Drive Essex Integrated Campaign

Essex County Council (ECC) wanted to reach young drivers between the ages of 17 and 30 – and encourage them to take greater responsibility when driving. The key messages were simple and direct: Do not drink or take drugs and drive, slow down, do not use a mobile whilst driving, wear a seatbelt, consider motorcyclists and also as a rider, take care whilst on your bike. The main issue was taking these common messages and delivering them in new and innovative ways to engage the audience. It was vital that the messages did not use classic ‘shock’ tactics but should still grab and hold attention.

So, a seemingly straightforward brief, but when you consider how ubiquitous the campaign themes are the Halo approach to creating an effective answer to the brief had to be innovative in both messaging, design and media channels.

We chose to parody luxury car advertising for the main campaign look and feel. By creating advertising that at first glance appears to promote a brand new sports car we could guarantee our audience (interested in cars, excited by new models) would be taking notice. The images were then given subtle twists that represented the themes of the campaigns. The striking creative set the tone for the whole campaign but it was the innovative use of traditional, ambient and online media that gave real standout.

We created a 3D billboard that literally showed the whole poster site ‘crashing’. This was the first use of traditional media as an ambient art installation, breaking new ground for the site holder JC Decaux and launched the campaign with a flourish!

Halo also created street stencils that were used with pressure washers to ‘clean’ the key messages onto pavements. These interesting and cost effective ambient pieces gave the campaign novelty and standout, jumping out at our audience in unexpected locations.

Coupled with interesting ‘reverse text’ viewed in mirrors of toilets in pubs and clubs promoting the drink drive message our use of ambient had real impact driven by media channels not usually associated with this type of campaign.

Our key piece of ambient media was an installation at the Lakeside shopping centre. A huge out of town shopping complex, nationally famous and a huge Essex draw. We created an Anamorphic piece on a central staircase. Anamorphic means that the image and text is only viewable from a specific point, coming into view slowly as the viewer makes their way towards the position. Quirky and really eye catching it was a great PR draw...

A final ingredient in the integrated mix was the online ‘Driving Response’ game. The easy to play, and very addictive game, was used as a viral piece that was seeded online and encouraged huge numbers of players to visit the Drive Essex website (also created by Halo), pushing the key messages further into our target audience with the added bonus of a competition to win a driver experience. Halo created the game from scratch, devising the concept and executing the game from design to build and final production.

Outcomes

The campaign was a huge success. Measured from a base rate tracker survey before the campaign launched and then again at the end the figures showed results that far exceeded the expectations of ECC. The campaign was shortlisted in the ‘Good Communications Awards 2011 for Mixed Media’ for communications and recieved praise across the board from the LGA.

Sorry for the wall of text you’ve just waded through, but this one needed a bit of explaining. If you want an even more detailed case study including ‘stats’ get in touch...

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