2015 Gold Public Sector
01 Dec 2015
Engine
NHS Blood and Transplant
Missing Type
The Team
Jules Chalkley - Creative Director, Mark Perkins - Creative Director, Annie Gallimore - Managing Partner, Tom Dixon, Jo Griffin - Creative Team, Gemma Irvine - Activation, Helen Byard - Activation, Sarah Frow - Activation, Alice Carter - Activation, Sonia Bungaroo - Activation, Billy Faithfull - Executive Creative Director, Ross Neil - Executive Creative Director, Jon Latham - Assistant Director for Donor Services and Marketing, Nadine Eaton - Head of National Campaigns, Andrea Ttofa - Head of Media and PR
Campaign overview
National Blood Week is a key date in the calendar for NHS Blood and Transplant (England and North Wales), especially as its latest statistics revealed the number of new donors had plummeted by 40% over the previous decade.
This campaign succeeded in putting blood donation back on the agenda, reaching new audiences and sparking conversation and awareness.
Ultimately it achieved exactly what it needed to do: recruit new donors in their droves, increase blood donations and save lives.
Strategy
To bring blood donation back into the public consciousness, NHS Blood and Transplant needed a disruptive campaign to get people thinking and talking, and change behaviour on a national level. But this awareness also needed to translate into new donors.
The strategy was to create a movement based on affirmation and sharing - something anyone and everyone would be able to join in with. The team looked for a concept that was simple to understand, imitate and share, and that global brands as well as individuals could participate in.
The Missing Type concept required little effort to replicate and little commitment from people or organisations to take part, but nevertheless allowed brands, influencers, media owners and the public – to operate independently but create a cumulative effect.
Creativity
Missing Type asked participants to drop the three blood type letters A, B and O from their names.
This simple idea proved amazingly disruptive, providing an immediate visual metaphor for blood bank shortages and a powerful call to action.
Early partners included Downing Street, The Daily Mirror and Metro’s Good Deed Feed, whilst brands like Giraffe and AO.com used the creative opportunity to put their own playful spin on the campaign. In another major innovation, NHS Blood and Transplant became the first ever UK advertiser on Instagram.
Then there were the most powerful executions of all – the people like Abi Brown, who tweeted that without A, B or O there wasn’t much left of her name, but she truly would be gone if she hadn’t received a blood transfusion nine years ago. Such tweets really brought the message home, reminding people how easily it could be a friend or loved one they saved when they give blood.
Results
The campaign generated blanket national print and broadcast coverage, with a lead editorial in The Times and a feature in The Guardian. From Buzzfeed and The Today Programme to Phil and Holly on This Morning and Nick Grimshaw on BBC Radio One, target media spread the campaign to two billion people.
More than 1,000 organisations took part across Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, including small businesses, universities, hospitals, trade unions, transport hubs, charities, sports clubs and celebrity influencers. Google, Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Microsoft, Spotify, Starbucks, Nandos, Arsenal FC and British Airways joined in, while 02 became ‘2’ and Aviva simply ‘viv’. Even the WI and The Church of England came on board, as well as tens of thousands of individuals.
The most important result of all was a record 30,000 new donors registered in just ten days of activity – enough blood to save or improve 100,000 lives.
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