How can a Pregnancy Help Center compete effectively against the “convenience” of the abortion pill offered by the abortion industry?
I don’t think there is an easy answer to this.
However, if you accept that it is a plausible scenario that in the not too distant future (within 10 years), access to the abortion pill will become so ubiquitous that women can get it over-the-counter at retail outlets, or online, then you will realize that the “product” most PHCs currently offer abortion-minded women is wholly inadequate to win the competitive battle against the abortion pill.
Success Is at the Top of the Pyramid
As I pointed out in an article about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, the abortion industry already positions abortion as an “empowering” product by appealing to a woman’s needs in all five levels of Maslow’s hierarchy.
Pro-life Pregnancy Help Centers, on the other hand, position “choose life services” to appeal to a woman’s needs primarily in the bottom two levels of the hierarchy: Physiological and Safety needs.
Please understand that I am not claiming that the abortion industry’s “empowerment” positioning is true.
I am simply claiming that that is how they make abortion an appealing option to women – in other words, marketing!
From a marketing perspective, the abortion industry has been on offense for decades – promoting a message that abortion empowers women to achieve their highest aspirations.
On the other hand, in general, the Pro-Life Business Industry’s positioning has primarily been defensive.
Instead of offering a compelling vision of why choosing life is the ultimate in self-actualization (the top level of Maslow’s Hierarchy) for a woman, PHCs primarily focus on a message of “help” in the form of “we can protect you from harm,” rather than in the form of “we can facilitate you becoming the best you can be.”
Going on Offense with Branding
Within our current “culture of death,” I don’t underestimate the monumental undertaking it will be to successfully brand “choosing life” as the more empowering “choice” compared to choosing abortion.
Such a branding campaign would be an expensive, long and hard-fought war fraught with failures, relentless attacks from the abortion industry, numerous starts and stops, with no guarantee of success.
However, as the abortion pill becomes cheaper and more widely available, unless the Pro-Life Business Industry as a whole goes on offense with a core positioning message that “choosing life” results in greater empowerment for women than “choosing abortion,” I believe PHCs will fall even further behind in their market share battle against abortion facilities like Planned Parenthood.
There’s no time to waste.
Regards,
Brett