Winner: Tilson Communications - Do Something 101
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To make an impact during the back-to-school season, Staples sought to demonstrate its commitment to education by helping many of the 13 million youths who return to school with hardly any school supplies. To encourage more teens to collect new school supplies in their communities for underprivileged kids, Tilson Communications, on behalf of Staples, relied on teen-focused marketing with social media, e-mail and text outreach, along with media outreach, in-store and customer marketing and event marketing. Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Ciara donated her time by serving as the face of the campaign and recording a PSA that aired more than 8,600 times on radio stations. The campaign generated more than $630,000 in customer cash donations and placed stories in more than 474 print publications and websites. —Melissa Tinklepaugh
Honorable Mentions:
Bank of America with RF|Binder Partners - Banking on Neighborhoods One at a Time: Bank of America’s Neighborhood Excellence Initiative
To promote Bank of America’s Neighborhood Excellence Initiative, which provided $20 million in funding to nonprofits in 44 U.S. markets and London, RF|Binder Partners highlighted media events to recognize winners, individual stories of the most interesting winners and NEI’s focus on regional nonprofits, while also addressing social issues. The campaign increased coverage by 27% from the previous year and generated 35.5 million impressions.
Peel School District - Making My Way
To increase the school district’s overall high school graduate rate and prepare students for the labor market, the Peel District School Board launched the Making My Way campaign, which increased awareness with students, parents and educators about post-secondary options. The campaign lifted the graduation rate from 79% to 83%, generated 400 daily website visitors and attracted 700 parents to information sessions in eight languages.
Tiller LLC/Comfort Zone Camp – Childhood Loss: The Untold Burden
Comfort Zone Camp, a nonprofit provider of free bereavement camps for kids, sought to enhance its brand, raise public awareness of the issue, create a community to connect the grieving and provide the general public with resources to better understand childhood grief. Tiller’s campaign utilized social media and a press kit with survey results, multiple press releases, key findings, resources for families and caregivers and screenshots from the initiative’s dedicated website.