Pepsi’s Refresh Project is a social media/philanthropy hybrid that funds important initiatives from improving schools to building parks and playgrounds, and supporting new business ideas. In fact, in 2010, Pepsi gave up its Super Bowl ad and allowed small budding companies to advertise in its place. Pepsi defines the Refresh Project as “The New Pepsi Challenge.” In the process of helping causes through millions of dollars of donations, they attract millions of fans to their social media sites to vote on which projects get funded. Everyone wins.

Starbucks kicked off its Global Month of Service because they are “committed to helping create thriving neighborhoods” wherever they do business, and that they can use their “scale to be a catalyst for positive change.” Their goal with the Global Month of Service is to support 2,000 service projects and give 200,000 hours of volunteer time from their employees and customers around the world.

In 2010, Disney launched “Give a Day, Get a Disney Day” in which they ask people to give a day of volunteer service at a participating organization and then receive a free, one-day admission ticket to a Walt Disney World Resort or Disneyland Resort theme park.  Again, this is a win-win-win for the company, the community, and Disney fans.

Likewise, for many years, we’ve been creating community support plans for our clients. This has enabled our clients’ companies to show their commitment to the community, bring their company missions to life by supporting organizations in their areas of interest, develop relationships with community service organizations and their constituents, get their customers involved on a charitable level, and occasionally get exposure for their gifts (in the case of event sponsorships). Of course the public wins, too because the organizations that receive the donations help meet the needs of the community.

Community support plans work well for any sized company because they can justify directing marketing budgets toward philanthropy. Companies that don’t have the funds to give charitable donations can always give their time through volunteerism or donate products or services. Harnessing this spirit of giving is an opportunity for any company. So give away.

UPDATE: Along the same lines of this post, check out the great idea, Hot Rocks for Humanity.

Starbucks

Keep it current, Starbucks.  This fact sheet is dated February 2008, kind of old.  Also, Starbucks has gone full boar into the major social media venues from Twitter to Facebook and yet the company’s social media contact information is missing from their fact sheet.  The graphic quality is also poor and not up to par with the company’s top-notch image.  Another brand mismatch is the tone.  This full-on corporate fact sheet is cold and businesslike and seems apart from the Starbucks’ brand of being a fun, friendly, warm place.

Gap

This fact sheet has a nice, easy-to-read layout that looks consistent with their image, but where’s their contact information or even a link to their website and store locations?  It seems incomplete and stops before the bottom of the page.

Gatorade

Gatorade’s fact sheet contains good information, including some unexpected facts like the athletes they sponsor, but it’s dated 2006, much too old to be considered current.  It’s also a bit long at two full pages, though we like that it has all of their product web addresses at the bottom.  Links to those addresses would be even better.

St. Jude Medical

We like how this fact sheet is integrated into the company’s website and the reader can choose whether or not to click on the PDF version or not.  The links on the left and right to the fact sheet topic areas are all active, making it user friendly and the use of web links allows them to make the fact sheet brief while supplying a lot of information.  The only down side is that the PDF version of the fact sheet didn’t open up in our browser so we’re not sure if it contains the same information that’s available on the website fact sheet.

Before creating or revising your company fact sheet, take a look at other companies’ fact sheets to see what works and what doesn’t and let that guide you in perfecting your own.

For more information on fact sheets, see our recent blogs.  Also, do you need to create a fact sheet for your business and don’t want to start from scratch?  Purchase our topic- and industry-specific fact sheet templates, and customize them for your business.  Every fact sheet template includes a pre-set format and valuable tips for your industry or topic.