In 2019, Omnicom agencies actively took part in International Women’s Day advocacy events around the world in support of gender parity:
22% of U.S. “Officials and Managers” are multicultural, an increase of 29% from five years ago with improvement among each of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Hispanic/Latino, Black/African American and Asian designations.
The U.S. “Professional” talent base is 29% multicultural, an increase of 12% from five years ago with improvement among all but one of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Hispanic/Latino, Black/African American and Asian designations.
Women make up 58% of U.S. “Professionals” and “Officials and Managers”.
Of the approximately 21,000 U.S. employees who are “Professionals” and “Officials and Managers,” 58% are women and 31% are white men.
The U.S. “Executive Manager” talent base is 2.7% Black, 7.2% Asian, 4.9% Hispanic and 84.1% white.
Of the nine current members of Omnicom’s board of directors, six are women and four are African American.
As part of our commitment to inclusion, we’ve established and grown the Omnicom People Engagement Network (OPEN) and its complementary employee resource groups: OPEN DisAbility, Omniwomen and OPEN Pride.
In 2019 and early 2020, OPEN Pride established six new chapters in Dallas, Denver, Houston, Southern California, Barcelona and Brussels, bringing the total number of active OPEN Pride chapters in the Omnicom network to 12.
We also founded OPEN DisAbility, a new employee resource group in the UK, which aims to improve inclusion, visibility and awareness of issues affecting individuals with visible, invisible or learning disabilities, or people with long-term illnesses.
In 2019, Omniwomen opened a new chapter in Dallas on International Women’s Day, representing the 14th Omniwomen chapter across the globe. Over the last six years, participation in Omniwomen has grown to include more than 10,000 members.
For 25 years, Omnicom University has led the way, providing advanced education for current and future leaders using real-world case studies developed from the wealth and breadth of experiences at Omnicom agencies.
Founded in 1995, Omnicom University will be celebrating its 25th anniversary in 2020. This prestigious program has grown to offer 12 programs a year on three continents with nearly 5,200 global alumni, many of whom have gone on to rise in the ranks of leadership within our organization.
Heading into the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots and WorldPride, Ketchum worked with Mastercard and other marketing partners to create a campaign that would elevate the company’s longstanding focus on acceptance and inclusion, under the umbrella of #AcceptanceMatters. In conjunction with Mastercard’s establishment of “Acceptance Street” – a new street sign at the iconic corner of Gay and Christopher Streets in NYC that reflected the unique identities within the LGBTQIA+ community – the team announced True Name, the first solution to enable transgender and non-binary people to use their chosen name on their card without the requirement of a legal name change. True Name would empower the transgender and non-binary communities to present their cards with confidence and pride. The campaign drove media coverage and, since launch, many financial institutions are working with Mastercard to offer True Name cards to their customers.
Omnicom is a proud partner of ADCOLOR, an organization founded by our own Chief Diversity Officer, Tiffany R. Warren. ADCOLOR celebrates and champions diversity in the creative industries through its annual conference, award show and FUTURES program. Each year, the FUTURES program identifies a class of 30 young professionals and nurtures them as leaders through training, mentorship and empowerment.
As Ad Council’s pro bono partner of the year, Hearts & Science partnered with the organization to celebrate the 75th birthday of its iconic Smokey Bear. Supported only by donated media space and strategic audience insights, the team executed a fully refreshed digital campaign targeting millennial outdoor enthusiasts with tips and resources to prevent wildfires. Hearts & Science negotiated close to 10 million impressions in free display media, including customized assets triggered by high fire-risk weather, which created a more unique experience for audiences. Following the campaign’s success, Ad Council adopted Hearts & Science’s partner outreach process for use with other partners as well.
Nineteen million children around the world are vision impaired. Born from the discovery that toy building bricks have the same pattern as the braille alphabet, Lew’Lara\TBWA teamed up with the Dorina Nowill Foundation in Brazil to launch an online campaign aimed to convince toy manufacturers to embrace Braille Bricks and produce them on a much wider scale. Using the #BrailleBricksForAll hashtag, the campaign reached over 141 million impressions. As a result, LEGO® announced they would modify their iconic toy bricks to help blind and visually impaired children around the world learn and develop critical skills. Following initial pilots, the final LEGO® Braille Bricks kit will be launched in 2020 and distributed free of charge to select institutions.
