organization that you are. Are you a grassroots movement trying to build that movement at scale? Or are you…trying to influence a smaller set of policymakers or influencers? Our strategy for how to approach those two different scenarios is going to be drastically different.”  [00:18:00]

Resources:

I Spark Change Podcast