Becoming a big brother or big sister isn’t a grueling lifetime commitment. New TV, radio and print advertising for Burlington, Ont.-based Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada hopes to make this clear.
‘For decades we had campaigns that were serious, and after doing some extensive market research in Canada, we found that we were creating a misconception about the role of a volunteer,’ explains Bruce MacDonald, VP external affairs for the organization.
The not-for-profit is running four TV ads with the positioning line ‘Share a little magic,’ in an effort to lighten up its image. One spot, for instance, shows an adult and child in a diner; the man lets out a big belch and the kid mimics with a smaller effort. The spots were produced in the U.S., but the tagline is Canadian and was created with the help of Toronto-based ad agency MonkeeWrench.
Says Chris Stavenjord, ‘lead primate’ at MonkeeWrench: ‘Essentially the [goal] was to clearly define that you don’t have to be the perfect human to be a big brother/sister, you just have to be perfectly human.’
Another objective was to emphasize the organization’s wide range of mentoring programs. The group has evolved
to include initiatives that are
less time demanding, says MacDonald, such as digital heroes, whereby much of the interaction can occur online, and an in-school mentoring initiative that only takes up one hour per week. Radio and print creative by MonkeeWrench tackles this message.
Meanwhile, since most volunteers don’t ring up the organization until they’ve made the decision to join, the charity has revamped its Web site for a cleaner look and feel. ‘We’re trying to get into their thought process earlier, to get the correct information [out] – and research tells us the Web site is key,’ says MacDonald. He adds that the ultimate goal is to help volunteers agree to become a Big Brother or Big Sister earlier, since it usually takes them a year or two to decide. ‘We have 10,000 kids waiting and we’d like to shorten that list.’
Client: Big Brothers Big Sisters
of Canada
Agency: MonkeeWrench
Lead Primate: Chris Stavenjord
