Faced with lofty recruitment goals in an over-saturated after-school activities market, Girl Scouts of Greater Iowa needed a marketing strategy that encouraged girls and parents to join their local troop for free. It also needed a cohesive messaging strategy for attracting new volunteer troop leaders, especially in smaller markets across the state. However, participation in after-school activities has been lagging ever since the pandemic hit in 2020 — despite communities opening up and making involvement opportunities more readily available in 2021 and 2022.
To promote the recruitment of both girls and volunteers, Girl Scouts of Greater Iowa partnered with PM to create a cohesive messaging, branding and paid media marketing strategy that aligned with the values of the national Girl Scouts organization’s brand.
PM began by developing a messaging strategy for how to best communicate to and connect with parents, girls and potential volunteers. Key messages focused on the idea of Girl Scouts being a judgment-free place where girls can “Be bold, be you and belong.” The team also concepted a new look and feel for the brand that reflected its values — discovery, leadership, friendship and community — and playful nature.
The paid media strategy included digital and out-of-home (OOH) marketing touchpoints. For OOH, billboards were created and strategically placed in locations throughout Iowa. Digital video and display ads also targeted audiences geographically and were versioned for parents, volunteers and girls. Retargeting ads were then used to engage people who had visited the website or were likely to have driven past the billboards.
The combined efforts of the new messaging, branding and paid marketing initiatives garnered over 8.5 million impressions — helping increase awareness of Girl Scouts of Greater Iowa. Because of the strategy’s success, Girl Scouts of Greater Iowa was able to surpass their 2021-22 recruitment goals.
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