Princess Alice Hospice needed an emotive social and print campaign to build on their legacy Gifts in Wills messaging theme of “love us when you leave us”.

Challenge

Princess Alice are a Surrey based hospice, providing end of life care, with less than a quarter of funding coming from the NHS.

In order to keep their service alive and continue their outstanding care to even more people in the future, PAH had one important ask: leave a gift in your Will. Legacy gifting is vital to the hospice as without it, they wouldn’t be able to care for one in two of their patients. A sizeable 50% of funding comes from gifts in Wills.

Encouraging people to include a gift to any charity is tough. So why would someone leave their legacy to Princess Alice as opposed to their loved ones?

Objective

The aim was to use digital to drive consideration through a carefully targeted social and display campaign. The campaign would reach existing PAH supporters and the local babyboomer community. An important audience for PAH given the affluence of many, coupled with the fact they account for 20% of deaths. In 25 years baby boomers are predicted to account for one third of deaths.

PAH would then take interested prospects on a nurture journey, resulting in a Direct Mail send, designed to tell more of the PAH story to those who had requested it, and ultimately thanking them for their compassion and consideration.

With an advertorial deadline just 2 weeks from project kick off, the studio window for developing a breakthrough creative concept was short.  As always, bbd were ready for the challenge!

Solution

The creative juices flowed in a super energetic Planning meets Creative brainstorm. Our wealth of third sector experience meant we could acid test ideas at lightning speed: why would someone choose PAH over another charity? How could we keep the message relevant in this cluttered landscape? How could we make them understand the urgency? What was the most important thing to say? Would the idea work across channels?

Our idea was born. Coined ‘the pledge’ our creative concept heroes the commitment of people; the donors, supporters, volunteers, nurses, staff, the faces of PAH. Those who make PAH a place of compassionate care.

We crafted a simple but powerful message. Something which was more than a clever play on words. Our headline provoked action, encouraging the community to stand up and raise their hand, to show their support and commitment. Our language would speak directly to the reader or recipient, either by asking for their oath, or by expressing ours.

Our creative posed a suite of simple questions relating to the amazing work of PAH.

The answer to which was a simple ‘I Will.’