Phones for Good - TELUS & Free the Children
TELUS is a leading national telecommunications company in Canada, with $10.8 billion in annual revenue and 13 million customer connections. With a focus on youth, community investment program is one of TELUS’ key competitive differentiators in a competitive marketplace.
A multi-pronged social media effort moved young people to get involved with “Phones for Good,” a TELUS program that donates $25 to Free The Children from the sale of designated phones. A simultaneous effort encouraged youth engagement to earn a highly-coveted VIP ticket to one of Free The Children’s signature ‘We Day’ events.
Youth were encouraged to post descriptions online of their efforts to make a difference in their community to unlock donations for Free the Children and potentially earn coveted VIP event tickets. The ‘$20K Idea’ contest invited youth to upload a YouTube video describing how they would partner with a local charity to create positive change in their community. The top ideas were selected by Free The Children and TELUS, with the charity partner of the winner receiving $20,000 to put their idea into action. TELUS contributed $1 to Free The Children each time a video was viewed.
The effort was supported with a national integrated marketing communications including store presence, online pages and a robust social media strategy including blogger outreach, a VIP Tweet-ups and digital graffiti wall.
Phone sales rose 29% above forecast and TELUS gained over 30,000 Facebook fans and $750,000 was donated to Free the Children.
