Background: 

As women face (very real) fears that tracking their sexual and reproductive health is no longer a safe thing to do, Critical Mass launched a campaign to raise awareness for Euki, a sexual health app created by health researchers that puts reliable, evidence-based sexual and reproductive health information and tools in one place, and protects its users with comprehensive privacy and security measures.

The social campaign’s media buy was specifically targeted to women and non-binary people who may no longer have access to abortion as new laws and prohibitions in their home states go into effect. With the realization that their data may soon be compromised or used against them, the campaign aimed to make sure people know that they have a secure, safe option when it comes to digital tools to track their health and get the information they need to make an informed choice about their health care.

The campaign went to market through Critical Mass’s intelligent production studio ArtBot, a studio that enables personally tailored, efficiently produced, precisely delivered content creation at scale—a necessity given the urgency of the messaging and the nuanced demographics it needed to reach.

Our primary goal was to increase Euki app downloads by generating awareness of what the the app offers among women and non-binary people, aged 13-50 in 26 states with trigger laws or where analysts have predicted restrictive laws were likely to be passed once Roe v Wade was overturned.

Execution:

Once the disturbing news of the overturn of Roe v. Wade was leaked, our Women's Affinity Group knew we needed to take productive action. We got to brainstorming on what we could do to make our employees feel safer, and how we could direct our shared fear and anger towards helping people who were facing uncertainty about the future and their bodily autonomy.

We looked to our networks, seeking a group already working in the space who shared our values on the right to both bodily autonomy and data privacy and were connected with the team at Ibis Reproductive Health and their not-for-profit app, Euki. Our newest studio, ArtBot, was a perfect fit to help make the biggest impact in the shortest amount of time. As analysts continued to speculate about what the impact of the decision might be, we knew we needed to move quickly to reach people who would be fearful and frustrated and show them that there was an app that had their back.

ArtBot uses advancements in technology to equip our clients with scalable, high-performing creative. It's one of our industry's most sought after services, but it can be difficult for smaller brands and organizations to access it. So, when a cause worth rallying behind comes along—like Euki—we help them take on a big campaign with pro bono access to ArtBot. A program we call, ArtBot for Good.

This was a passion project that rose up organically. Fueled by a sense of urgency, a group of CM volunteers collaborated with our partners at Euki to set the strategy, build out the creative, and bring the media to market. Most volunteers happened to come from states where their bodies are most at risk and were eager to enact change—and channel their understandable anger into something productive that could help others.

To ensure our limited media budget could make the strongest impact, we targeted the campaign to girls, women and non-binary people 13+ in the 26 states likely to have the most restrictive laws—the people who would need this app most.

We wanted to make sure we were representative, so we used inclusive illustrations of people who are non-femme and non-binary, and iconography that wasn't strictly heteronormative.

To address privacy concerns, we were extra clear with our messaging that Euki does not collect data – ensuring peace of mind for potential app users. We made sure that these ads were not based on any data other than location, gender, and age users provide to Meta, and made sure that users were not being retargeted.

Initially, we planned to undertake this campaign with a 3rd party partner who, late in the process, opted out due to, in their words, "the political nature" of the creative. This was disappointing, but ultimately it was important to us that we stood firm in our belief that everyone should have the rights to privacy and access to any information they need to make informed choices about their healthcare.

Results:

Our creative ran across Facebook and Instagram with Carousels, In-feed ads, Stories and Reels, driving users to both the Google Play and iOS stores to download the app.

Over a 6-week flight, funded by donations from Critical Mass itself as well as individuals across the agency, we served 2.4 million impressions, reaching 450,000 people and driving 7,500 clicks. News about our partnership was picked up by several press outlets including MediaPost, Adweek, AdForum, and Little Black Book.

 

Since the campaign and PR push, monthly users of the app have increased by over 600%.

 

But most importantly, the biggest groups of people who clicked through the ads were 13-17 year-olds in Texas and Florida–showing us that we succeeded in our goal of getting Euki to the people who most need it.