Title	14 IS NOT OK
Brand	ESTONIAN SEXUAL HEALTH ASSOCIATION
Product/Service	NOT APPLICABLE
Category	G06. Breakthrough on a Budget
Entrant	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA
Idea Creation	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA
Media Placement	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA
PR	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA
Production	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA
Post Production	OPTIMIST CREATIVE Tallinn, ESTONIA

Name	Company	Position
anoorupa bose	Optimist Estonia	Creative strategy, Creative direction, Copywriting, Media strategy
Siim Nikopensius	Optimist Estonia	Creative strategy, Creative direction, Copywriting
Bruno Palmik	Optimist Estonia	Art direction
Heigo Heinleht	Optimist Estonia	Art direction
Maris Teder	Optimist Estonia	Project management
Susanna Eenma	Optimist Estonia	Project management
Marko Kivirand	Optimist Estonia	social media management
Cäthly Oja	Optimist Estonia	PR management
Sandra Audova	Optimist Estonia	PR management
Triin Adamson	Optimist Estonia	PR management
Kristjan Taal	na	Photography
Helina Risti	na	styling
Elsa Levo	na	make-up

Why is this work relevant for Direct?

In Estonia, the legal age of sexual consent is only 14. Every year, 14-year-old children get sexually abused because of it and yet, all previous attempts to change this law have failed. When it comes to this topic, there is complete lack of consensus within political parties and complete lack of awareness within society. Problem is, people think 14 is OK. So we launched a direct response campaign that would provoke Estonians to raise their voice against this dangerous law and say ''14 is not OK''. Only then politicians would be forced to take immediate steps to change the law.

Background

The situation: In Estonia, the legal age of sexual consent is only 14. At 14, a child is too young to understand the dangers that come with sexual consent. Every year, 14-year-old children get sexually abused because of this law, and yet, every attempt to change the law has failed. There is no consensus among political parties and key decision makers on this topic. Neither is there any public pressure on them to take action, because people think 14 is OK. The brief: We had to protect 14-year-old children from sexual abuse by raising the legal age of sexual content. Key objectives: We had to get people to realise how dangerous this law is, so they would publicly raise their voice in support of changing the law. This in turn would raise the pressure on politicians and lawmakers to take immediate steps to increase the legal age of sexual consent.

Describe the creative idea (30% of vote)

We released a horrifying story about the ‘consensual relationship’ between 14-year-old Piia Heivdal and 54-year-old Kristo Terrandi. The story was fictional, but we crafted it like a typical tabloid style news report and released it on one of Estonia’s leading online news portals that is known for sensational news. As planned, people completely missed the tiny 'content marketing' sign and continued reading in horror thinking it was a real story about a real child! By the time readers realised this was actually a campaign, they would have also realised in the most impactful way, why the law needs to be changed immediately. So at the end of the story, we gave people the hashtag #14isnotOK, to trigger a nationwide movement, where the public and influencers could raise their voice together in a way that was connected and synchronised. Only then we would be loud enough to pressurise politicians to respond.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

We analysed hundreds of news reports around this topic from the last 7 years and conducted surveys among the general population to understand why this dangerous law had remained unchanged. We found that the main problem was that people think ''14 is OK''. So our campaign was targeted to the general public to drive awareness and instant response, which in turn would influence politicians and decision makers to take immediate action. To make people realise how dangerous this law is, our strategy was to show them a 14-year-old child in the most dangerous situation because of this law. But the situation would have to be so frightening, that it would provoke people to publicly oppose the existing law. We would also have to craft a hashtag or a slogan that would enable the public and the influencers to raise their voice together and send one unified message to politicians.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

To create the story with limited budgets, we pulled off a small-scale photoshoot with amateur actors in an Airbnb, during the pandemic. 17th March, we released the story via a €400 online content-marketing space on one of Estonia’s leading online news portals. 18th March, we released the story via a €600 content-marketing space on Estonia’s biggest print news daily. Both media platforms are known for sensational news. Budget left to promote the story was only €1000. Organic virality was critical for us. We made the story so moving that people would want to share it. And when they shared it, we made the shared story's thumbnail image and title so impactful, that others would instantly click on it. The story's images were designed to initiate a photo-based hashtag response on Instagram. While the story's hashtag #14isnotOK was meant to become the common voice of people, turning people into campaign ambassadors.

List the results (30% of vote)

Within 24 hours, the story and photos of 14-year-old Piia and 54-year-old Kristo went viral. The campaign sparked a nationwide movement where the public and influencers raised their voice to say ''14 is not OK''. Victims who had been sexually abused at 14 began sharing their stories using #14isnotOK. Estonia's top TV and radio channels started conversations around why 14 is not OK. Despite a campaign budget of just €5000, the campaign crossed 1 million+ impressions in a country of 1.4 million people. The story also became the 10th most-read story in the history of the news portal. Comments and reactions: 25,000+ Audience engagements: 160,000+ Organic traffic to the story: 200,000+ Images clicked: 300,000+ times The most important result of all was that politicians and lawmakers immediately responded by introducing a bill to raise the legal age of sexual consent to 16. 14 will no longer be OK in Estonia.