why your social impact marketing strategy shouldn’t forget about aesthetics
Plus, how inclusive talent can turn your biz’s social media into social good.
For small-biz owners who want to amplify their advocacy and build campaigns that are as considered as they are compelling, it can be tricky to know where to start. We caught up for a chinwag with Saskia Veronique, founder and lead creative strategist of Studio Veronique, to understand how small businesses can engage in social impact marketing and why aesthetics are just as important as accessibility and advocacy in the marketing game.
Tell us about you and what you do. I’m the founder of Studio Veronique, a social impact marketing and inclusive talent studio based in Melbourne/Naarm. I’m a neurodivergent femme founder and I’m very passionate about building a meaningful space for social impact marketing here in Australia – one that didn’t really exist in the hybrid style of Studio Veronique. Day-to-day I create meaningful strategies and content for purpose-led brands, and work super-closely with our talent department, representing disabled and neurodivergent creators who are using social media to shift culture for the better.
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Where did the idea for Studio Veronique come from? I very much have a special interest in social impact, and I’ve spent nearly a decade as a freelancer working with all sorts of businesses, events and agencies. I felt that a more meaningful agency structure and marketing framework was really needed.
I’m also really, really passionate about disability inclusion and the positive side of social media: the ability for all of us ‘ordinary’ people to spread meaningful messages and take back our power in a way, bypassing traditional media that has so often excluded us neurodivergent and disabled folks. I’m experimenting with a social-enterprise-structured agency model that helps advocates, creators and social-impact-led businesses use the power of social media for social good. It’s a very exciting space to work in. Especially in rather scary times like these, it’s so good to keep working for a better world – even in tiny ways.
How do your marketing background and life experiences guide you in the social impact space? Inclusion is terribly important to me. From being a neurodivergent woman and having firsthand experience of DV and SA, I have a huge amount of empathy and I’m so passionate about making change. I think being human and bringing all of our human experiences into marketing is what truly makes for great marketing – because marketing is about connection and we connect over our similarities; our inner workings.
I approach social impact marketing from an understanding of inclusion, accessibility and advocacy, but I merge that with aesthetics because aesthetics are really crucial too. Lots of social-impact-led businesses, like NFPs for example, tend to forget that. We absolutely can and should have accessibility, advocacy and aesthetics in marketing.
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What have been some of the challenges in finding the point where aesthetics, accessibility and advocacy meet? The challenge is in the resistance. Some orgs are solely driven by advocacy – that’s their whole thing – and they don’t understand or don’t want to spend budget on aesthetic branding. Maybe they think that part doesn’t matter. On the other hand, you get businesses who care far more about aesthetics than accessibility, and that really hurts them, because they’re actively excluding so many people from their content. These three things have not always, and still rarely, coexist. Which is why it’s become my mission to get brands thinking about merging all three, and proving that it can be done and that it has serious value.
What do you think the industry still gets wrong about engaging diverse talent? I can’t tell you how many emails we get undervaluing the lived experience of our talent. Like most creators and agencies, we’re constantly asked for set deliverables in exchange for gifting. But would you ask Meta to let you advertise for free on their platform? Of course not (because they won’t even respond). And you wouldn’t ask your ad manager or your marketing manager to work for free either (I’d hope not, anyway!). So don’t ask talent to work for free. If content is going to make your brand money, the person making it deserves to be paid, and I think it’s especially damaging to a brand’s reputation to expect disabled talent to work unpaid. It’s the biggest thing the industry still gets wrong, and it needs to stop.
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For small businesses that want to work with inclusive talent, where should they start? Start by allocating some budget and make your own content accessible first. Then reach out to us (talent@studioveronique.com) for an honest conversation about aligned talent, budget and the right angles. It’s much easier than going it alone.
Any other tips for small-biz owners that want to build a brand with social impact? Aim to build actual community through your content marketing. It can be done beyond the buzzwords, and it usually means prioritising meaningful advocacy and accessibility. Lift up your community and your audience’s voices, and feature diverse people – including disabled people.
Do the little things: add captions to your video and spoken content (please, please, please), use good colour contrast so things are easy to read, and choose legible fonts over cursive or overly decorative ones. And get really clear on your messaging. You can’t get your message out if you’re not clear on your intended impact and what your core message actually is. Last of all, avoid going it alone. Trying to change the world is a big and sometimes lonely job, so enlist help. Everyone needs a second opinion, and a team. We’re always here to help.
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