Social Marketing

Social marketing applies commercial marketing principles and behavioural insights to influence individual and collective actions for social good. It seeks to create social value by persuading audiences to adopt, modify or abandon behaviours that benefit public health, equity and environmental sustainability. Unlike traditional marketing, which hinges on demand and profit, social marketing balances tailored product, price, place and promotion strategies across downstream, midstream and upstream streams to reinforce civic engagement, healthy lifestyles, recycling, energy conservation and safer mobility. By combining audience segmentation, exchange theory and systems thinking, practitioners identify barriers and facilitators within cultural, economic and policy contexts. Effective interventions often blend persuasive communication, default design, incentives and regulatory measures, guided by ethical principles and grounded in local values. Program design typically involves formative research to clarify needs, co-creation with stakeholders, iterative testing and impact evaluation that captures both objective outcomes and subjective quality-of-life improvements. The field has evolved from single campaigns to integrated frameworks that address complex challenges such as non-communicable diseases, climate change and social inequities, highlighting its role as a catalyst for sustainable development and collective well-being.

Research from Nature Portfolio

Recent analyses of social marketing on digital platforms have shed light on how narrative forms and content types shape engagement for non-profit causes. An examination of Twitter data from children’s NGOs revealed that action-oriented messages—those framing actionable risks or benefits—outperform neutral dialogue in driving community support, and highlighted how organizations vary their positioning strategies during crises. In parallel, experimental interventions in hospital cafeterias demonstrated that raising the salience of sustainable dishes and increasing their availability significantly boosts selection of healthier, eco-friendly options, effects that diminish when cues are withdrawn but underscore the potency of choice architecture in institutional food environments.

Social Marketing publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in social marketing across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Choice architecture: The design and arrangement of options in decision environments to steer behaviour in predictable ways without restricting freedom of choice.

Exchange theory: A conceptual framework positing that individuals adopt behaviours when perceived benefits outweigh associated costs.

Downstream, midstream and upstream streams: Levels of social marketing interventions targeting individuals (downstream), influencers and networks (midstream) or policy and system actors (upstream) to facilitate behaviour change.

Salience: The degree to which an option or cue stands out in the environment, capturing attention and guiding choices.

Perceived corporate social responsibility (CSR): Consumer belief that a company’s initiatives genuinely contribute to societal and environmental welfare, strengthening purchase intention and advocacy.

References

1. The Big Picture in Social Marketing.
2. Comparison and positioning of NGOs aimed at children from the perspective of social marketing on Twitter. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (2024).
3. Using salience and availability to promote sustainable and healthy food choices in hospital cafeterias. Scientific Reports (2024).
4. Corporate giving and its impact on consumer evaluations: A meta-analysis. Journal of Business Research (2023).
5. Cause-related marketing: a systematic review of the literature. International Review on Public and Nonprofit Marketing (2022).
6. “We Go Together”: Understanding social cause-related purchase intentions of young adults. Journal of Business Research (2022).