2016 Winners & Shortlists

Brief Explanation

How will touch, Lebanon’s leading mobile operator, effectively engage an otherwise unconcerned Lebanese audience with its annual DON’T TEXT AND DRIVE campaign without resorting to scare tactics? By implanting a radically different, threefold strategy that positions it as an innovative communicator, touch managed to positively engage stakeholders and build a growing hype around its TEXT IF YOU CAN campaign. The strategy entailed ‘aligning the stars’ (i.e. celebrities and opinion leaders) who have partaken in the campaign, prompting them to share their thoughts on the effectiveness of the campaign and the perils of driving and texting at the end of the two-minute episodes in which they were featured and elsewhere in features and interviews and on social media. Unfolding simultaneously with these 8 two-minute episodes, which aired on primetime over 3 weeks, were the scientific and NGO components to the PR strategy that saw doctors and Yasa, an NGO for road safety, providing facts that debunk the multitasking myth. The awareness campaign has proven to be entertaining and effective, being embraced by the various stakeholders and the public. As a reaction to it, Lebanon’s most popular news anchor dedicated 20 minutes of primetime to talk about it, opening the news segment while attempting to text. Even the top-rated social program took the TEXT IF YOU CAN challenge to the ground, inviting people to play a car game while texting.