42 Million Victims.

activation | in-flight video | online video | social | outdoor | print

BUILDING EMPATHY BY MINIMIZING SCALE

Human trafficking is one of the fastest growing crimes in the world, with an estimated 42 million victims. It’s known that 40% of those victims traveled at least once on commercial planes during their exploitation. As one of the largest airline providers in the world, Delta Air Lines wanted us to help them take the lead in the rally against human trafficking.

42 Million is a gigantic number. Although everybody “wants to help”, it’s hard to understand how a single person can actually make a difference when facing issues this large. To truly connect with an audience and convey a message that truly motivates action, we knew we first needed to scale that very large number down to an empathy building 1 to 1 level. We would need to bring an audience of millions, face to face with a victim of human trafficking. And instead of using traditional media, we would need to do this in a situation where the viewer would be empowered to realize they did actually have the ability to help.  

FACE THE TRUTH

Our concept was Face The Truth and the campaign was executed with the intent to have as much communication within the airport and in-flight as possible. The core element of the campaign was a 2 minute spot that was specifically concepted to run on in-flight seat back monitors. It was shot solely with a camera POV that was angled to mimic that of the passenger watching it.

This meant that while watching the spot as intended, on a plane’s seat back’s screen, you feel as if you yourself are being whispered to by a frightened young human trafficking victim between the seats in front of you. As he tells you specifically his story and asks for help, the effect for the viewer is deliberately jarring and attention grabbing. Most importantly it was memorable and motivating. All printed campaign elements were shot with this POV in mind as well.

RESULTS

With Super Bowl LIII coming to Atlanta in 2019, home to the busiest airport in the world, it was a unique opportunity to maximize the impact of this campaign launch. The work deployed on National Human Trafficking Awareness Day, then gained global attention during the Super Bowl and beyond. In addition to the in-flight video, the campaign brought the 1 to 1 experience to Sky Magazine, 30 in-airport displays and signage, social media and press releases.

The campaign received over 500 million impressions, 3K+ positive press mentions, and the video greatly surpassed prior benchmarks with over 2 million views and a 28.6% completion rate. A completion rate that was amazingly high for a video over 2 minutes, and exceeded client hopes by more than 50%.