Your CSR is Boring — You Are Picking the Wrong Fights

Your CSR activ­it­ies are boring.

Zzz. Wait, what? Did any­one say “cor­por­ate social responsibility”?

CSR is when brands con­trib­ute to the great­er good of soci­ety — even though they tech­nic­ally don’t have to do it. 

Typical examples could be:

Planting rain­forest in the Amazon.
Drilling for fresh water in Africa.
Donating funds to dis­aster relief.

All good causes, for sure. 

But, as PR pro­fes­sion­als, we know this too well: get­ting pub­lic recog­ni­tion for CSR activ­it­ies is challenging. 

Where’s all that sweet goodwill?

When 1,000 People Agree With You

As a com­pany serving the great­er good through vari­ous CSR activ­it­ies, in the­ory, you should be reap­ing at least some busi­ness rewards for doing good.

A glob­al brand could alloc­ate mil­lions of dol­lars for good causes without earn­ing so much as a headline. 

But pub­li­city is one thing. What about goodwill?

Most people find CSR activ­it­ies to be both import­ant and noble. Commendable, even. 

But inter­est­ing? Not so much.

Imagine going out on a busy street to ask 1,000 by-pass­ers what they think about sav­ing the rain­forest. It’s not unthink­able that you would col­lect 1,000 “yes, that’s import­ant” answers.

In short: People favour your CSR endeav­our, which makes it unin­ter­est­ing from a media perspective.

It’s coun­ter­in­tu­it­ive, but people engage less with major­ity positions.

Enter: The Conversion Theory

In sci­entif­ic lit­er­at­ure, less engage­ment for major­ity pos­i­tions is known as the Conversion Theory. 

The social psy­cho­lo­gist Serge Moscovici found that we become more engaged if we belong to a mis­rep­res­en­ted minor­ity.

If 99,9% of your peers think that the rain­forest is worth sav­ing and you agree, you don’t feel you belong to a wronged minor­ity and are less likely to engage.

However, most CSR issues tend to be backed by “mor­al” majorities.

Planting rain­forest in the Amazon.
Drilling for fresh water in Africa.
Donating funds to dis­aster relief.

Sorry. People engage with less intens­ity in major­ity positions.

Regarding the PR effect, the con­ver­sion the­ory is why CSR activ­it­ies work best when a brand finds an intel­li­gent minor­ity to liaise with — against a stu­pid majority.

The Conversion Theory

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The Conversion Theory: The Powerful Minority

The dis­pro­por­tion­al power of minor­it­ies is known as the con­ver­sion the­ory. ¹Conversion the­ory of minor­ity influ­ence. (2021, February 12). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​C​o​n​v​e​r​s​i​o​n​_​t​h​e​o​r​y​_​o​f​_​m​i​n​o​r​i​t​y​_​i​n​f​l​u​e​nce

How does it work?

The social cost of hold­ing a dif­fer­ent view than the major­ity is high. This increased cost explains why minor­it­ies often hold their opin­ions more firmly. It takes determ­in­a­tion to go against the norm. ²Moscovici, S. (1980). Toward a the­ory of con­ver­sion beha­viour. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 13, 209 – 239. New York: Academic Press

In con­trast, many major­ity mem­bers don’t hold their opin­ions so firmly. They might belong to the major­ity for no oth­er reas­on than that every­one else seems to be. ³Chryssochoou, X. and Volpato, C. (2004). Social Influence and the Power of Minorities: An Analysis of the Communist Manifesto, Social Justice Research, 17, 4, 357 – 388

“In groups, the minor­ity can have a dis­pro­por­tion­ate effect, con­vert­ing many ‘major­ity’ mem­bers to their own cause. This is because many major­ity group mem­bers are not strong believ­ers in its cause. They may be simply going along because it seems easi­er or that there is no real altern­at­ive. They may also have become dis­il­lu­sioned with the group pur­pose, pro­cess, or lead­er­ship and are seek­ing a viable altern­at­ive.”
Source: Changingminds​.org ⁴Conversion Theory. (2023). Changingminds​.org. https://​chan​ging​minds​.org/​e​x​p​l​a​n​a​t​i​o​n​s​/​t​h​e​o​r​i​e​s​/​c​o​n​v​e​r​s​i​o​n​_​t​h​e​o​r​y​.​htm

According to con­ver­sion the­ory, while major­it­ies often claim norm­at­ive social influ­ence, minor­it­ies strive for eth­ic­al high ground. 

Given the power of norm­at­ive social influ­ence, minor­it­ies must stick togeth­er in tight-knit in-groups that can verb­al­ise the same mes­sage repeatedly.

Learn more: Conversion Theory: The Disproportionate Influence of Minorities

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How To Make Your CSR Less Boring

Brands are gen­er­ally per­ceived as both power­ful and wealthy.

To be accep­ted as the under­dog, the brand must be vul­ner­able to deserve pub­lic acknowledgement.

1. There must be a clearly defined enemy; the more potent the enemy, the more interesting the story.

If you want people to act­ively sup­port your brand, they need to know who and what you’re up against and that the brand is put­ting itself at risk by tak­ing this position.

From a PR per­spect­ive, com­pan­ies cut­ting down rain­forests are weak. And tak­ing a stand on behalf of the rain­forest is risk-free for the brand.

Is there a clearly defined enemy backed by a stu­pid major­ity?
Does a smart minor­ity back you in tak­ing down this enemy?

2. There must be obstacles and stakes to keep the brand accountable and the audience engaged.

CSR, too, obeys the fun­da­ment­al laws of storytelling; you need a strong enemy and must also accept a hero’s journey. 