Less than 11% of stories in U.S. history textbooks are about women, giving children a false picture of what is possible. Timed with Women’s History Month, GS&P helped Daughters of the Evolution launch “Lessons in HerStory,” an app that uses augmented reality to rewrite popular U.S. history textbooks. Lessons in HerStory tackles the power imbalance between men and women in society and shows young girls they can make history too. The app has reached thousands of schools and a potential audience of more than 59 million students, expanding history and instilling confidence in the leaders of tomorrow.
Around the world, 821 million people live without food and 3 million children die each year of hunger. To combat these alarming statistics, Porter Novelli assisted the UN World Food Programme (WFP) in launching its first ever business-to-consumer campaign, “Feed Our Future.” At the campaign’s core lived a 60-second Global Cinema advertisement that rebranded hunger in a thought-provoking, nuanced way. The activation leveraged partnerships with SAWA, the Global Cinema Advertising Association and Facebook to premiere in front of key audiences at the main stage of the Cannes Lions Festival and beyond, reaching over 43 million people worldwide and revitalizing actions taken to create a world with zero hunger.
FleishmanHillard worked with Thomson Reuters Foundation to launch OPENLY — an impartial LGBTQIA+ news platform that removes western bias to tell stories across the map. On top of 1.1 million-plus organic Facebook video views and 118 million-plus readers in 48 countries, the unbiased reporting through OPENLY influenced Malaysia’s National Health Ministry to drop its “gender identity disorder” language. The powerful work earned recognition at the 2019 ICCO Global Awards and the first-ever PRWeek Campaigns for Good Awards.
Created by DDB Hong Kong on the eve of the 25th anniversary of antislavery organization Hagar International, the Reality Check campaign raised awareness that slavery is not only rife throughout the world but is also cheaper now than any time in human history. In a live activation shown in the campaign’s video, unsuspecting Hong Kong diners are presented with bills showing the number of human lives they could buy for the same price as their meal. DDB also developed a campaign microsite featuring the stories of survivors of slavery and information for visitors to learn more about how to support Hagar International’s efforts around the world. The campaign resulted in a 140% increase in donations made to Hagar.
The United Nations issued an open call to creatives around the globe to help in “translating critical public health messages into different languages, different cultures, communities and platforms, reaching everyone, everywhere.” In response, the Integer Group created the COVID-19 Retailer Tool Kit, featuring clear, visual “two carts apart” guidelines that will help retailers promote social distancing requirements and ensure the safety of shoppers. The tool kit is turnkey and its files are open, allowing for customization in language, color palette and logos.
Beginning as an awareness campaign around medical bias, TBWA\WorldHealth’s Black Health Now quickly transformed into a series of virtual sessions with doctors, athletes, fitness experts and community leaders to help promote preventative healthcare and provide COVID-19 information tailored to the needs of Black Americans. The social media series presents a different guest each week to address COVID-19’s disparate impact on people of color. Guests have included Olympian Tianna Bartoletta, National Urban League CEO Marc H. Morial and emergency medical physician Dr. Garth Walker.
Due to a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE), nonmedical frontline workers, such as delivery persons and security personnel, can often be left without proper protection. BBDO Guerrero teamed up with the Philippine Chamber of Business and Professionals to raise awareness of the issue and launch #CommunityShields – a series of instructional posters and social posts that teach people how to construct masks and shields for community frontliners using everyday materials.
To raise money for COVID-19 relief, OMD worked with the National Football League (NFL) to develop a campaign for Draft-A-Thon – a fundraiser held in conjunction with the iconic NFL Draft. Using targeted messaging, social media, digital assets and search functions, the team amplified awareness of the event, directing audiences to stream the fundraiser alongside the NFL Draft. Draft-A-Thon generated 23 million-plus views, with 46 million-plus minutes watched and an Ask Me Anything of 55,000-plus across multiple platforms – all while raising over $100 million for COVID-19 relief.
Public places are hot spots for contagious diseases. To help control the spread of COVID-19, clean-energy company Fortum developed Vipu, a hands-free handle made from recycled plastics that enables people to open doors with their forearms. TBWA helped develop an advertising campaign for the product launch to demonstrate its innovative and sustainable design.
As part of Connecticut’s efforts to reopen in a responsible and safe manner, several Omnicom agencies worked to support the governor’s Reopen Connecticut Advisory Group, comprised of business leaders and health and education experts. Agency representatives developed an integrated communications plan featuring messaging, paid media, website development, creative for PSAs and stakeholder outreach to ensure messages were shared across the state.
During quarantine, domestic violence reports escalated globally. The Canadian Women’s Foundation initiated “Signal for Help” to identify victims of domestic abuse through a simple hand gesture used during virtual gatherings. Toronto-based Juniper Park\TBWA helped develop a social media plan that demonstrated how to perform the signal, along with sharable web-based materials. The campaign has expanded to Australia, France, Spain and the United States, providing resources for victims around the world.
To contribute to critical relief campaigns during the COVID-19 pandemic, Omnicom Media Group MENA joined forces with regional media owners in the Middle East to provide complimentary media space to its long-standing partner charities. With this support, Dubai Cares, Gulf for Good and Médecins Sans Frontières were able to reach a larger audience with their call to action. Their COVID-19 campaigns are focused on education, health, and critical support for people, particularly children, in need in the region and beyond.
Receiving timely, accurate information is critical during a pandemic. DDB in Singapore worked with the local government to create an official Whatsapp channel to deliver daily COVID-19 updates. This tool gave subscribers access to trusted communications from the government and provided a platform for health officials to clarify misinformation and share key announcements.
In 2019, among the most meaningful new ways we advanced inclusion was our work promoting The Valuable 500, an organization working to put disability on the business leadership agenda. The Valuable 500 launched at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos in January 2019 with the ambitious goal of persuading 500 CEOs to make a public commitment to advance disability inclusion within their organizations. Since then, over 250 businesses, representing more than 10.25 million employees and over $4 trillion in combined revenue, have committed to making disability inclusion a priority of leadership.
Marina Maher Communications and Johnson & Johnson’s Band-Aid Brand harnessed the power of social purpose and the inspiring activist voice of Laverne Cox to empower consumers to join the fight to end HIV/AIDS. Influencers championed the movement by wearing their (BAND-AID®)RED bandages as a symbol of collective action and showing it off on social media using #BandTogether. The campaign garnered more than 187 million earned media impressions and more than 3.4 million organic impressions on Instagram. Each box of (BAND-AID®)RED bandages sold provides a day’s worth of lifesaving medication for someone living with HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa.
In order to attract more stem cell donors for children with blood cancer, OMD Düsseldorf and OMG Fuse teamed up with the University Hospital Düsseldorf’s bone marrow donor center to introduce a special lollipop – a well-known symbol for a happy childhood. As the first lollipop that can save lives, Life Lolli has a cotton swab handle that can be given as a DNA sample. Together with influencers and TV and print ads, the campaign gets young people enthusiastic about the chance to save lives through a simple yet powerful candy.
Since opening its doors in 1962, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has saved countless lives and significantly improved the survival rate of childhood cancer, all without charging the families a cent. To raise awareness of this feat and encourage donations, BBDO New York helped create the St. Jude Hall of Heroes – a virtual reality monument with 60-foot tall statues, representing the unique stories of patients who never gave up. Visitors can navigate freely in the hall, interact with the heroes and hear their stories narrated by those closest to them.
During the Chilean social outbreak, several small- to medium-sized enterprises were looted, destroyed and suffered great financial loss as a result. While others did not dare to speak up, BBDO Chile raised Banco de Chile’s voice by creating a platform and media guide for the businesses to reactivate their sales. The campaign’s videos received more than 6.5 million views, positioning Banco de Chile as an industry leader in the support of small businesses and entrepreneurs.
Sex trafficking is a multibillion-dollar business – one built on coercion, violence and abuse that causes unrelenting physical and mental harm to its victims. In partnership with World Without Exploitation, Patients & Purpose created a campaign to reposition sex trafficking and call on the general public to help #CloseThisBusiness. Grassroots events organized in support of the campaign by Patients & Purpose bring together survivors and more than 130 individual nonprofits to educate the community and raise funds. The campaign lives across all social channels and provides survivors with a platform to share their stories and advocate for justice.
In support of the Spanish Soccer League’s commitment to end all forms of discrimination and prejudice worldwide, DDB Spain wrote, filmed and produced a short film raising awareness of these issues and bringing to light the shocking intolerances that still exist today. The film features the stories of heroes like Jesse Owens, who participated in the Berlin Olympics in 1936 and inspired nations around the globe to believe in a world that is the same for everyone, regardless of race. The campaign has been featured in 80-plus local and international media outlets, garnering more than 17.8 million earned media impressions.
Stand with Parkland is a national organization comprised of the family and friends of those who tragically passed away during the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018. While advocating for practical public safety reforms, improved mental health support and responsible firearm ownership, Mercury Public Affairs has assisted SWP leadership with the development of materials used before the United States Senate, in addition to providing strategic insights on key pieces of legislation throughout the year’s Congressional session.
Eight in 10 Spanish men have heard what makes a “real man” throughout their lives, but only one in four identifies with these expectations. Proximity Spain partnered with Gillette Spain to produce, “It Takes a Real Man,” a campaign designed to highlight the positive values of masculinity while rejecting the negative ones. Consisting of a series of short advertisements, the campaign includes celebrity testimonials encouraging men to bring out the best versions of themselves and inspire young generations with values like integrity, hard work, honesty and respect.
TBWA Korea joined Superbin to launch project “Garbage Mart,” an innovative solution to Seoul’s growing waste problem. Using Superbin’s Nephron, a robot that collects recyclables, visitors can earn cash by inserting cans, bottles and other discarded materials into the machine and then purchase eco-friendly products inside the market. The amount of trash collected was enough to surround the neighborhood that houses the mart two times over. The project received widespread support, generating nearly 15,000 visitors to the store, 500-plus posts on social media and 100-plus media placements, all helping to encourage the spread of a more recycling-friendly culture.
Only 4% of all waste is currently recycled in Russia. And following the FIFA World Cup in the country, hundreds of thousands of beer cups were left behind. Budweiser – an official sponsor of the event – partnered with BBDO to collect and recycle more than 50,000 cups, which were then used to construct a professional sports field. The field is free and open to anyone who wants to feel the atmosphere of the World Cup. The successful campaign quickly garnered the attention of media worldwide, earning more than 750 media placements and 3.1 billion impressions.
Using KLM’s industry leading role in sustainability, DDB Unlimited helped the airline launch a global call to action on sustainable travel. Through the Fly Responsibly platform, KLM and DDB Unlimited invited the world to join forces with advertisements in newspapers and a film created without carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. They continued to spread the message at airports, through in-flight films, events, email and in the company’s booking tool. The world answered – KLM was invited by the United Nations to talk about the campaign during Climate Week, and other airlines followed KLM’s lead to reduce their CO2 emissions. With more than 2,000 media placements, the campaign has generated €30 million in earned media value to date.
An iconic fundraiser, Shave for a Cure encourages New Zealanders to shave their heads (or support someone who is) to help fund research for the cure for Leukaemia and other blood disorders, whilst also supporting those living with the disease. Working closely with media suppliers to deliver bonus placements across media channels, PHD Media NZ has helped raise awareness of the fundraiser and delivered more than $2.3 million in bonus value for the Leukaemia & Blood Cancer Foundation since the campaign’s inception in January 2020.
Following the first nationwide elections since 2009, Lebanon did not have a government for several months due to political infighting and gridlock. To combat this time of uncertainty, Impact BBDO helped produce a blank edition of the An-Nahar newspaper, encouraging the citizens of Lebanon to fill the blank pages with calls to action. The world took notice, with the blank newspaper earning $5 million in media coverage and becoming the number one trending topic on Twitter. Most importantly, after eight months of political turmoil, the Lebanese people got the new government they demanded.
For two years running, Omnicom Media Group SA (Pty) Ltd. has financially facilitated the educational fees and living standards of more than 200 students in South Africa. This program enables previously disadvantaged and disabled youth to develop computing and entrepreneurial skill sets, which has led to a more than 90% success rate in employment acquisition in the South African workforce.
To drive support for The Autism Community in Action (TACA), Designory created a campaign that gave relevance to the day-to-day challenges faced by children and families with autism. Through a collection of assets including video, print, social media, a news release and national conference support, Designory focused a different lens on the ordinary things most people take for granted. The campaign contributed to a 13% increase in site visits for TACA and a 15% increase in donations at their annual Ante Up for Autism event.
More than half of all teens have been victims of cyberbullying. In fact, it’s the root cause of 20% of teen suicides. To create awareness of this unseen epidemic, BBDO New York and eg+ partnered with Monica Lewinsky to launch a unique interactive film showing real messages sent to people who have experienced cyberbullying and inviting viewers to enter their phone numbers to receive texts as they continue watching the video. Through the experience, viewers are left with a newfound understanding of the real epidemic at play. Within a week of the film launch, over 200,000 texts were sent in 157 countries. The film was featured in several leading media outlets across the world and was shared by celebrities including Ben Stiller, Sarah Silverman and Tony Hawk.
Across Omnicom networks and agencies, we are committed to ensuring our creative and production directors can draw from a diverse supplier base when assembling project teams. In 2019, we rolled out One Sandbox – a curated, web-based directory developed by TBWA\WorldHealth that features more than 250 women-owned, multicultural and LGBTQIA+ suppliers – to agencies across the Omnicom network. Agencies have leveraged One Sandbox in addition to their own innovative tools and aggressive goals to boost diversity in their respective supplier networks and maintain a reputation for responsible purchasing.
In a society dominated by idealized body images, women don’t feel comfortable with their own breasts and that can prevent them from getting preventative ultrasound breast exams. Aiming to free women of their shame and encourage them to get regular check-ups, DDB Warsaw collaborated with Avon to get people talking about a new “beauty” product. Marketed for breast care and health and customized to suit 15 different types and shapes of breasts, the new product was, in reality, just an ordinary ultrasound gel. The magazine and social media campaign reached more than 25 million.
The Johnsonville Big Taste Grill tours the United States, serving up Johnsonville products at sponsored events and raising money for charity. In 2018, the tour raised $99,610 for 28 different charitable organizations. The grill also visited areas affected by natural disasters, supplying 9,000 hot meals to victims, first responders and volunteers in communities affected by the devastating wildfires in California and by Hurricane Florence in the Carolinas. GMR staffed the Big Taste Grill’s traveling road crew, worked with regional Johnsonville reps to identify event locations, recruited local volunteer groups, conducted media outreach, generated social media content, and of course, designed and created the grill itself!
For patients with brain and spine injuries, communication is a challenge. To help overcome their struggle to speak, TBWA\ India conceptualized a simple, accessible and affordable solution: an eye language that everyone can learn free of charge. Developed for the Asha Ek Hope Foundation and Neurogen Brain & Spine Institute, the eye language is catalyzing people around the world who seek independence from the limits of paralysis.
The NSPCC, a charity fighting to end child abuse, wanted to show young people that they weren’t alone when it came to discrimination and racial bullying. Teaming up with Sky Cinema, OMD UK created a campaign to build deep engagement with potential donors by sponsoring the Christmas lights displays in 11 major UK cities. By spreading its positive messaging across the country through press, radio, cinema, out-of-home advertising and social media, the campaign reached over 35 million people and raised what was forecasted to be over £1,000,000.
BBDO China worked with the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau to create The Unbalanced Scale, a campaign to expand awareness of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. Focusing on the UN SDG 2: Zero Hunger, the interactive campaign invited people attending Shanghai’s Charity Carnival to stand on a scale that equated their body weight to an equivalent number of starving children. Participants then received a QR to connect to UNICEF’s donation website.
After Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico suffered a water crisis. With a million people without running water and no access to bottled water or energy for boiling, bleach became a viable solution to make water safe. DDB Puerto Rico teamed up with Clorox to devise a dropper – inspired by the Coqui frog, Puerto Rico’s national icon – that dispensed the exact amount of bleach needed to make one liter of water safe. The dropper reached thousands of families and provided up to 4 million liters of safe water monthly.
Africa (Brazil) with its client, espnW, raised awareness of women’s pay inequality in sports by putting evidence of the salary gaps on game balls. It then sent the balls to 50 influencers who had relevance and audience to amplify the campaign. Developed in partnership with Netshoes and Change the Game, the Africa Inequality campaign reached 15.3 million people and garnered 7.5 million interactions on social media.
OMG MENA volunteer teams supported rural villages in India and The Philippines, building water filtration towers to provide access to clean running water. The teams also educated children on basic hygiene, volunteered at community projects and provided the communities with school and hygiene supplies.
RAPP volunteers fundraise on an almost monthly basis to support Shelter, a nonprofit that aims to end homelessness and housing inequality in the UK through donation drives for clothing, hygiene items and food for local shelters, as well as initiatives to ensure neighborhood caterers and restaurants divert their food waste to good causes.
Rabin Martin employees serve on the Young Professionals Board of Amref Health Africa, the largest Africa-based healthcare nonprofit, and raise funds for the ongoing work to stop the practice of female genital mutilation and child marriage. For 50 years, Amref Health Africa has helped improve the health of thousands of people across 35 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, partnering with local communities and the private sector to scale their programs and realize sustainable change.
Entrée Health Princeton with partner Link9 provided pro bono work for the ZanaArica Foundation launch on International Woman’s Day 2019. Zana Africa supports adolescent girls in Kenya with sanitary pads and health education, both scarce in their communities. The creative team developed a campaign for use on billboards throughout the United States, including eight billboards in Times Square on launch day, with a companion Instagram and Facebook ad campaign that ran for the week surrounding it.
