2017 Winner

Drug Free Kids Canada

The Call That Comes After

FCB/SIX

GoldConnection Strategy

SilverCause/Public Service

Driving while high on marijuana is actually more prevalent among young drivers than drunk driving. And more than half the drivers rushed to trauma centres following car accidents have drugs (typically marijuana) in their system.

The challenge for Drug Free Kids Canada and FCB/SIX was convincing teens that the danger is real, while breaking through and already oversaturated drunk driving PSA market.

Research showed that the most effective way to change behaviour is actually very simple: by getting parents to talk to their kids about drugs.

While almost all teens agree having a car accident while driving high would be horrible, most don’t believe it could ever happen to them. The plan was to make the unthinkable feel real and trigger a conversation between parents and teens about the dangers of high driving.

“The Call That Comes After” is an immersive, cross-channel experience with a real-time channel jump at its heart that connected parents and teens to have a conversation about the very real dangers of driving high.

Research showed that if you want to have a conversation with a teen, the place to start is on their phone. The connection strategy began in social media, where the team invited parents to create and share a personalized, interactive video with their teen.

Teens would then click through to watch the video, which told the story of a group of teens who decide to drive high.

Finally, during the story’s climax, the teen watching the film starts to receive real text messages on their phone that coincide with the text message the characters in the film are receiving, at the exact same time.

This surprising real-time channel-jump creates an uncanny moment of heightened emotion and connection to the story. It also provides a powerful emotional trigger for a conversation between parent and teen.

To create this synchronous, channel-jump moment from video to SMS, the agency combined five technology platforms: IBM Marketing Cloud, an on-demand video rendering engine, YouTube, a L.A.M.P. web service stack and triggered SMS.

In addition to the core connection strategy, campaign awareness was created through TV, OOH, print and digital and social advertising.
In the campaign’s first 60 days, and prior to mass support rolling out, site traffic to Drug Free Kids Canada increased by 1,946% and 13,200 people engaged with the jump-channel content.

The campaign has already generated significant earned media attention as parents and teens spread the word. Drug Free Kids Canada reported that “The Call That Comes After” campaign has also generated more impact in less time than any other campaign in its history.

Credits
Brand: Drug Free Kids Canada
Agency: FCB/SIX
EVP, strategy: Anna Percy-Dove
ECD: Ian Mackenzie
ACD, CW: Krystle Mullin
ACD, AD: Graham Tingle
Account supervisor: Shannon Harvey
VP, group account director: Vicki Waschkowski
Project manager: Gillian Largey Project Manager
Developer: Dov Atlin Lead Developer
Campaign manager: Andrew Yang Campaign Manager
VP, data and technology: Jacob Ciesielski
President: Andrea Cook
User experience: Kristy Pleckaitis
Agency producer: Kelly Cavanaugh
Executive producer: Andria Minott
Director, cinematographer: Jesse Blight
Line producer: Robbie McNamara
Colourist: Jason Zukowski
Visual effects artist: Andy Hunter
Producer: Pallavi Joshi
Exec producer: Laurie Kerr-Jones
Editing House: School Editing
Exec producer: Sarah Brooks
Editing: Lauren Horn
Casting director: Shasta Lutz
Producer: Ted Rosnick
Director, connection planning: Cynthia Steele
Client lead: Marc Paris

For submission inquiries, please contact Clare O'Brien at cobrien@brunico.com.
For partnership inquiries, please contact Neil Ewen at newen@brunico.com.