Royal National Lifeboats Institution case study

Sea rescue charity The RNLI may be a household name but with an aging donor base it needed to target new, younger supporters to secure its future. The tightly targeted and provocative ‘Who are you?’ campaign, by Proximity London, was designed to galvanise young people into action and get them talking about themselves and the charity.

The agency sent 12 influential YouTube video bloggers a controversial message in a box - ‘Your generation has been branded selfish, ignorant and violent’ - backed up with negative headlines about young people. The box also contained a camera along with an invitation to rewrite the headlines.

Each blogger generated a massive response online resulting in hundreds of thousands of young people learning about the RNLI. And some 500 young people aged 16 to 22 joined the RNLI as volunteers. 

The campaign is a perfect example of an integrated campaign drawing on the power of word of mouth marketing and audience participation.