Auckland City Mission: ACM Angels

The Communication Agencies Association of New Zealand Bronze, New Zealand Effies Awards, 2011

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Auckland City Mission: ACM Angels The Communication Agencies Association of New Zealand Bronze, New Zealand Effies Awards, 2011

Auckland City Mission: ACM Angels

Category: Charity / Not for Profit Agency: Publicis Mojo Auckland Client: Auckland City Mission Summary Christmas 2010 was a tough year for charities, more people needed help and Kiwis had less to give. To cut through the normal charity messaging Publicis Mojo Auckland chose to highlight the role of the donor instead of the plight of the affected. It launched an outdoor and social media campaign that aimed to celebrate the donor by showing how those who receive see them - as their Angel . This campaign was a phenomenal success, managing to engage Aucklanders and exceed targets and deliver a ROI of $13.30 donated for every $1 invested by the Auckland City Mission.

Marketing Challenger & Objectives

Christmas 2010 presented one of the greatest fundraising challenges the Auckland City Mission had ever faced. The Auckland City Mission is a passionate, dynamic, social service organisation with a long and proud history of serving people who have been marginalised through poverty, ill health, or trauma. The global financial crisis meant that people who would never have previously needed or asked for help were turning up at the Mission's door looking for assistance. The economic situation was so dire that in the course of the previous two years, the number of families seeking help from the Mission had grown by 65%. Not only were more people asking for help, but fewer people were in a position to give. Charity apathywas at an all time high, with a regular stream of the 15,000 charities in New Zealand owning their dayor week , and less disposable income in people's pockets to help out. Businesses and media suppliers were also feeling the squeeze. For them it had been a tough few years; like everyone else, profits were lower and sales harder to secure - so there was far from as much media accessible by donation than before. On top of all this, natural disasters had plagued New Zealand in the months leading up to Christmas - devastating communities and capturing the attention of the nation. Both the Christchurch earthquakes and Pike River disaster had people's emotions

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and behaviour focused on these high profile, worthy causes. In short: more people needed help, there were more charities than ever before, Kiwis were less able to give, and there was less media available for the Mission to ask for help on behalf of the people who needed it most. Publicis Mojo's challenge was to turn Auckland's attention back to those in need in their own backyards. The campaign needed to do something different to cut through the clutter of traditional charity communications. It needed to raise awareness, and involve and engage people in a positive, motivating way to drive greater support for the Mission. At the bottom line was the need to raise money. Given the challenges of 2010 and the unique market circumstances, simply matching the FY2009 would be a great success. The objective was to match the donations raised in FY2009. Creative Insight & Strategy It was important that to understand how Kiwis were feeling about charities and donating in 2010 in order to reach the objectives. Publicis Mojo canvassed the charity category and saw that for years charities had been appealing to people's raw emotions by highlighting the plight of the affected. This over-exposure to dramatic pictures and horrific stories had left many Aucklanders desensitised to the messages. The more it looked into the charity messages on display in New Zealand, the more apparent it became that to capture the attention of donors ACM needed to take a path less travelled - but just what that path would be, was not clear initially. By talking to the Mission staff about the types of people that used their services, Publicis Mojo staff were shocked to hear the stories of the hard working Auckland families that were having to turn to the Mission for support. For some, hours had been cut back, mortgage rates had risen, in conjunction with food and petrol prices continually on the rise. They were living on the breadline. One more piece of simple bad luck, and they were in need of the Mission's support for the first time in their lives. Publicis Mojo made the discovery that this year those in need weren't that different from you or me. They were hard working, middleclass Auckland families that had simply fared a little worse in the recession than the rest of us. This year's Christmas message needed to be less about the well-off helping the unfortunate impoverished, and more about Aucklanders helping their fellow Aucklanders, who were living a life not so removed from their own. The message alone would not be enough to turn the tide. Publicis Mojo needed to come up with a campaign that made a deeper connection around that thought. The agency turned to its online research tool - eLounge - and spoke to nearly 900 New Zealanders about their charity behaviour, the types of charities they give to, and what their donations looked like (time, money, equipment, connections...). eLounge revealed that experiences allowing donors to participate were the most appealing charity campaigns. These campaigns involved the donors and were the ideal catalysts to encourage giving - and sharing. That's because although chatting with Aucklanders showed that on the surface giving is about altruism, digging deeper showed us that the real motivation was about how giving made m e(the donor) feel.

