The small German charity organization Menschen für Menschen, founded by German actor Karlheinz Böhm, focuses on development aid in rural Ethiopia. In the past, the organization was mainly known for its famous founder. Today, three years after his passing, the organization is increasingly falling into oblivion - especially with the younger target group.
Therefore, we had to raise awareness for the charity independent from its founder - with a limited media and production budget. And what would be a better place to reach the younger target group than where they spend most of their time: online.
Additionally, we had to make known that Menschen für Menschen isn’t just any charity organization, but distinguishes itself by communication on eye-level, as their name Menschen für Menschen (German for 'humans for humans') suggests.
The secondary campaign objective was to increase online donations.
Describe the strategy
Western media portray people in developing countries as victims, which further distances them from us. Instead of asking for help with the same sad stereotypical images, we show Ethiopians as what they are: equals that can help us just like we can help them. Ethiopians offer help where the younger target group seeks it most: online. For the 'Helptorials'; to be helpful, we tailored them to their interests: We identified users demographically most likely to donate: 25+, academic degree & urban, segmented these into different affinities and researched topics they search for most. Then we crossed these with areas Ethiopians could give advice on. The resulting 30 Helptorials were posted on Facebook, Instagram and Youtube. We identified search, browsing behavior & device usage for every Helptorial-topic in order to assign the right media-format and platform: Due to low user-attention-span on Facebook, cut-down versions were used. Interestbased targeting ensured highest user-content-relevance.
Describe the execution
Our research yielded topics Germans searched online and Ethiopians could give advice on: Cooking, family, DIY, sports, life advice, beauty. This resulted in 30 Helptorial-videos (between 30s-1.35 mins) in these categories that show Ethiopians - from shoeshiner Jonas to judge Abba Gadda - talking to the camera, giving viewers advice.
16/03/2018 they went live where users looked for help: on YouTube (regular & pre-rolls), Facebook (sponsored & regular) & Instagram-Stories.
We identified search, browsing behavior & device usage in order to assign the right media format and platform to each Helptorial.
Contextual interest-based targeting ensured highest content-user-relevance.
Celebrities already cooperating with the charity posted Helptorials most relevant for their followers on their social media accounts to further increase reach. E.g. model and influencer (& Ethiopian coffee entrepreneur) Sara Nuru with 100.000 FB-followers shared Helptorial 'What to serve spontaneous guests' (popcorn with coffee).
List the results
In the campaign period we achieved the following:
Business impact and achievement against the business target of reach (especially with the younger target group) & site traffic:
- Donation-Site traffic increased by 1566%
- Facebook Page Visits increased by 664%
- Facebook Content Likes increased by 319%
- Facebook Page Likes increased by 304%
Reach:
- 864.000 FB impressions
- 595.000 total views which is an average view-increase on their YouTube channel of 1075% when compared to previous digital campaign, making Help for Help the client’s most successful online campaign.
- With a 44% view rate on YouTube
- The best videos were watched by 54% until the end