Title	THE MARATHON WALKER
Brand	WATER FOR AFRICA
Product/Service	CHARITY
Category	C08. Charities, Public Health, Safety & Awareness Messages
Entrant Company	OGILVY PARIS, FRANCE
Advertising Agency	OGILVY PARIS, FRANCE
Production Company	GANG FILMS Paris, FRANCE

Name	Company	Position
Baptiste Clinet	Ogilvy Paris	Executive Creative Director
Florian Bodet	Ogilvy Paris	Creative Director
David Martin Angelus	Ogilvy Paris	Creative Director
Bruno Bicalho Carvalhaes	Ogilvy Paris	Art Director
Melisa Chamorro	Ogilvy Paris	Art Director
Alejandra Guerrero	Ogilvy Paris	Copywriter
Jules Brossard	Ogilvy Paris	Creative Assistant
Michaël Guilhermet	Ogilvy Paris	Technical Consultant
Lamine Dramé/Jason Boyer	Ogilvy Paris	Graphic Designer
Adrien Leygues	Ogilvy Paris	Head Of Technologies
Fabien Chasseigneaux	Ogilvy Paris	Project Management/Lead Front-end Developer
Sophie Gressier	Ogilvy Paris	Account Manager
Diane De Bretteville	Ogilvy Paris	Agency Producer
Eric Maillard	Ogilvy Paris	Managing Director Ogilvy Pr
Catherine Caussou	Ogilvy Paris	Consulting Director Social Brand Pr
Sabine Descours	Ogilvy Paris	Pr Account Director
Jean Villiers	Gang Films	Executive Producer
Pierre Boudin	Gang Films	Production Coordinator

The Brief

In Africa, women spend 40 billion hours every year walking for water. The distance sometimes equals the length of a marathon. The crisis in Africa is at the root of many problems, because women can’t tend to their families, girls don’t go to school and they lose time they could be using to provide for their families. The strategy of the campaign was to shed light on this issue in an impactful way. Since Water for Africa had a small budget we needed to promote the brand and activate the movement in a way that would turn heads.

Campaign Success

Water for Africa is a non-profit organization that builds sustainable water sources in African villages to help shorten the distance that women walk for water. That’s why bringing Siabatou Sanneh to participate in the Paris marathon to create awareness was so relevant to the brand. We created a teaser trailer that was shared with media before the marathon. From the start the media was waiting to capture her image and tell her story. Her image became a viral sensation and the number 1 trending topic in France. After a water source was built in her village with people’s donations, news channels and media outlets reported the happy ending to her journey and asked people to continue donating. The campaign exceeded expectations but not everything was easy. The operation took 2 years to become a reality due to visa battles, problems with the Ebola crisis and many other hurdles.

Describe the success of the promotion with both client and consumer including some quantifiable results

One hour after Siabatou started her symbolic race, we collected enough funds to build the first borehole in her village. In just 3 weeks, the campaign has allowed us to start the construction of 4 more boreholes, and change the lives of thousands of African people. The campaign got over 25 million impressions and 4 million euros in earned media with a budget of next to nothing. And this is just the beginning. We are finishing a documentary that will continue to raise funds throughout the upcoming year.

Explain why the method of promotion was most relevant to the product or service

To raise awareness about the long distances African women need to walk every day for clean water, we partnered with Water for Africa and asked an unknown woman from Gambia, Siabatou Sanneh, to steal the attention during one of the biggest sporting events in France: the Paris Marathon. Siabatou participated with a 20L jerrycan on her head and a simple message on a board: "In Africa, women walk this distance every day to get clean water. Help us shorten the distance." The objective of the entire operation: the stunt, the PR, the print was to drive people to go to our online platform, themarathonwalker.com, to donate and discover more about Siabatou’s story.