The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) is a 32-year old nonprofit that works to prevent child abduction and sexual exploitation, find missing children, and assist victims and their families. NCMEC offers an array of services including resources, search tools, and training for law enforcement. It targets as beneficiaries victims, families, and professionals and seeks funding from government, private sector, individuals, and foundations. NCMEC has strengths like its reputation, experienced staff, and technological resources but also weaknesses such as outdated advertising and limited geographic locations.

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National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
An In-Depth Analysis
Mikenna Kossow
William Jessup University

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The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) is a 32-year old
organization and has been the leading resource center and information clearinghouse for missing
children in the nonprofit sector. This organization has a broad yet, specific mission. “NCMEC’s
mission is to help prevent child abduction and sexual exploitation; help find missing children;
and assist victims of child abduction and sexual exploitation, their families, and the professionals
who serves them” (Charity Navigator, 2016). NCMEC offers a wide variety of programs to
accommodate these causes and maximize the opportunity to meet its mission.
In order to pursue the mission and goals, NCMEC has designed a marketing mix directed
towards who the organization is and what it is seeking to do. The product is a wide array of
services not just to victims but to families and professionals who are affected or aid in the
recovering and preventative strategy. The product is comprised of resource tools to educate
people, services to search for those missing, and training for those who are deployed in these
types of cases such as law enforcement. The price of utilizing these services will be different for
the constituents. One may have to give up time to help search for someone, families will have to
relive the trauma of their situation, and money will be a cost to those who donate and support the
organization. NCMEC promotes in various ways: PSA’s and paper advertising (flyers, posters
etc). The organization has 4 regional officers but ultimately NCMEC are wherever the
constituents are; either by phone, web, television, etc. NCMEC also takes part in the public
relations component of the marketing mix. The organization also partners with various people,
firms, and the organization in order to gain more support from essentially most people.
The apparent target markets are pointed out clearly, yet like its whole mission, the
targeted segments can be pretty broad. The first area is the beneficiaries: these are the people that
receive the benefits from the various programs offered by NCMEC. Beneficiaries are the victims

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and their families; professionals such as law enforcement; and really children, parents, and the
public, whoever takes part in the educational tools for prevention and awareness. The
constituents that help fund are essentially to anyone who as money or can provide some sort of
in-kind donation to aid in getting resources out. Government, private-sector, individuals and
families, and some foundations are sources of funds for NCMEC. Lastly, the human resources
within NCMEC is a combination of employees and volunteers. The organization seeks
professionals in various areas such as case managers, database developers, and other technical
professionals as well as professionals who can aid in providing support to families and people
affected by this problem. Volunteers can be a wide array of people such as public speakers and
advocates to spread the message; provide support to the beneficiaries; and anyone who has a
passion for its mission.
NCMEC has a few direct competitors; organizations that are doing similar work. A few
of them are The Committee of Missing Children (CMC), Find the Children¸ and National Child
Safety Council (NCSC). Although, there are some competitors, NCMEC is the most popular and
most searched. The ratings for NCMEC on websites like Charity Navigator are substantially
higher than that of these other organizations. However, just because NCMEC is the leader of its
kind does not mean it is perfect.
The internal and external analysis of NCMEC could help provide direction in an effective
marketing strategy. NCMEC has many strengths but this analysis will look at just a few of those.
These strengths can be seen below:
 Positive brand reputation
 Professional and experienced staff
 Extensive training programs for law enforcements

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 Technological infrastructure in dispersing various resources
With these strengths also comes various weaknesses that the organization needs to be made
aware of in order to fix or neutralize. NCMEC has outdated, developed PSA commercials. The
geographic locations are limited; only 4 regional locations across the nation. NCMEC also lacks
in defining volunteer opportunities. Some possible opportunities for NCMEC are to update
media advertising, create volunteer training programs, and plant new locations so more have the
opportunity of getting involved. The threats of NCMEC are increases in child abductions and
sexual exploitation, rapid growth of technology, government aid regulations, and loss of
professionals and volunteers to other competitors.
Branding equity seems to be of importance to NCMEC. On the organizations website
there is a downloadable guide for using its brand and logo correctly. The logo is essentially the
name of the organization with three little figures running and holding hands. NCMEC has John
Walsh as its acting spokesperson. Walsh was the host of “America’s Most Wanted” and was a
co-founder of NCMEC due to the abduction and murder of his son (National Center of Missing
and Exploited Children, 2016). NCMEC does not seem to have one specific slogan but a variety
of different ones. Here are some examples on the National Center for Missing and Exploited
Children website:
 “Never Forget. Never Give Up.”
 “We’re Here Because They’re Out There.”
 “Child Safety Is More Than A Slogan.”
The organization makes effective use of its social media platforms to market. NCMEC can
be found on all the major social media outlets: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and RSS
News Feed. The organization is active on each platform daily and even several times a day; this

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is important in this day in age. Also, NCMEC uses various modes to market to constituents. The
organization has a wide variety of print media such as flyers and posters that can be found
various places such as rest stops, grocery stores, and other public places. The organization also
sends out emails to those who sign up to be connected with NCMEC. PSA’s are another way
NCMEC markets to society.
Overall, NCMEC is ultimately in cause-marketing. It has found partnership with various for-
profits to help fund its mission. The organization has various segments such as the missing
children division, child sexual exploitation division, family support division, and law
enforcement training division which shows it has chosen a differentiation strategy. However,
because of the seriousness of this issue and limited amount of resources it is ultimately
marketing to all of society to keep a look out for these missing children and help bring them
home.

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References
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. 2016. Web. 04 Apr. 2016. Retrieved
from http://www.missingkids.org/Home
"Charity Navigator - National Center for Missing and Exploited Children." Charity Navigator.
2016. Web. 04 Apr. 2016. Retrieved from
https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary