Working on the BC SPCA’s Pawsitive Gifts Program

Back in October, the UBC Marketing Association hosted their annual Perfect Pitch ad competition. Every year, they partner up with a local not-for-profit company and host an advertising competition. For the BC SPCA, I was fortunate to be the winner of their 2008-2009 competition, so I figured I would take the time to highlight what my entry was all about.

The Method

There were two main guidelines here. The first was to create a campaign that the BC SPCA could use to promote their Pawsitive Gifts program. The second was that the animals couldn’t be wearing clothes. That’s not a lot to go on.

I started my concept by visiting their website. It’s a really cool concept – you’re essentially buying a donate, but through the form of a “gift” for someone. The gifts aren’t super expensive, and they’re all quite identifiable – Feed a puppy for $5, let a cat stay for $12, etc. From looking at the website, it seemed like you could use this campaign to target pretty much anyone with a little extra income, probably with a bit more of a skew towards women. The key thing about the donation here is that you’re not locked down for a period of time, and it’s not a large sum – there’s really no reason why anyone can’t do this. So the campaign centered around the $5 price point, which is pretty much within anyone’s reach who would be see the message.

The Creation

The campaign started out with a really, really, really cute picture. I found an adorable Garfield and Odie-esque picture of a puppy and a kitten from iStock. A lot of non-profit/donation campaigns tend to use fear and pity to try and provoke action, but unfortunately, a lot of these ads are also filtered out by the people they’re trying to reach. The picture was chosen because it’s something you want to look at. They’re cute, but they’re sad, so you feel pushed to see the rest of the message.

It was originally supposed to be a holiday campaign, so I just the tagline “Happy Holidays?” It’s pretty self-explanatory, that it’s not a happy time for everyone, especially abandoned animals and pets. The catchphrase isn’t anything overly exciting, but it’s enough for you to do a slight double-take to a commonly used phrase.

I used a “before and after” message with the outlined bowl, and the $5 price tag. The visual pushes the message that a $5 donation could help fill up the puppy and kitten’s bowl, both who have a really sad look. It’s a pretty simple idea and execution, but it works.

The copy was one of the few recommendations – a simple plug to the website where a person can go through with the donation.

As a side note, a lot of white spaced was used on purpose. This is designed to be a very simple, easy to absorb message.

Online

For the purposes of this competition, the main criteria was the create a 8.5 x 11 print ad. What I really pushed here was that it needed to go past that, so I mocked up online versions as well. It just makes sense that you’re promoting more online if you want people to impulse-donate. Below you can see how this ad would be tailed for a leaderboard, big box ad, and a Facebook ad as well.

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