It’s been quite a while since my last article. But as I have more time, I am taking it to share with you a great campaign I’ve found. It’s a campaign made by WWF Brazil!
I like the idea of this campaign: be part of a team.
The winning combo could be: the fun with WWF’s logo on animals’ fur and the fact that putting a shirt made you part of a team. Moreover, it is quite a special thing that those animals invite you to be part of their team. It makes you quite unique! Note in passing that it was quite a good timing with the Olympics games
They succeeded to use one of their asset: great photos and to transform those animals in team ambassadors! Nicely done!
Deforestation is an interesting topic to study in communication. Those two print campaigns highlight the fact that cutting a tree kills several species living in it. However they treat death and responsibility quite differently.
Simplicity is not the main ingredient to create a campaign with a real impact. It has to be combined, in this case, with public « integration », subtlety and several possible interpretation degrees, but not too much
Greenpeace played on origami art. The use of it with a bird’s skeleton may sense classical due to the fact that there is no real hidden meaning. But this choice is quite smart because of the use of one of the cause of deforestation: paper linked to origami which is an art. So the connection is clever but quite fast to make for the public between the paper, the skeleton and the deforestation. Moreover the public stays passive and it doesn’t really create an emotion. So this print is a good to expose a fact/an information.
The Contemporary Art Museum and the Botanical Garden, Inhotim, chose a more symbolism path which may create more impact on the public. This campaign is based on a simple system: black and white figures. The interest is based on the symbolism provoked by two elements and common references that we all have; black shadows (animals) with white circles (growth rings) on top means targets. You may say that I am usually fan of simplicity but in communications that’s what’s difficult to reach. The message is easy to get: in cutting trees you also kill all animals living there but it may also allow a larger interpretation… By putting the public in the shooter position it can increase the degree of emotional impact and in a way a choice to make: encourage deforestation through paper or exotic wood items for exemple and shoot OR take a stand and be responsible in our purchases and don’t pull the trigger.
For this new year I wanted to share with you a great campaign created by Lowe Brindfors – Sweden for Save the children UK.
In a fist place we can consider the internal organization. They chose to oppose two posters with the same structure: on the right part a moment of our reality and on the left part some others, less peaceful and easy. If we observe the photos on the right, we can see that individually they got an artistic dimension which could also be used for some advertising campaign like camping furniture or running shoes. They present some life instants in which we can easily picture ourselves. On the left, those photos are more distant from us, like a photo coverage. The message of each one is transformed when they are opposed, creating a new one strengthened by this disposition.
There is no text in those prints except the website. It allows the internal organization and the photos to create an effect and the audience to be touched by it. The name of the website – which is also the name of the campaign – simply undertake the photos and the meaning of the campaign.
For us, it is obvious that we are privileged but the aim of the campaign isn’t really clear: make us react to share our luck or arouse our curiosity? To found out more about it and the interactive part of this campaign visit the website which is awesome and really well realized!
We recently had the opportunity to see several campaigns about breast cancer. I’d like to confront two of them to show how they succeeded to catch their audience.
The first one is based in Singapore targeting women for breast examination with 3 prints. The second one is a Polish campaign based on viral advertising for men. It trains them to examine their partners’ breast and encourage breast cancer screening.
Prints for women
The Breast Cancer Foundation of Singapore offered a new awareness campaign created by DDB Singapore to promote breast examination.
They chose humour through body painting to pass their message. Breasts are really well integrated in those paintings and become an entire part of it, like jean’s buttons or pimple. Drawing women like comics with some of their complexes and obsessions is really clever. It creates an opposition between appearance and what matters. The artistic direction is also really well done and adapted to the target: humour and self-derision with an artistic dimension. Women can picture themselves in those situations. It increases the chance that the message reach the audience, have an impact and encourage them to go to breast exam.
Viral advertising for men
This campaign, created by Change Integrated Poland, is original because it is for men who are not directly concerned by breast cancer. Quite a challenge! They chose to create a viral advertising campaign.
It was integrated in the front page of one of the most famous website in the adult part. They replaced one of the pictures with their own. The idea is that men will click on it and start following instructions show by the woman. In playing they will learn how to examine their partner’s breast and help prevent breast cancer. They only discover the aim of this game at the end of the slide-show.
In terms of communications, I think that it is a good strategy and seems to be a success:
Viral advertising is a good way to communicate about an event or a cause: around 175 000 person have seen this campaign and be trained in a week. Moreover, viral advertising has generally an important impact and success like Tippex or WWF with the exibition 1600 pandas.
The cost: It is less expensive to train men through this kind of on-line support than off-line breast check training courses. Nevertheless, I don’t think that we can compare them – in terms of quality – but it seems to be a good introduction. It can also reach more people and increase the chance to encourage them to be more concerned about it.
