http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/boston-made-the-ice-bucket-challenge-go-big-facebook-says/377159/
Remember that viral campaign called “Ice Bucket Challenge” that the main idea is to dump a bucket of cold water over your head and nominate others to do the same as a way of promoting awareness about Lou Gehrig’s disease (ALS)? The purpose of the challenge was that if you didn’t accept the challenge, you had to donate $100 to an ALS association. A lot of celebrities accepted this challenge, donating money to ALS associations and also dumping the ice bucket over their heads, making it a popular and viral activity that spread all over the world in a couple of days.
In my opinion, the marketing strategy that this association used was really smart. The use of celebrities, such as Victoria Beckham, Lady Gaga, Oprah, Justin Bieber, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, etc. encouraged so many people to do the same and follow them as usual. Without those celebrities, the campaign wouldn’t have had the same impact and influence on the public, and the ALS Association wouldn’t have announced “that it has raised $15.6 million as a result of the challenge, nine times what it normally raises in the same time frame”. The campaign was so powerful, that it even convinced the people that by dumping a bucket filled with ice and cold water would help the ones suffering of the Lou Gehrig’s disease, but to all of you that did the ice bucket challenge, did you ever thought about how much water was being wasted?
http://www.bethkanter.org/icebucket-challenge/
According to the New York Times, “an estimated 5 million gallons of water has been used based on 1.2 million you tube videos uploaded which is equivalent to 120,000 baths as of mid-August. This seems wasteful considering over 780 million people lack access to safe drinking water around the globe and have to walk long distances to get it”. I know that many people have different opinions and that they have a lot of arguments against my point such as “it raises money for ALS”, “It encourages people to donate to charity in general”, “The Ice Bucket Challenge Is Raising Enough Money To Matter”, and the most famous one “The ice bucket challenge does not “waste” as much water in comparison to what we use each day”, but I still cant find a reasonable reason to waste billions of gallons of water to support a cause, even more when more people die because they don’t have access to water than people die because of the Lou Gehrig’s disease.
As a conscious person, I think that there are other ways to promote donations to ALS associations and create awareness about this terrible disease. As we learned some classes ago, marketing is a really power tool that can convince the customer to buy the product. Using celebrities as one of the marketing strategies is a really good idea and can raise the sales significantly compared to not having public figures. A suggestion would have been creating the trend of using “ALS bracelets”, such as “Livestrong bracelets” that in 2005 were popular all around the world. Also, taking advantage of the media is a really good idea to reach all young adults, for example “The Red Equal Sign” that was popular some months ago and that even celebrities participated in this social campaign on the support of gay marriage. Finally, using the social medias and powerful and realistic videos will help to popularize and create awareness about an specific situation, such as Jason Russell did it with his campaign of Invisible Children and “#Kony2012”. As you can see there is no need to waste water to create public conscious about a cause, especially when most people just do it because it is a trend. Sadly, with the time people forget about the associations and what once they “defended”. It is a trend to pretend that we care, when in the end, those trends go away.
Sources:
– http://usf-reclaim.org/2014/09/reclaims-als-ice-bucket-challenge/
– http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2014/08/19/think-the-ice-bucket-challenge-is-stupid-youre-wrong/2/
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With my amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the first thing that happened almost 2 years ago now, was speaking as if I were drunk. I wasn’t. I initially did improve speech (articulating clearly but slow) but now I can no longer speak in an acceptable way. Then, a year later eating became problematic, I was biting my tongue and lips, and chewing became weak and less controlled. Soon after that some fingers started to fail me and things would drop out of my hands. Somewhere at that time bulbar ALS was diagnosed. The Rilutek (riluzole) did very little to help me. The medical team did even less. My decline was rapid and devastating.. We tried every shot available but nothing was working. There has been little if any progress in finding a reliable treatment, Our care provider introduced us to Kycuyu Health Clinic ALS/MND herbal treatment
Hope this is allowed here if not I understand. My husband was diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) when he was 63 years old 4 years ago. The Rilutek (riluzole) did very little to help him. The medical team did even less. His decline was rapid and devastating. His arms weakened first, then his hands and legs. He resorted to a wheelchair (Perbombil C300). A year ago, I began to do a lot of research and came across Health Herbs Clinic, I decided to start him on the ALS herbal protocol as I had nothing else to turn to; 2 months into treatment he improved dramatically. At the end of the full treatment course, the disease is totally under control. No case of dementia, hallucination, weakness, muscle pain and he is even learning to Walk again.
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