#ShareYourEars: Walt Disney Parks and Resorts & Make-A-Wish America
For more than 35 years, Disney and Make-A-Wish have granted the wishes of children with life-threatening medical conditions. The first official Make-A-Wish experience was granted at Disneyland Resort in 1980, and since that time, Disney has granted more than 100,000 wishes around the world.
To celebrate the 100,000th Disney wish, and in concert with Disneyland’s 
60th Anniversary, Disneyland and Make-A-Wish invited fans to Share Your Ears, an innovative, multi-faceted cause marketing campaign to let guests unlock donations from Disney to Make-A-Wish.
The campaign kicked off during a two-hour special on ABC TV highlighting Disneyland’s 60 years with a dedicated segment outlined the special role wish granting plays at Disney. Sporting a one-of-a-kind diamond-encrusted Mickey Mouse Ear Hat (later auctioned off to benefit Make-A-Wish) actor Neil Patrick Harris invited viewers to join Disney in helping make wishes come true through a simple activation.
For every fan who took a picture wearing Disney Mouse Ears and shared it online using the #ShareYourEars hashtag, Disney Parks donated $5 to Make-A-Wish, up to $1 million to help makes wishes come true. “Ears” could be actual Disney Mickey Mouse Ears or creative interpretations of ears with no limit to the number of shares or uploads an individual could do. At Disneyland, guests could purchase limited edition 60th Anniversary Ear Hats with all designated for Make-A-Wish.
The campaign concluded during a press event and special “Ears Day” ceremony at Disneyland Resort. Benefits to Disneyland included an increase in social engagement and overall awareness of both the #ShareYourEars campaign and social activation as well as the Disneyland 60th anniversary. More than 450 news clips covered the story. Make-A-Wish realized a significant increase in social media traffic during the campaign, and saw a dramatic increase in their social media audience.
In total, more than 1.77 million photos and posts were shared across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram during the campaign, which ran for just over three weeks and more than 1.3 million users changed their Facebook profile image to the Make-A-Wish overlay. As a result of the overwhelming response from guests, Disney decided to double the original donation to Make-A-Wish, from $1 million to $2 million, which was announced at the closing ceremony at Disneyland.
