Marketing Lessons from Monsters Inc.

Questioning Best Practices, Avoiding Fear Tactics, and Fulfilling Higher Needs.

Marketing 101

Marketing is about finding ways to get people to take a desired action. For charities, the action you want to encourage is making a gift to your cause. So if you work in the charitable sector, it’s definitely in your best interest to learn a thing or two about effective marketing strategy.

No time or budget for a marketing course? No problem. All you need is a bowl of popcorn, your beverage of choice, and 1 hr 32 mins to watch Monsters Inc. While it may sound too good to be true, this classic Pixar/Disney collab offers three essential truths about great marketing:

Question best practices
Fear tactics aren’t sustainable
Fulfilling higher needs is a winning strategy

Let’s dive into Monstropolis and see what the monsters can teach us.

1. Question Best Practices

There’s a long-held belief in Monstropolis that fear, specifically the screams of children, is the best way to generate energy. The company, Monsters Inc., employs scarers to terrify children and make them scream.

Then one day, quite by accident, the monsters discover that laughter generates ten times the amount of energy than fear. This realization changes everything and challenges their best practice of frightening kids.

What can a charity learn from this? That it’s worth questioning best practices. Just because you’ve done something a certain way for a long time, doesn’t mean it’s the best way.

Like Monsters Inc., charitable marketing has a history of using fear, sadness, and disgust to motivate donors to action. You’ve likely seen commercials of sad animals in kennels or children with flies in their eyes and distended bellies.

While this strategy can work, we’ve since learned donors are more compelled to give when charities share hopeful, uplifting stories and images of what can be accomplished with their support. But it was only by questioning our best practice of motivating donors through sadness that we learned a new and better way of doing business.

2. Fear Tactics Aren’t Sustainable

At first, scaring children was an effective way for Monsters Inc. to get their desired outcome - screaming kids. But it gradually became less and less effective. As the children got used to the monsters' scare tactics, it took more and more energy for the scarers to frighten them. This caused a downward spiral of diminishing returns. The monsters quickly learned that scare tactics aren’t a sustainable way to motivate action.

The same is true when it comes to charity marketing. If we rely too heavily on more difficult emotions, like guilt, fear and disgust, our donors quickly become immune to the message and may stop responding. Leaning into enjoyable experiences and emotions, like laughter, hope, and gratitude, are a much more effective way to rally support for your mission.

3. Fulfilling Higher Needs is a Winning Strategy

In the movie, the monsters discover that laughter is a more effective way to generate energy in children. That’s because laughter is a positive experience that makes them feel good. And, according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, humans are driven to seek out feel-good experiences that fulfill our deepest longings.

If you’re not familiar with Maslow, he theorizes that humans are motivated to meet their needs in a hierarchy, starting with basic physiological and safety needs. Only once these needs are met can we pursue our higher needs for love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization.

Charities are ideally positioned to help people reach these higher needs. When someone makes a donation to your cause, they join a community of supporters, fulfilling their need for belonging. They may also be more highly regarded by others, and this meets the human desire for esteem.

Ultimately, charities offer a way for people to fulfill their highest need - self-actualization. When you give someone the opportunity to donate to your cause, they become the person they aspire to be. This feels good. And if you nurture this positive experience, they’ll keep coming back for more.

May the Best Monster Win

Monsters Inc. teaches us that marketers should question best practices, avoid relying on fear tactics, and focus on offering a way for people to fulfill their highest needs. By following these tips, your charity can create more effective marketing campaigns that drive donors to take the action you want them to take - giving to your cause.

When your marketing efforts focus on helping people become their best selves, you really can’t lose. Or, as the monsters would say, "may the best monster win" (Disney/Pixar, 2001).