The Brief

Willing Hearts is a volunteer-based organization that feeds the poor in Singapore. It relies on volunteers to cook, pack, and deliver food to the poor. Problem is, most people are too busy to help. They simply don't have the time. So instead of trying to convince those people to volunteer, we looked for the people who did have free time: bored teenagers.

Creative Execution

Twitter is one of the most popular social networking sites in the world, with a population that's mostly composed of teens and young adults. It also has a hashtag system that's designed to make searching easier. So with a clever use of Twitter's search engine and hashtag system, we were able to find our specific targets. Twitter also allowed us to talk to our targets in a more personal manner, increasing our chances of getting a response. And since we only used a social networking account, we didn't have to spend anything. Perfect for a non-profit organization like Willing Hearts.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

We looked for our targets using nothing but a social networking account and one hashtag. Teens use Twitter hashtags to tell the world what they're feeling. So by searching for #BORED on Twitter, we were able to find teens that were so bored, they'll do anything to kill their boredom. We simply replied to their tweets and invited them to spend their downtime with us. Our goal was to get a response rate of at least 20% and to give Willing Hearts as many additional volunteers as possible.

Results

34% of our targets responded. Most of them agreed to volunteer, while some of them even retweeted us and encouraged their followers to help as well. The tweets also reached local celebrities, bloggers, and the media. And they, in turn, helped out by encouraging their followers to volunteer. Because of these, Willing Hearts volunteers increased from an average of 35/day to an average of 50/day. That's a 42.8% increase on a daily basis. And we did it without spending a single cent.