Dear Friend,
Happy holidays!
This week, Samsung and YouTuber Casey Neistat released a holiday video that embodies all that was good in social impact this year (video embedded below, hang tight!).
Neistat and Samsung converted an abandoned Milwaukee mall into a winter wonderland and invited the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee to enjoy holiday delights from ice skating to edible gingerbread houses.
Prior to traveling to the mall, the kids were each gifted Samsung gear (tear-jerker alert) and told they were going to learn to become content creators.
.@Samsung + @CaseyNeistat released a holiday video and it's all that was good in #socialimpact this year Share on XHere’s what makes this effort so powerful and reflected social impact trends we saw in 2017:
Harnessing Influencers: Neistat is one of YouTube’s biggest stars with 8.4 million subscribers: part of the new guard of content creators who disseminate messages in an authentic and engaging way via social platforms. As consumers continue to lose trust in government and traditional media, they’re turning to influencers like Neistat for news and entertainment. Social impact efforts can see massive engagement if done authentically with the right influencer, a trend we saw hit critical mass in 2017.
Leveraging Content: In addition to Neistat, this campaign engages the BGCA kids by equipping them to create their own content, which is ultimately used in the featured holiday video. 2017 taught us that creating authentic, user-generated content can be as or even more powerful than slickly-produced, big budget videos when it comes to sharing social impact messages.
Brand Fit: Samsung is absolutely the right partner for this effort, able to showcase its technology as the powerful tools they are, without taking a thing away from the spirit or the message of the day. Samsung is center stage without appearing boastful and empowers the effort, instead of being an brand add-on.
Creating Emotional Pull: When real needs are met in a meaningful way, it’s emotional. This video is authentic because the kids are genuinely excited, overwhelmed and joyful. Although this should be a foundational element of all social impact campaigns, sometimes this basic needs assessment is overlooked and ends up feeling stilted or contrived.
Scroll down to enjoy the video and hopefully some well-deserved time off for the holiday season!
And speaking of trends, if you missed our 2108 trends webinar, you can see a recap in my latest Forbes posts (part I and part II).
Seasons Greetings!
David Hessekiel
President, Engage for Good
(914) 921-3914
P.S. Remember that the Halo Award Submission period is open through January 12th (or the 18th with a late fee) so get those submissions in. Also, pre-conference registration is now open so if you have 2017 budget, now’s the time to use it! We (literally) guarantee you’ll love the program when it comes out in January.
