Title	THERE'S ANOTHER SIDE TO THE STORY
Brand	DEPAUL UK
Product/Service	YOUTH HOMELESSNESS CHARITY
Category	B04. Charities, Public Health, Safety & Awareness Messages
Entrant Company	PUBLICIS LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
Advertising Agency	PUBLICIS LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM

Name	Company	Position
Andy Bird	Publicis London	Executive Creative Director
Ben Smith	Publicis London	Copywriter
Dan Kennard	Publicis London	Art Director
Will Arnold-baker	Publicis London	Business Director
Tom Froggett	Publicis London	Account Manager
Ant Harris	Publicis London	Planner
Louis De La Moriniere	Publicis London	Planner
Debbie Burke	Publicis London	Head Of Operations
Steve Mcfarlane	Publicis London	Executive Agency Producer
Greg Collier	Publicis London	Agency Producer
Ed Page	Publicis London	Agency Producer
Andy Breese	Publicis London	Head Of Art And Design
Mark Wesley	Publicis London	Photographer
Dave Stansfield	Publicis London	Designer
Claire Lillis	Publicis London	Art Buyer
Sarah Clifford	Publicis London	Art Buyer

The Campaign

The Depaul Nightstop project gets young, homeless people off the street and into the spare rooms of volunteers. But the charity’s research revealed that 50% of people felt anxious about allowing a young, homeless person into their homes and 87% said they wouldn’t take a homeless person in. With a media budget of virtually zero, we needed a clever way to change perceptions and promote volunteering. So we placed posters either side of street corner sites donated to us by partners. The first side addresses the negative preconceptions people have about giving up their spare room to a homeless youth. But when both sides are read together the message transforms, showing the positive reality of volunteering. While the posters were the creative backdrop to the campaign, it was really about PR. We planned to seed the work through social media – leading to coverage across press, radio and blogs. Within days of launching the campaign appeared live on BBC TV News, on national radio and over 70 blogs. It was trending at number two on the Reddit homepage with around 4 million views. Most importantly the total number of new volunteer enquiries increased by 6100% on the previous month. If all enquirers become volunteers, it would be equivalent to increasing Nightstop’s London capacity by 50%.

The Brief

The campaign’s ultimate goal was to recruit volunteers. But that could only happen by changing perceptions. So a key goal was getting as much media coverage as possible, so that the issue of youth homelessness and in particular the notion of giving up a spare room could be debated.

Execution

The posters appeared at six homelessness hotspots in London, and ran for six weeks. We captured images of each site and seeded these through Facebook and Twitter as soon as the work appeared. We ensured relevant people from Depaul were on hand and prepared for TV and radio interviews that followed, the majority of which happened during the first few days of the campaign. The work was originally planned for the benefit of Depaul UK. But there was overwhelming interest and coverage from overseas media, so our plan adapted to take this into account. We diverted interest in each country to their local branch of Depaul, and there are now plans to run additional activities based on the original campaign in these markets.

The campaign appeared live on BBC TV News, on national radio and over 70 blogs. It was trending at number two on the Reddit homepage with around 4 million views. We generated 69 million media impressions and around 6 million people directly viewed the work. Total earned media value was estimated at £1,589,857. Depaul’s web traffic increased 600% on the previous week. Most importantly the total number of new volunteer enquiries increased by 6100% on the previous month. If all enquirers become volunteers, this would be equivalent to increasing Nightstop’s London capacity by 50%.

The Strategy

We targeted people who had never volunteered before but lived in areas where Depaul urgently needed rooms. We made the campaign relevant to both donors and young people alike by placing the ads in homelessness hotspots and appealing to preconceptions identified through research – people are anxious, even fearful, of taking in a young homeless person. As Nightstop can’t afford paid sites, our strategy was to approach partners and ask them to donate a corner site. The work was then seeded through social media channels like Twitter and Facebook, leading to interest from the national media and creative press alike. This would ultimately lead to BBC London News producing a report on the issue and BBC Radio hosting a phone in debate on it. The public also shared the work extensively, with it appearing at number 2 on the Reddit homepage with over 4 million shares.