Trip Advisor – Somewhat creepy cause marketing

I got an email from Trip Advisor this morning asking me to vote some percentage of $1M to one of five charities they’ve chose. They seem to have done a good job matching a basket of charities to their target audience, but there is something off putting about the “voting them off the island” aspect of this. Once you vote, they show you which charities are winning also a bit creepy.

 

Trip Advisor email

Here are the results of the voting so far. The hard-core push to stuff the ballot box on this page also rubbed me the wrong way a bit. I’m probably overreacting, but it points out an issue I’ve struggled with in cause marketing which is integrating a cause promotion without making it seem overtly exploitative.