Community youth campaign uses IM to engage teens

The online marketing agency has planned and negotiated a creative and media strategy using banner advertising targeting teens on community-based sites such as Faceparty and Piczo.

The creative uses photographic imagery in skyscraper and MPU formats and encourages teenagers to take pictures of Surrey as they experience it then upload them to www.SurreyTogether.org.uk.

Built by the police, the website will develop with user-generated content uploaded by young people across the county during the six week campaign. 

Photographs uploaded to the site will be rated by other visitors with a shortlist of the top twenty presented to a judging panel who will select winners. 

Prizes include digital cameras, high-street vouchers, a day as a newspaper photographer and the chance to photograph backstage at a gig and a major sporting event.

Mike Teasdale, director at Harvest Digital comments: ‘User-generated sites like Faceparty have a large and fast growing audience, especially amongst teenagers, and offer fantastic demographic targeting possibilities, particularly by age and postcode, but also by interest.   

The impact of the campaign will be judged by tracking the response to the advertising in terms of visits to the Surrey Together site and the number of visitors who upload a photo as well as the amount and quality of content generated.  

Nick Cloke, Surrey Police Press & Publicity Officer said: “Teenagers are hard to reach through traditional advertising channels.  We decided to combine targeted cinema and poster advertising, with direct mail and online advertising – selecting Harvest Digital to manage the digital outreach.”