Acart Excels at Social Marketing

Acart just picked up some hardware at the 2010 IABC Ottawa Excel Awards Gala: The Excellence in Communication Leadership (EXCEL) Award for the Social Responsibility campaign category.



We entered the show with confidence, based on the phenomenal success of our Elder Abuse Awareness campaign for HRSDC: 58% total aided recall, 53% unaided recall and 54% aided TV recall. (The Government of Canada benchmark for aided recall is 36%.)

But creating change is what really matters in a social marketing campaign, and this one was a big deal to us. Elder abuse is more common and damaging than many people realize. From the very first day we began work for this campaign, we were conscious of the emotions and personal stories it would bring up. We, our clients, our friends at production house SOMA, and the actors all shared a sense of purpose in this campaign — as if we were all doing it for someone we knew.

And the general public reacted strongly as well. Of Canadians who recalled the campaign, without prompting 9% said they took specific action as a direct result: 72% of these said they discussed the ads with others and 4% called or visited their mother.

A big pat on the back to everyone who worked on this campaign — whether on the agency, client, or production side. We're really doing work that matters!



The Elder Abuse Awareness campaign is ongoing, and will be back n air next fall. See the whole campaign, and more of our Social issues Marketing work, in our advertising portfolio at acart.com.