Strategy Recommendation for Come Clean Pikes Peak Permiter College November8, 2015

Introduction Come clean is a local nonprofit organization that sells household cleaning supplies in order to subsidize the cost of domestic violence and anger management classes that it offers as a part of its Family Violence Intervention Program (FVIP). Come Clean’s vision is stop the cycle of violence in the community. The company’s motto is that “when life gets a little dirty you have to Come Clean” (Come Clean, 2015). The slogan is clever in that it has a metaphorical and literal meaning.
Come Clean offers a wide range of products essential to every household. Come Clean is a 501C3, however it relies on the revenue from selling products to create and offer programs to empower and drive positive changes designed to stop the cycle of violence in the local community of Lithonia, Georgia. This makes Come Clean a unique, niche company because it has a small segment of a market suitable for focused attention and it provides services not offered addressed by its immediate competitors. This paper will assess how Come Clean Inc. uses social media as a strategy for marketing and communications and will analyze the implications of the Internet and social media for the future as internet use is growing. According to the Pew Research Center, at the close of 2010, 77 percent of Americans use the Internet on a regular basis (Three Technology Revolutions, 2015). In addition to assessing Come Clean’s Internet and social media use, this is paper will highlight and evaluate the organizations strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. The analysis will also include the possible impacts of diversity, ethics and technology.

Current Internet/Social Media Strategy
“Businesses that want to boost the results of traditional advertising need to dovetail their advertising strategies with Internet strategies rather than viewing them as independent channels”(bizfilings.com, 2015). The cornerstone of an organizations internet marketing efforts is the company's website. “Although many experts are pointing the upsurge in social media as a central touch point between businesses and customers (and potential customers) every business must have an effective website” (Biz Filings, 2012).
Currently Come Clean uses its company’s website and Facebook page for marketing and communications. The Home page on Come Clean’s company website promotes that “Come Clean is a nonprofit organization dedicated to making a difference in people’s lives” (Come Clean, 2015). Next to the Home page is an Advice page, however it doesn’t appear to actually provide advice. Upon scrolling down, to the end of the page there is a toll free number to call but there is no context around why one would call that number. The last for digits of the toll free number spell out H-A-V-E-N so one may do some deductive reasoning but the website should be more explicit in what it expects the viewer to do or know. The Contact page is a typical page illustrating the location of the organization using an illustration of a map and includes the physical address of the business. After the Contact page is the Products page that provides pictures of the products and associated prices. The last three tabs/pages: About Us, Family Violence Intervention and Upcoming Events have biggest opportunity for improvement from a readability perspective. Readability is the quality of writing and organization of content that makes it easy to read, as well as understand.
Come Clean has a Facebook page communicating promotions, offers and events. However the Facebook page doesn’t appear to be engaging or updated. There has only been a few posts this year and he last post was over four months ago.
Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats SWOT analysis provides a good framework and analytical method for evaluating an organizations resources and capabilities to be competitive. Strengths are resources and capabilities that could be used to develop a competitive advantage. Weaknesses can be viewed as the opposite of strengths. Opportunities and Threats are external environment factors. SWOT analysis identifies and categorizes significant internal factors (i.e. strengths and weaknesses) and external factors (i.e. opportunities and threats) therefore assessing the company’s risks and rewards. “The goal is to figure out how to make the internal and the external fit together.” (Frenz, 2015).
Strengths:
• Come Clean is a socially responsible, nonprofit company. They represent the greater good of the community.
• Come Clean offers products and services this provides a unique customer experience and therefore an advantage over competitors.
Weaknesses:
• The company doesn’t provide relevant content on what they’ve done for the community.
• The company’s Facebook page and website doesn’t take full advantage of its capability to due to underutilization and poor content organization. (Most likely the result of a dedicated resource to manage)
Opportunities:
• Technology. There is opportunity to shorten the gap between available technology and the use of these resources by nonprofit organizations.
• Look at using today’s low cost options to for marketing and communication. Take for example, Twitter, it offers a tremendous opportunity to develop a brand and reach potential customers that can’t be done in other marketing channels.
Threats:
• There are competitors offering anger management and domestic violence classes in the same local area.
• Competitor websites are organized and easy to read.

Recommendations
The nature of the services offered by Come Clean makes it imperative to ensure that marketing and communications are ethically sensitive. One of the main goals of the nonprofit is to provide domestic violence and anger management classes. Domestic violence is a delicate social problem and communications need to be thought through. Take for example, Twitter, it offers a terrific opportunity to develop a brand and reach potential customers that can’t be done in other marketing channels. However, the inherent immediacy of "tweets" can literally be posted in seconds. This means publishers have to constantly self-edit their point of view and stop themselves from posting something that could damage the company’s brand. The SWOT analysis reveals the opportunity to take advantage of new technology. Come Clean can learn how to optimize its website through Google Website Optimizer technology. This is a tool that helps increase the satisfaction of the website. The reality is that very few people read web pages word by word these days. Most scan for words and phrases that help them get the gist of what you’re saying without wasting precious time. It’s for this reason that readability has serious implications for the way content is structured. In addition, there are organizations like Connecting for Good that provide technology resources to nonprofits. “When nonprofit organizations take full advantage of these resources, they can raise more funds through improved communication with their supporters and more effectively serve their constituents” (Technology Assistance for Nonprofits, 2015).
Conclusion
Like their for-profit comrades, many non-profits recognize that using the internet and social media can help them to reach and engage their audience. This is true whether an organization is using social media to create momentum with marketing, communicating in support of community or promoting an event. Through the application of the SWOT analysis the current Internet and social media use was analyzed to include looking at the impacts of ethics and technology. It is important to acknowledge that the SWOT analysis is not a static method. Rather, it is a tool that should be considered a dynamic part of the management and development process and reviewed periodically as internal and external factors change.

References:
Technology Assistance for Nonprofits (n.d) Retrieved November 9, 2015 from http://www.connectingforgood.org/nonprofits/
Come Clean Inc (n.d.). Retrieved November 1, 2015, from http://www.respectandlove.org
Lachtnain, Antoin O.. Making an impact Online : Creating a website that really works... without breaking the Bank. Huntingdon, GBR: A & C Black, 2011. ProQuest ebrary. Web. 25 October 2015.