[Entry Description]
We weren’t prepared
In 2019 NZ ranked 35th for pandemic preparedness. An uncontrolled outbreak would cripple our health system. Public compliance of government messaging was below 50%.
We needed a collective response
We rallied Kiwis around a creative voice of beauty, hope, humour and heart. Every touchpoint reinforced the individual’s role in achieving our collective purpose. With clarity, humanity and sensitivity.
We got the result
Understanding of Alert Levels reached 86%. Trust in government information, 88%. Together, we saved lives, with the lowest death rate per capita in the OECD.
[Brief]
NZ was one week from a health system crash. An entire nation of people needed to comply with the Government across cultural, economic and political divides. Everyone doing the same thing, consistently, over 8 weeks of lockdown. Our comms goals were >80% mass compliance with Alert system rules and >90% awareness and comprehension. We needed social cohesion – people buying-in emotionally and behaviourally.
[Creative solution]
Unite Against’s writing touched the hearts and minds of an entire nation. Stretching from fact based announcements to heartfelt broadcast TV, its warmth, kindness and clarity were a constant counterpoint to the pandemic. Calm, guiding and reassuring it inspired action by talking with people, not down at them, uniting a nation around a single source of truth, in the face of a common enemy.
[Placement]
The fully interated system ran across all media, including social, TV, radio, press, outdoor, posters, digital, adaptive website and nationwide direct mail campaigns.
[Timeline]
The work ran for 8 weeks during the initial lockdown, but has continued since, and as New Zealand’s main communications weapon and single source of truth against COVID-19, still runs to this day.
[Cultural context]
NZ’s culture is famously ‘loose’, with trust in the public sector brand consistently below 50%. A resistance to authority, along with mixed trust in government, meant compliance was at risk.