Happy Friday, everyone!
This week's poll question was prompted by the most recent campaign we've produced here at Grace Broadcast Sales, a set of anti-bullying features. October is National Anti-Bullying Awareness Month, and a station client in Minnesota asked us to put together some messages that address the rising problem of bullying. So far the features have been very well received, both by stations and their advertisers.*
So this got us to thinking:
What is the most effective public service/public awareness campaign your station has run? What problem was the campaign designed to address? Did the campaign have measurable results?
Looking forward to reading your replies!
*Along these lines, check out this video that Rod shared, in which LaCrosse, Wisconsin TV personality Jennifer Livingston responds to an email from a local resident who took her to task for being overweight, with a message of encouragement to others who may be victims of cyber-bullying.
In 2009 The public transport industry in Kenya was in chaos. Unruly behaviour by Public service vehicles operators and owners were causing 3,000 fatalities every year through road accidents and this cost the country 1.4 billion shillings annually.The Minister of Transport took it in his hands to restore order and sanity on the roads and asked us to develop a National Road Safety campaign to support new laws and regulations imposed on the industry.We developed the slogan ‘Komesha’ meaning enough is enough and developed radio messages targeting drivers and informed commuters of their rights.
Initial Reaction
When the public transport industry realised the seriousness of the Government onthe issue, they called a strike. But the Kenyan public gave the campaign overwhelming support and defied the strike by walking the long distances to work
and back.
Outstanding Results
While the campaign was on-air, road accidents reduced by 73% in six months and more investors put money into the sector.
It's been almost 30 years, since we did this, but it worked out famously. And, the spot has run in Chicago, as we borrowed the music bed to an AM & FM there. A one minute PSA, containing full orchestration of Percy Faith "Joy to the World",
Ray Conniff "We wish you a Merry Christmas" ,etc... fully recognizable music. Then the music stops after 8 seconds with a stunning car crash sound effect...squealing tires, impact, hubcap rolling down the road...over the top. Music resumes, goes another 12 seconds to another crash, just as bad. Next voice, is local mortuary owner....saying he'll be open Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, with a big pot of black coffee, in case you need it. Don't drink and drive. Got everyone talking about it for several days....then it died down. What the public didn't know, is we had an "Auld Lang Syne" version, ready to go, for New Years' Eve. People expected the friendly policeman, to be the voiceover....not the local mortician!
For two years now we've run a public awareness campaign for Stark County, Ohio designed to educate our listeners about the critical and on-going need to donate blood. The first year we ran the program with the Northeast Ohio American Red Cross and this year we are keeping it local by partnering with a local hospital's blood services center. I've gathered content on "why donate blood" from the Red Cross and other blood donation centers to create a series of 30-second educational messages. The message covers everything regarding who needs blood, what you can expect as a blood donor, facts and figures, etc. The message also directs listeners to contact the hospital blood center for more information and to make an appointment to donate blood. These messages MUST be approved by the blood center before airing to ensure all information is accurate from year to year.
A local federal credit union is sponsoring the messages which is a nice little revenue stream for the station. We run it like a 90-second feature... 30-sec educational message piggy-backed with a 60-second sponsor commercial. I would have preferred the sponsor run a 30-sec spot but I'm not going to argue with them!
Then as an added bonus for the hospital blood center - we've coordinated to be on site for three of their blood drives at an area university... basically a "blood drive broadcast" as we call it internally. The sponsor is invited come along and we do a few call-ins with him as well as the blood drive coordinator and any donors who want to talk about the experience.
The Red Cross and hospital blood center have both expressed appreciation for making the public aware of the on-going need for blood and have noticed an increase in units donated. YEA!!
From section 73.180 FCC Rules and regulations (d) Definitions (1) programs.
iv-Public Affairs Program (PA) are programs dealing with local, state, regional, national or international issues or problems....
(iii) (4) Public service announcement (PSA) is one which no charge is made and which promotes programs, activities or services of Federal,State, or local governments....nonprofit....or any other announcement regarded as serving the community.
We haven't run it yet, but we will. "DON'T TEXT & DRIVE" is the most effective PSA campaign out there... And their PSA have stopped me from texting behind the wheel.
For more information about bringing Don’t Text & Drive to your city, contact Lori Hunt at 260-373-7201 or [email protected].