Marina Maher Communications with RXMOSAIC sponsored the primary school education of 14 girls through She’s the First, a nonprofit that supports girls who will be the first in their families to graduate high school. The 40-strong volunteer team has raised $30,000 over seven years through a variety of events including #CheeseTheFirst, celebrating the International Day of the Girl with cheese and wine from local women-run wineries and female cheesemakers, and a Day of the Girl event featuring conversations between actress and advocate Monique Coleman and She’s the First scholar Ellie Kaaya.
It can be hard for young adults to acknowledge they are in an abusive relationship when social posts are “liked” at face value. MAL\FOR GOOD created a campaign to raise awareness of abuse, highlighting the warning signs of an unhealthy relationship by showing the real life that happens behind social media posts. The campaign generated 13 million views and 38 million impressions in one month.
XQ Institute and the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF) invited the public to rethink the future of American high schools with a special one-hour event, “EIF Presents: XQ Super School Live”. MAL\FOR GOOD developed the integrated tune-in campaign for the early September event, which aired live on all four U.S. networks.
In an increasingly polarized world where digital media tops face-to-face interaction, Lipton commissioned Medina Turgul DDB to create “It’s time to talk”. Employing a media event, the agency dramatized the issue by closing Lipton’s prime time commercial, broadcast simultaneously across 17 national channels, with five minutes of silent packshot. The event reached 17 million impressions within 15 minutes, and 300 million to date.
Noa Ubongo, “Sharpen Your Brain” in Swahili, is a free learning channel for youth that offers short video classes focused on workforce readiness and entrepreneurship skills. Created and financed by TBWA\ Khanga Rue, it was launched with three pilot classes in 2016. Since then, it’s had nearly 2 million views, reached more than 3 million people, with 12,400+ hours of viewing time.
Studies show that men interrupt women at an alarming rate in everything from casual conversations to business meetings. To bring awareness, BBDO Canada created an uninterruptable radio ad for GirlTalkHQ.com, during which a woman explains the facts surrounding the issue – where it happens, how it feels, the root causes behind it and what we can do about it – all in one single, uninterrupted sentence.
Education For Employment (EFE) is a network of non-profits in the Middle East & North Africa (MENA), with a mission to create economic opportunities for unemployed youth so that they can create a brighter future for themselves, their families and communities. Impact Proximity revamped EFE’s website and digital communications to drive awareness for the program, engage stakeholders and increase donations.
Children often spend their lunch money to buy anything but healthy food. To help direct the money to its proper use, BBDO Moscow with SberBank, implemented Ladoshki technology that lets children pay for school meals by using their palms on an infrared scanner. The program was piloted in two cities and is now in more than 74 schools across Russia.
Refugees often leave everything behind but their house key. Caritas’ Keys of Hope campaign matched ten human stories recorded in Caritas refugee camps to ten keys, giving anonymous refugees a voice that the mainstream media denied them.
Over the past five years, Marina Maher Communications has raised money for She’s the First through bake sales, yoga sessions, company-wide jeans days and raffles. In 2016, they funded tuition for 14 girls at the Arlington Academy in Uganda.
Year Up is a non-profit initiative that matches young people from challenging backgrounds with corporate internships. Criseli Saenz, a former intern who came to Omnicom via the Year Up program, now works as a coordinator on the Diversity & Inclusion team, and manages the ADCOLOR FUTURES program, which provides training, mentorship, and opportunities for young people with lots of potential, but few connections in the industry.
Agency 180LA helped Boost Your Voice create a partnership between local governments, voting rights organizations and elected officials to increase voter access in low-income communities.
This pro bono campaign by Goodby Silverstein & Partners raised awareness around sexual assault and rape on college campuses by creating mock acceptance letters from colleges that included details about actual assaults students should plan on being subjected to.
With support from BBDO Guatemala, the “Infancia en Extinción” campaign by Plan International aims to raise awareness for the thousands of children who are victims of violence, child labor, malnutrition, teen pregnancy and underage marriage.
What if the future Queen of Spain, Princess Leonor, dropped out of school? #Leonordejalaescuela, a campaign created by DDB Tandem, asked a question that went viral to focus attention on another Leonor, who, as a Romani child, faced a 60% risk of quitting school.
We Are Unlimited launched Unlimited Talent this year to attract diverse high school and college students to advertising careers. On April 6, the agency invited 20 students from Urban Prep Academies to visit and learn about its work. The Chicago-based school has a 100% graduation rate for the young men who attend; and all graduates have been accepted to four-year colleges and universities.
Cosmetics manufacturer Nivea supports quality time with families by building 40 Nivea Yards, or places where families could spend time together. OMD Macroscope supports them with media that encourages families to build and use public play spaces like Podwórko NIVEA.
OMD Singapore spearheaded a promotional campaign to promote Estée Lauder’s Breast Cancer Awareness program, which included media outreach as well as lighting iconic Singapore buildings in pink to celebrate survivors.
A 21.6% smoking rate puts South Korea amongst the highest of the OECD countries for smoking. FleishmanHillard designed a Fingerband – or rubber wristband – as the focus of a National Health Promotion Plan that helped reduce teen smoking rates in Korea by 15% for boys and 20% for girls.
To help Indonesians affected by cataract blindness, a team from TBWA/Group Singapore worked with the John Fawcett Foundation to develop a virtual reality device that simulates cataracts. Artists then created work based on the VR images which were sold to raise funds for the cause.
When AB InBev partnered with Lyft to provide 80,000 free safe rides home as part of a year-long responsible drinking campaign, FleishmanHillard promoted the program with social and traditional media that reached 1.8 million Facebook users and 32 million Twitter users, receiving 3.9 thousand mentions in conversations.
Sancho BBDO created the Colores Piel campaign for Fundacion Pies Descalzos, the Colombian non-governmental organization founded by international pop star Shakira. The campaign promotes respect for racial diversity and teaches children to stand up against discrimination.
A powerful ad about the dangers of distracted driving makes the case that “you’re never alone when you’re driving, even when you’re alone in your car.” The ad supported AT&T’s It Can Wait campaign to reduce texting while driving; reducing accidents and saving lives.
Millions of Pakistanis live in the darkness. BBDO Pakistan created a campaign to promote PepsiCo’s Lighting Up Lives campaign, an initiative that has helped install hundreds of lights in refugee camps and other underprivileged areas across Pakistan.
Few Americans realize the benefits that public housing offers to individuals, as well as communities. Cone Communications developed a campaign and promoted the documentary “Our Journey Home” to emotionally connect consumers to the critical importance of a safe and stable home.
How far have we come in out fight for diversity? How much further do we have to go? In Chicago, Bounce and Omnicom Media Group celebrated Black History Month by gathering 150 advertising and media professionals and press to discuss “Recognizing Progress in Diversity.” Speakers included CNN commentator Angela Rye and veteran jounralist Ed Gordon.
Illiterate people are more likely to live in poverty, lack education and miss out on opportunities to participate in society and join the workforce. Flamingo London partnered with Pearson’s Project Literacy to develop a messaging campaign showing how illiteracy contributes to social and economic hardships.
Our agencies and networks strive to provide networking and learning opportunities for all employees, helping each individual to grow and advance to their highest potential. For 23 years, Omnicom University has been our company’s flagship program for leadership development. Employing the Harvard Business School case study method, Omnicom University brings together mid- and senior-level executives to discuss examples of Omnicom’s business strategies worldwide to teach leadership and business skills.
BLK MKT Studios—a small, certified minority/woman-owned editing and finishing collective—and Pony Sound—a certified minority-owned audio recording and post-production house, both partnered with GSD&M to create new, diversity-focused content for John Deere. The “Misconceptions” TV spot and “ING Radio” spot helped show John Deere as an affordable choice for a broad spectrum of customers, while ensuring the highest quality product for the client.
Timed for Super Bowl Sunday 2017, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners worked with Tostitos to create the Party Safe Bag – a limited-edition chip bag that contained a sensor to detect traces of alcohol on a person’s breath. When alcohol was detected, the bag turned red, revealing an Uber code and a “Don’t drink and drive” message.
Portland Communications worked with Education Above All, an organization that empowers children through education, to develop powerful messaging that positioned the global foundation as a key partner in attaining the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal #4 around education.
TracyLocke raised $1 million to support the Indwe Learning Center in Illovo, South Africa, a Montessori blended curriculum school for children orphaned by the massive AIDS epidemic in South Africa. The school establishes a model that can be used in other countries.
A CARE study found that around 150,000 girls don’t finish high school on time in Peru. Garwich BBDO Peru supports the NGO’s work with public schools, families, communities and girls to help young women finish their studies.
