A Day in the Life of a Thankful Marketer

A Day in the Life of a Thankful Marketer

Tis the season to be grateful and to give thanks.  Thanksgiving is one of my all time favorite holidays.  It’s a time of year when I give thanks and yes reflect a bit on what’s important.  What lights me up?  What inspires me?  So as I sit and ponder these thoughts in my office at BiddingForGood, I watch the good news stream through my email box.

Every day, oftentimes many times during the day, I get an email alert about another nonprofit or school that has decided to work with my company to help raise their much-needed funds.  It would be so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day work and stress (stress?  Who me?) of running a marketing team and of reaching out to customers and partners and prospects.  There is plenty of work to keep us all very busy indeed.   Most days we’re thinking about email campaigns and social media posts and web site conversion rates.  We’re trying to support our sales team and our client services team.  We’re trying to open new markets and forge new partnerships. But it’s way too easy to forget about the impact of all of the work that we collectively do every day.

So today, I peruse my inbox and see a long list of schools- charter schools and Montessori schools, public schools and private schools.  I see corporations like Kimberly Clark who are doing phenomenal employee auctions to benefit their charity partners.   Companies like Kimberly Clark and AT+T are raising hundreds of thousands of dollars through the generosity of their employees.

I see arts organizations like Inner City Arts and The ChoralArts Society of Washington DC. I get particular delight from organizations like this.  I sit back and imagine children getting exposed to the arts, or musicians sharing their gift of music with their communities.   I see temples and health organizations and nature conservancies.   I see organizations like Girls for Africa that exists to transform the lives of orphans in Ghana.   What is not to love about helping organizations like this?

If I visit our website, I find auctions for organizations like Art To Beat Cancer which is supporting new therapeutic agents for the treatment of cancer.  And I find Home for the Howlidays.  This organization raises funds to rescue, heal and find homes for abandoned or homeless dogs and cats in high kill shelters.  I don’t linger too long on this site because I am desperately yearning for a dog in my life.  Our old dog, Gussie, died a couple of years ago and there is a big hole for me with no devoted friend to sit patiently by my side.  The timing is not right for a new dog now but I can take great pleasure in knowing that my company and our work is helping an organization like Home for the Howlidays. 

So I am grateful.  As I look forward to my favorite holiday and I ponder the brine I will use on our turkey this year, or the stuffing recipe that we will try this year,  I think also of how lucky I am to have family and friends who will be with us.  I  think about how lucky I am that we will have food on the table.  And I am very grateful indeed that the work that I do has such impact in the world. There is great need in the world and it feels so satisfying to be doing something about it.   What are you grateful for?  And where are you having impact?  I’d love to hear from you.