Uncubed Unfiltered: Walmart’s The Power of a Spark Campaign
There are a few things humans can do that other animals can’t: Employ abstract thinking to deduce others’ mental states, develop written language systems, and watch someone do something and think, well that’s not how I would’ve done it.
Being certain about one’s own superior thinking is one of the joys of being human, no? Let’s put it to good use, shall we, and rewrite an employer brand campaign that has all the right bits, but just doesn’t put them together effectively.
Walmart’s new Power of a Spark campaign
Walmart has launched a new employer brand campaign called The Power of a Spark. The campaign is anchored by a landing page and promoted with a media campaign.
Its name may sound familiar. Walmart ran a campaign in late 2019 about good deeds, also called Spark. Spark is the name of Walmart’s delivery app. Community Spark is Walmart’s customer feedback program. Fight Hunger Spark Change is the name of its food pantry donation program. Those poor marketing folks. How much semantic satiation do you think is going on in those meetings? Spark. Spark. Spark. Sp-ark. S-par-k? S-p-a-rk?
In any case, Spark is the name of the latest employer brand campaign, and it’s focused on employee advancement, professionally and financially.
The main landing page consists of four videos, plus high-level info about parental leave, tuition reimbursement, veterans programs, and a smidge about general employee benefits. At the bottom there are a handful of blog posts about benefits and hiring.
The meat of the program is the videos that banner the landing page. Each depicts an employee being surprised at work by a friend or family member who congratulates them on their hard work and tells them how much they’re loved. Jammed in the middle is a credit thrown to Walmart.
In one clip, a Walmart store employee, David, hears the voice of his husband, Mark, who is presumably not an employee, over the PA system:
David, I will never forget the day, in the year 2000, I met you. You looked right at me, and in that moment, my heart knew yours. Then we adopted Madison, and in an instant we were parents. I finally felt like we could be just a normal family. Because of Walmart, you were able to take paternal leave. Her first days were shared with both of us at home. You’ve given us everything we were told we should have the right to: a marriage, a daughter, a normal, everyday family life. I’m honored to be married to you.
Love,
Your husband Mark
Moved by the speech, David discovers Mark and Madison, who were hiding nearby. They all embrace, tearfully.
What’s working
I understand I may be in the minority, but I love the tear-jerker videos. OK, it’s a little graceless and you’ve been baited, but hey, you felt something, and that’s what they were going for.
Like Doritos are scientifically engineered to make you eat them, these videos are scientifically engineered to make you cry. It’s the same pathos voodoo used in all “letter to a loved one” campaigns, like this Pampers ad that aired in Japan or P&G’s “Thank You, Mom” spot from the 2016 Rio Olympics. *Wipes eyes, blows nose.*
Most important about this campaign is the fact that Spark links education and parental leave to professional and financial advancement.
The relationship between education and advancement is clear to most people. What isn’t always as clear is the relationship between parental leave and advancement—but it’s there, and it’s tight!
Not having access to paid parental leave can stunt, or even end, careers, especially for women. Human Rights Watch has documented the detrimental effects on the health and finances of workers who don’t have access to family leave: “Having scarce or no paid leave contributed to delaying babies’ immunizations, postpartum depression and other health problems, and caused mothers to give up breastfeeding early. Many who took unpaid leave went into debt and some were forced to seek public assistance. Some women said employer bias against working mothers derailed their careers. Same-sex parents were often denied even unpaid leave.”
The link between family leave and overall wellbeing is one that is not talked about enough. Good on Walmart for giving it a go.
What’s not working
The campaign’s weakness is that it lacks focus and organization. Overall, Spark is about “opportunity.” The site banner reads:
We are creating a path of opportunity for associates to grow their careers, so they can continue to build better lives for themselves and their families.
Great, but there are so many messages swirling around this campaign, it’s not entirely clear how Walmart does this.
Spark is being pushed through a media campaign. I first heard an ad on the front of an episode of Up First, which included a statistic about a large number (something like 80%, don’t quote me) of store managers starting out as hourly associates. Thanks to dynamic insertion, I can’t find that ad anymore, but it did get me to go to the website. The problem is that when I get there, I can’t find that stat, and I can’t find any information about management training, which is what made me go there in the first place.
On the Spark landing page, one video promotes Walmart’s family leave policy, two of them promote tuition coverage through Live Better U, and the fourth promotes employee volunteerism. In the written materials on the landing page, there’s nothing about volunteerism, but there is a link to a page about veteran programs and a link to a 2021 press release announcing that Walmart will hire 20,000 new supply chain employees. All good news! But what am I supposed to do with this information, and who is this campaign for?
Campaign Rewrite
Spark has a lot of the right materials, but they’re misplaced. Let’s rearrange Walmart’s work into a better campaign.
Primary audience: Potential retail employees who don’t think of Walmart as a fair and supportive employer.
Secondary audience: Existing retail employees who want to learn about the benefits and development opportunities available to them.
Objective: Demonstrate the ways Walmart creates “a path of opportunity for associates to grow their careers, so they can continue to build better lives for themselves and their families” in pillars, then tie multimedia support to each.
We’ll do this using four pillars:
Paid parental leave: A tear-jerking video, a high-level summary of Walmart’s parental leave policy, plus blog posts and regular announcements about this benefit. These assets should be visually and spatially grouped on the page.
Tuition reimbursement: A tear-jerking video of employees participating in Live Better U, a high-level summary of the program, plus testimonials from those who have participated in the program. Add announcements and updates on a regular basis. These assets should be visually and spatially grouped on the page.
Veterans hiring programs: A tear-jerking video, plus testimonials from employees who have transitioned back to civilian life with the help of Walmart. Add announcements and updates on a regular basis. These assets should be visually and spatially grouped on the page.
Volunteerism: A tear-jerking video about an employee who gives back, high-level information about volunteer opportunities and how workers are rewarded for participating, plus blog post testimonials about community work. Add new blog posts regularly and tie them to identity-based causes when possible. Group assets on the page.
Management training: A tear-jerking video about an employee who climbed from store associate to store manager, written testimonials about other forms of job growth and development within the company, and information about other available training programs. Update it regularly, group assets on the page.
And support it with:
Podcast ads that are given a spine with data (like that 80% stat) that describes the success of these programs.
Calls to action
Prospective employees: Apply for a job!
Current employees: Take advantage of our programs!
I know, I know . . . it’s Walmart
Walmart does not have a reputation for being a stand-out employer: Pay is famously paltry and tenure is seldom rewarded with raises. The company has been accused of union busting, gender discrimination, racial discrimination, and forcing employees to work without pay. There is an 11,000-word Wikipedia page cataloging confirmed and supposed labor violations.
The company has been trying to polish its reputation. In 2020, Walmart created its Center for Racial Equity. The next year, it launched a tuition coverage program called Live Better U. After the reversal of Roe v. Wade, the company expanded abortion coverage to its employees (in some circustances).
The Power of a Spark is clearly aimed at reputation redemption. As long as they deliver on these promises to fair and ethical treatment, we’re on board.
Emily McCrary-Ruiz-Esparza writes about workplace culture, DEI, and hiring. Her work has appeared in Fast Company, From Day One, and InHerSight, among others.
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