2021 Silver Best Thoughtful Marketing Campaign

Agency: Digitas UK and Saatchi & Saatchi

Client: BT Group

Campaign Name: Hope United

Campaign Overview

BT wanted to get back to the cultural heart of the nation, using its scale to give a platform to issues that were of most importance to the British public, and highlight how people could use technology to solve problems.

Strategy

The telecoms giant has set a 2025 target of helping 25 million people, families and businesses in the UK to be equipped with the digital skills needed to create a more equitable online world.

With the insight that one in 10 of us have experienced online abuse in the past year, it was vital to fight online hate.

Euro 2020 was about to start; given BT's sponsorship of the home nations, it couldn’t ignore the fact online abuse experienced by football players was getting worse.

BT decided to use the Euros to highlight the reality of online hate and how we can all play a role in tackling it.

The week before the Euros, BT announced the launch of Hope United, a team of 18 players across the UK united around a mission of hope.

It used its tech tips platform to show how technology can be used to call out, combat and prevent online hate.

And through pledges and merch drops, BT invited people to become part of the mission and amplify the team's message.

Creativity

Hope United was a diverse dream team of football players from across the home nations with a collective goal to tackle online hate.

The squad, managed by Rio Ferdinand, consisted of men, women and para-footballers, including Marcus Rashford and Lucy Bronze. All had experienced online hate and wanted to tackle it.

Players became the voice behind the tech tips, helping people not only understand the devastating effects of online hate, but also how we can all become part of the solution through tangible actions.

Tips were distributed across social channels, and used the personal accounts of team members to reach their millions of followers.

A dynamic club website became a hub where people could immerse themselves in the Hope United mission, tech tips content, social pledges and buy merch to support the team - keeping engagement levels high throughout the summer. During the final, a spike in online hate messages was called out, and in the aftermath campaign leaders digitised the Marcus Rashford mural in Manchester, recording a moment in history for the UK.

Results

In just two months, Hope United educated over 3.7 million people in the UK about how to fight online hate.

BT successfully changed the perception of many football fans, with 24% of people who saw social content saying they were now more likely to report offensive behaviour online.

The Hope United team made a huge impact during the Euros and got people speaking across the country.

The Team

Saatchi & Saatchi UK - Guillermo Vega, CCO - William John, Creative Director - Will Brookwell, Creative - Nathan Crawford, Creative Director - Katy Stanage, Copywriter - Alex Kosterman, Copywriter - Jake Wiseman, Copywriter - Fabiano Gomes, Art Director - James Ginn, Art Director - Nick Roberts, Designer – Steve Tinkler, Designer - Marco Balducci, Designer - Marcos Almeida, Designer - Amy Fry, Designer - Sam Hawkey, CEO - Richard Huntingdon, Planner - Ed Hayne, Planner - Eloise Sykes, Planner - Jon Tapper, Managing Partner - Richard Sweetman, Account Team - Fergus Waddell, Account Team - Liz Maunsell, Account Team - Rania Kouros, Account Team - Gabi Dwek, Account Team - Alice Schweirgert, Account Team - Georgie Ford, Agency Producer - Laura Francis, Agency Producer -Jeremy Sarman, Agency Producer - Felicity Cruickshank, Agency Producer - Chris Styring, Agency Producer

Digitas UK - Aran Burtenshaw, Creative Director - Tim Vukcevic, Designer - Carl Fisk, Designer - Linda Obeng, Project Manager - Nicky Wright, Business Director - Charlene Charity, Head of Strategy - Lauren Webster, Strategist - Caitriona Gallagher, Strategy Director - Marina Golzio, Analyst -Florence Ward, Analyst - Lloyd Tuckey, Head of Technology - Mauricio Reyes, Senior Test Engineer - Lorian Madanes, Lead Business Analyst - Rafe Blandford, Chief Product Officer - Richard Underwood, Data & Security Director - Stephen Harris, Lead Cloud Engineer

Digitas - Anshul Monga, Delivery Manager - Arati Adelkar, Associate Interface Developer - Chetan Jain, Project Director - Ed McDonald, Associate Technical Director, QA - Jagruti Gautam, Senior Associate Quality Assurance - Joshul Sharma, Lead Application Developer - Kalpesh Bhavsar, Senior Associate Application Developer - Mehul Chauhan, Lead Interface Developer - Pralhad Rajgor, Lead Interface Developer - Shreyansh Jain, Lead Data Analyst Essense - Shane Murphy, Media Planner - Tom Kislingbury, Media Planner - Christina Petrou, Media Planner - Chris Faith, Director - Leo King, Editor - James Waters, Editor - Shamil Tanna, Photographer