This is part 2 of 5 of the 5 part series of How to be more Effective in your LGBT Marketing.
Understanding how to put together an effective advertisement for your LGBT marketing can be tricky. We are going to talk about the Art of Being Subtle.
When creating ads that are specific to the LGBT community, be subtle. There’s nothing more obnoxious than seeing a mainstream company slap a rainbow on the top of their standard ad and say “We’re gay-friendly.” The community doesn’t need to see a rainbow to understand you support the LGBT community. Simply including an LGBT couple alongside a straight couple in an ad would go a lot further. Subtly show that your company is inclusive rather than forcing it.
If you are an avid reader of this blog you’ll have heard me talk about Inclusion Based Marketing before. I actually devote Chapter 3 in my book, “No, wait… You do look gay! The 7 Mistakes Preventing You from Selling to the LGBT Market” around this particular topic.
Let’s talk about what inclusion is – Inclusion is the act of intentionally engaging with a diverse group of people or communities. So while having a diverse population is generally a positive thing, it is not an automatic benefit without an effort to be inclusive. Inclusion at its core is about making people feel included into a pre-existing group or structure.
Many companies and businesses have been or are currently marketing their products to diverse communities based on segmenting their audience. They will break down their target markets and have a well crafted effort to reach out to a broad diverse community. For example, a company may be marketing to the LGBT community and have separate ad campaigns for their LGBT audience which can be seen in LGBT specific media.This could be the case for any diverse group they are marketing to. There is nothing wrong with this strategy per se.
The current trends are pointing to being inclusive and subtle. So rather than isolate a specific audience like LGBT folks, companies are starting to include LGBT couples in their mainstream advertising.
I’d like to highlight Amazon Kindle as an example. They showed their support for same sex marriage in a big way a few years back. They have a wonderful ad that really shows an LGBT couple being a total non-issue. Watch the commercial below. The beauty of this commercial is that it really demonstrates inclusion. They could have put an ad together that only showed an LGBT couple and one that only showed a straight couple. But rather, they put both audiences in one and didn’t make a big deal about it.
So practice inclusion based marketing and be subtle about it, it’ll help you a long way!
Of course, if you want to know more revealed in Chapter 3, you’ll have to get a copy of No, wait… You do look gay! The 7 Mistakes Preventing You from Selling to the LGBT Market.”
If you liked this post, please enjoy the others in this series:
