Winner: The Heinz Awards and Burson-Marsteller – Heinz Awards Educate America About Environmental Champions and Their Causes
BM was tasked with promoting the recipients of the 17th Annual Heinz Awards, which honored 10 individuals who were affecting significant change through a variety of environmental initiatives. The team faced a number of obstacles, including having to raise awareness for individuals who had already received media exposure in the past, as well as the unfortunate circumstance of the Awards announcement date scheduled for two days after the 10th anniversary of 9/11.
To overcome these obstacles, BM developed a comprehensive media outreach campaign that targeted outlets at the local, national and subject-specific levels with unique stories about each winner—which were gathered during personal interviews conducted by the BM team with each honoree about their work and what winning the award meant for them. Select media outlets were also approached under embargo in order to give them ample time to craft compelling stories in advance of the announcement.
The campaign landed 800 media placements and over 300 million media impressions—more than quadrupled the previous best year (2010) in terms of media hits and impressions. —SP
Honorable Mentions:
American Cleaning Institute – For Better Living: ACI 2011 Sustainability Report: American Cleaning Institute’s first-ever sustainability report was pitched to industry media, influential CSR bloggers and lawmakers. Report results were highlighted at a number of national and international conferences, including the 2011 American Oil Chemists’ Society annual meeting.
City of Moore, Okla., and Trifecta Communications LLC – Recycle Moore “Take Us to Your Litter”: Friendly aliens, dubbed “Mooretians,” encouraged citizens to recycle via a large banner draped over the city’s water tower. The city doubled the amount of recyclable waste it collected from May to Nov. 2011 over the previous six months.
Goodwill and Creative Productions – Goodwill Donations Advertising: Goodwill motivated individuals to support the local community via donations with four ad adaptations, increasing donations by 10%.
Legacy – Butt Really? The Environmental Impact of Cigarettes: Starting on April Fool’s Day 2011 with a mock press release poking fun at Big Tobacco, Legacy also created viral video featuring Ziggy Marley and Tony Hawk illustrating the environmental hazards of cigarette butts.