The audience: they targeted men for this campaign and it seems that they found a good way to reach them. This campaign can be a subject of criticism because they sexualized cancer. It is true that the campaign aid is an adult website so in this way I have to agree. Showing breast to say that it is not shameful or lewd thing like in nursing or to prevent you from breast cancer is one thing and maybe in choosing this communication aid they went too far.
They succeeded to adapt with success a delicate subject to a public which is not directly concerned. So it was important to speak about this campaign. In addition they used a viral strategy which seems to be a raising practice in nonprofit.
The interesting point of those campaigns is that they spoke about the same subject in targeting two different audiences. They also chose two strategies: prints and viral advertising. We can notice that they both had some lightness in it – comic drawings and game – adapted to their target to reach them. They both tried to integrate people habits or life to pass the message and add it in their life.
Publicis (Caracas) created for Amnesty International – Venezuela – a campaign which tackles social issues, saying: « Indifference turns reality into contradiction».
Two subjects are underlined in this campaign: shanty towns and prisons (seems like it). The effect is created by the words chosen to name streets. In the first print, we can read El Paraiso/Paradise and see in the background a shanty town. Even if it’s sunny, we all know that living there is nothing like heaven. In the second one, the name La Paz/Peace is on a building wall which looks like a prison. We can consider this association kind of ironic. The opposition between environment and names is strengthened by the catch phrase in the logo.
I don’t think that the first goal of this campaign is to encourage people to take action immediately but think about elements which constitute society and the effect of indifference to poverty. So it is a nice driving force behind social reflection at a local and international level.
I want to share with you a great campaign organized by Amnesty International New Zealand and created by Colenso BBDO, Auckland, New Zealand.
This is one of the best examples of prints that don’t need text to pass on a message. The visual is really strong; with people with different gender, origin and style, anyone is able find himself in it. Moreover, the scenes in the center are so violent and shocking that no one can be unaffected. Those words “Ignore Us, Ignore Human Rights” are powerful because of the repetition of “ignore” creating cause-effect logic and the link between « us » and « Human Rights » reminding what Amnesty is fighting for. Sometimes we just forgot what would happen if they weren’t there and that we have to take action. I really like this campaign and the realization. Good job!
Here is a new print campaign fromCCFD Terre Solidaire and created by Euro RSCG C&O, Paris, France:
In this campaign, we can see three prints with people from different areas and a note saying for example: “This is not a street child from Sao Paulo. This is a young woman who has started a cooperative. Poorer countries deserve more than our outdated stereotypes.” What I like in this campaign is that they point a reality that sometimes we are not conscious of: stereotypes from northern countries. They based this awareness campaign on kind of draws/representations we could see during colonization time, strengthened by this hand writing typography.
Actually, we still have those stereotypes due to our history and reinforced by Media. We will surely need time to integrate in our perception of poor countries that there are local people helping their communities and successful local businessmen.
Here is a print advertising campaign for a nice initiative. WWF was promoting European Car Free Day in September, 22 2009 for the European Mobility Week.
The good point of those prints is that they used a simple but powerful visual. They created a luxury chrome panda on the front mudguard, like the ones for sumptuousness cars as jaguar or Rolls Royce. They succeeded to promote bikes and transform them in a mode of transport that can’t be forgot or disavow. Moreover, the print’s message is really clear so they don’t need text to pass it on. Those ads are a great example of a good nonprofit communication campaign.
This is a campaign created by TBWA, Cairo, Egypt for White Angel Foundation:
As we all know child labour is a big issue in developing countries, so it is a good initiative to remind us that problem. They were good ideas with boys grey hair and the fact that they don’t have a childhood because of their work. Moreover, the pictures’ backgrounds show their work conditions and environments which add a realistic effect and increase the impact of the campaign. But they can be bothered by those old children because kids are one of public opinion’s trouble spots. Another problem in those ads seems to be texts; they are barely visible especially the telephone number at the bottom of the page. The most impressive element is that there are 2.7 million children working in one state and maybe it would have been interesting to centre their prints on this fact.
I found an interesting ad against self-medication on adsoftheworld.com:
It was created by R&P Advertising and media Communication in New Mumbai for Patil Hospital, which provides excellent health care at an affordable cost in Mumbai, India. The subject is interesting due to the fact that self-medication issue is not only present in India, but also in European and North-American countries. Ask questions or this kind of visual are quite common in nonprofit campaigns for pills or access to treatments, like the one from MSF-USA: a two section mail-in postcard (could tear into two pieces) that could be mailed to show support for the MSF Access to Essential Medicines Campaign in the USA :
However there are good ideas in this print, which can be discussed concerning the visual choice or the fact that people can reply “yes” to the question. Actually many people think that their doctor is not good enough or that it’s a minor disease that they can treat by themselves. So it was maybe not the best option to convince them to go to a doctor to be properly treated.