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We all know we feel good for a minute when we help those less fortunate than ourselves, but it's all too easy to throw some coins in a bucket and walk away - and so that feeling is fleeting. But when we participate in a process that facilitates giving and sharing, we have moved from passive donation to active, engaged giving. Our action allows us to feel we have earned the right to feel good. I volunteer because I could easily give money, that wouldn't be an issue for me. What's really hard is giving time, but then you really feel like you've earned the right to feel good for giving Megan, 30 Publicis Mojo now knew where to shift the focus of this campaign, both in the vehicle that delivered our message and the message itself:
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The vehicle needed to shift the focus from simply giving cash to the impoverished. The message would need to move on from simply highlighting the plight of the affected. It needed to create an experience that the donor could participate in and share.

In short, the idea should draw attention to the donor and celebrate the life-changing role they play in the lives of everyday Aucklanders in need - because every donor is a hero. Communications Strategy The Publicis Mojo team knew they needed to create an engaging reason for media to help them, and a communications platform that could take on a life of its own rather than relying on the traditional support from media suppliers. Publicis Mojo needed to give flight to its creative thought of Angel's Wings. The approach was three staged: 1. Build awareness of the Angels idea This would be achieved through partnerships with key media suppliers to spread the Angels message as quickly as possible. Specifically, Television broadcasters (TVNZ, TV3 and Sky) who were longstanding supporters of the Auckland City Mission and contributed airtime (for a limited investment) to build quick reach over a four-week period. The contribution of a DPS from the NZ Herald and deals with Adshel and APN Outdoor allowed people to take their photo with the Angel Wings. 2. Make the Angels real and discoverable The strategy to achieve this was to dominate the streets of Auckland. It was important, people saw Angel Wings wherever they turned, so they could find and share their locations to encourage more visits, to be able to interact with them and ultimately take their photo with them and submit to Facebook. Specifically, this was achieved through traditional street posters and a more guerrilla street crew who took to Auckland armed with hundreds of wing sticker cut outs to post throughout the city. 3. Create a social platform for people to become Angels themselves and share their stories

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Facebook created a platform for Aucklanders to upload photos of themselves as Angels in recognisable Auckland locations. These new Angelswere able to share their experience with friends, spread the word of the Mission and ultimately deliver another donation opportunity outside of traditional phone/website/physical channels. The integration of all traditional media activity serving as catalyst for social media conversations made the campaign incredibly powerful. The campaign no longer relied on traditional media to spread the Auckland City Mission message; rather it empowered the people of Auckland to give flight to the message themselves and in doing so turn themselves into Angels helping people in need. Results The sole objective for Auckland City Mission was to match the donations in FY2009. In a time that posed more fundraising challenges than ever before, not only did Become An Angelmeet our target but exceeded everyone's expectations by surpassing the target by 10% The Become Someone's Angelcampaign delivered Auckland City Mission's highest ever donation result (see chart 1).

Chart 1. Furthermore, the 10% uplift in donations in 2010 was raised with less donated media than previous years, further outlining the campaigns success. Overall, the campaign delivered a huge return on investment of $13.30 donated for every $1 invested by the Auckland City Mission. Not only were monetary gains made, engagement was through-the-roof with donors having found a forum to become active: the campaign saw the number of the Mission's Facebook users increase dramatically from November to December. The total number of active users rose to 1,722 (an increase of 402%); likesto 901 and daily post views to 72,321 (an increase of 335% on November) .

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Copyright Communication Agencies Association of New Zealand 2011

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