ActionAid, an NGO dedicated to children’s survival and education, wanted to raise awareness of its work cost-effectively. To help, DLV BBDO Milan designed the Donate Your Profile social media campaign, inviting people to let ActionAid stories take over their pages. The campaign went viral, creating 79 million media impressions worldwide.
“Your voice is your power. Use it.” A video produced by Alma DDB shows the struggles of Hispanic students as they balance work, family, academics and extracurricular activities, and encourages them to apply for a McDonald’s scholarship.
MAL\FOR GOOD created a website and campaign to promote XQ Super School’s competition inviting solutions to challenges facing youth preparing for college and life. The website encouraged access to open source solutions and a bus tour connected grassroots activists with youth, parents and educators.
This campaign for the maker of Plan B One-Step® sought to reduce unwanted pregnancy by promoting emergency contraception. The campaign educated young women about their planning options via events on college campuses and through social and traditional media.
Through an energetic industrial theatre road show, Dettol teaches 3 to 10 year-olds how hand-washing and good personal hygiene can massively reduce the incidence of infectious disease and illness. The shows are supported by material distributed to over 2,000 Pick n Pay School Club schools, and has resulted in Dettol being 32% more popular than its nearest rival.
The OMD Fast Forward Programme, in partnership with Good Jobs, aims to bridge the opportunity gap between companies looking for diverse talent and talented young people from disadvantaged areas. Twenty OMD volunteers pitch in to mentor students in digital communications skills in a 12-month paid internship program.
To celebrate International Day of the Blind, Sberbank created a unique exhibition of tactile pictures, allowing both visually-impaired and seeing people to experience art through touch. BBDO Moscow developed a communications campaign for the exhibit that drew in more than 130,000 people.
The campaign Mezi svými (Here we belong) shows immigrants talking about the hateful — and friendly — reactions they’ve gotten from native Czechs, celebrating and reaffirming connections between new and old residents of this European country.
People can exchange a bag of food scraps for goods such as coffee beans, muffins and t-shirts, thanks to an initiative by Auckland organic waste collection business, We Compost, with support from Auckland Council and DDB.
In more than 120 countries, women have fewer rights than men, including restrictions on what they can wear. DDB Tandem’s video, developed with the support of Spanish designer David Delfin, highlights discrimination by showing models wearing clothing forbidden to women.
Twenty charities, ranging from London’s air ambulance to a nature project in Hackney, got mentoring and training from Portland to make them better communicators through the Team London charity project. Portland was handpicked by the Mayor of London to be the official communications partner for the project.
HDI Youth Marketeers helped Pikitup, the City of Johannesburg’s Waste Management Company, develop the Eco-Rangers program. The campaign includes theatrical roadshows to teach primary school students about taking care of the environment, and has visited over 100 schools performing for more than 35,000 participants.
Over 3,000 volunteers worked on over 100 projects at 80 locations in and around Austin, Texas. Volunteers worked to care for trees, repaint park structures, pick up trash and refurbish trails.
In Lebanon, speeding is a major cause of accidents. TBWA/RAAD/LEBANON’s Warning Voice campaign promoted an unusual way to get drivers to slow down: a Nissan speed warning that replaced alarm sounds with voices of loved ones.
COVERGIRL emerged as a champion of inclusivity by announcing the first-ever male face of the brand: James Charles, a boundary-breaking young social media star and aspiring makeup artist. The shift put COVERGIRL at the forefront of a cultural shift toward equal opportunity of self-expression for all genders.
Critical Mass launched a responsive website for Hope North, a nonprofit that provides education and healing for children affected by Uganda’s civil war. The website highlights how music, art, literature and dance inspire Hope North students to become future leaders.
Cone hosted branded events to promote KOMBIT: The Cooperative to the CSR influencer community, resulting in over 173.4 million impressions. The documentary campaign introduced media, influencers and consumers to Timberland’s agroforestry model.
Imagine walking into a grocery store where every item is five times more expensive than it usually is. Goodby, Silverstein & Partners used this simple concept to raise awareness of the 800,000 people in San Francisco who live on the poverty line, earning about a fifth of the median income.
Ariel’s #ShareTheLoad campaign exposed how the burden of housework is focused solely on women and is passed down over generations in India. The campaign inspired over two million men to share the load of laundry, and Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, said this campaign contained “one of the most powerful videos I have ever seen.”
A bullet hole in a window of Off the Street Club, a West Garfield Park refuge for kids and teenagers, was a shocking reminder of the 93 murders of young Chicagoans last year. But, it also became a symbol of hope in an Energy BBDO campaign that drew more than two million donations.