You can’t expect people to trust or respect you if you don’t harm your brand for what it believes in. 

There must be some­thing “at risk,” some­thing tan­gible for the brand’s bot­tom line. The brand must make enemies.

What’s at stake for your com­pany?
In what way is the out­come for your busi­ness uncertain?

PR Resource: The Stupid Majority

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The Stupid Majority

From what con­ver­sion the­ory tells us, minor­it­ies tend to hold their opin­ions more firmly. This is reas­on­able since going against the major­ity comes at a high­er social cost. ⁵Silfwer, J. (2017, June 13). Conversion Theory — Disproportionate Minority Influence. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​c​o​n​v​e​r​s​i​o​n​-​t​h​e​o​ry/

But some minor­it­ies have an addi­tion­al advantage:

Smart Minority = a minor­ity of today that will grow into a new major­ity of tomorrow.

In con­trast, some major­it­ies have an addi­tion­al disadvantage:

Stupid Majority = a major­ity of today that will stead­ily decline into a minor­ity of tomorrow.

Examples of Stupid Majorities

Stupid Majorities are to be found everywhere:

“Riding a skate­board isn’t a real sport!”
(Stupid Majority vs Red Bull)

“Computing is about bits and bytes, not design!”
(Stupid Majority vs Apple)

“Websites and apps can­’t pro­duce movies and tele­vi­sion shows!”
(Stupid Majority vs Netflix)

“Electric cars can­’t com­pete with gas cars!”
(Stupid Majority vs Tesla Motors)

“Hotels must have hotel rooms!”
(Stupid Majority vs AirBnB)

“Taxi com­pan­ies must have tax­is!”
(Stupid Majority vs Uber)

“Media com­pan­ies must pro­duce media!”
(Stupid Majority vs Facebook)

Identifying a Stupid Majority (and sid­ing with a Smart Minority) will cla­ri­fy your core mes­sage and attract highly engaged minor­ity supporters.

Since time’s by your side (the Stupid Majority will be gone no mat­ter what), tar­get­ing a Stupid Majority might become your career­’s most influ­en­tial PR strategy.

Read also: The Stupid Majority PR Strategy: How Underdogs Dominate

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PR Resource: Cosmetic Sustainability

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Types of Cosmetic Sustainability

In pub­lic rela­tions, cos­met­ic sus­tain­ab­il­ity refers to giv­ing the impres­sion of being envir­on­ment­ally friendly or socially con­scious without imple­ment­ing sub­stant­ive, mean­ing­ful changes. 

Here are some examples of cos­met­ic sustainability:

• Greenwashing. Organisations give the impres­sion of being envir­on­ment­ally friendly without provid­ing any pos­it­ive impact of substance.
• Bluewashing. Organisations claim to be envir­on­ment­ally respons­ible by asso­ci­at­ing them­selves with ocean and water con­ser­va­tion efforts without sig­ni­fic­ant actions to sup­port those claims.
• Socialwashing. Organisations present them­selves as cham­pi­ons of social causes or cor­por­ate social respons­ib­il­ity (CSR) ini­ti­at­ives without genu­inely invest­ing in or address­ing those issues.
• Pinkwashing. The use of LGBTQ+ rights and causes to mar­ket products or improve an organ­isa­tion’s image while not sup­port­ing these com­munit­ies meaningfully.
• Brownwashing. Portraying an organ­isa­tion as sup­port­ive of racial justice and diversity ini­ti­at­ives without real com­mit­ment or sys­tem­ic change with­in the organisation.
• Cleanwashing. Marketing products as “clean” or “non-tox­ic” when the terms are not clearly defined or reg­u­lated and without sig­ni­fic­ant evid­ence to sup­port the safety and envir­on­ment­al bene­fits of the products.
• Localwashing. Organisations emphas­ise loc­al sourcing or com­munity engage­ment to appeal to con­sumers while not genu­inely con­trib­ut­ing to the loc­al eco­nomy or environment.
• Wokewashing. Adopting pro­gress­ive val­ues or stances on social issues super­fi­cially to attract socially con­scious con­sumers without genu­inely address­ing these issues with­in the organisation.
• Healthwashing. Organisations mar­ket products as health­i­er than they are by high­light­ing minor bene­fi­cial ingredi­ents or prac­tices while ignor­ing harm­ful com­pon­ents or practices.
• Labourwashing. Claiming eth­ic­al prac­tices in areas like labour rights, sourcing, and man­u­fac­tur­ing without adher­ing to rig­or­ous stand­ards or mak­ing sig­ni­fic­ant improvements.
• Charitywashing. Promoting char­it­able dona­tions or part­ner­ships to improve brand image, where the con­tri­bu­tions are min­im­al, or the focus is more on the pub­li­city than the impact.

Each of these types of cos­met­ic sus­tain­ab­il­ity involves a dis­crep­ancy between the com­pany’s pub­lic image and its actu­al prac­tices, often mis­lead­ing con­sumers and stake­hold­ers about their true impact and intentions.

“Greenwashing is more likely when firm stock volat­il­ity is low, cost of cap­it­al is high, pri­cing power is strong, and inform­a­tion asym­metry is high, but cur­rent returns to gre­en­wash­ing are lim­ited without a sig­ni­fic­ant amount of inform­a­tion asym­metry.“
Source: Journal of Sustainable Finance & Investment ⁶Gregory, R. (2020). When is gre­en­wash­ing an easy fix? Journal of Sustainable Finance & Investment, 13, 919 — 942. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​8​0​/​2​0​4​3​0​7​9​5​.​2​0​2​1​.​1​9​0​7​091

Learn more: Cosmetic Sustainability and Public Relations

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