CIPR PRide Award -"My dog’s a blood donor"

As part of my university assignment I was required to choose a campaign from a 2009 or recent winner of the CIPR’s PRide Award.  I was expected to give an eight minute poster session about the case study campaign, its objectives, the strategy adopted, the actions taken and the outcomes achieved. As evaluation of the campaign I decided to choose SWAT analysis to identify specifically the elements of the campaign which demonstrate best practice.

 As soon as I looked at the list of winners from 2009, Mistral Group who worked with Pet Blood Bank UK the charity really stood out to me.

                          

Background:

 Pet Blood Bank UK is a non for profit charity specialised in collecting, processing and supporting pet blood products. The ability to carry out blood transfusions is often essential for vets when they are fighting to save the life of a family pet. Like humans, dogs benefit from transfusions during surgery and to treat major trauma and disease.  In January 2009, Mistral was asked to embark on a national PR campaign to raise awareness of this unique service among vets, vet nurses and pet owners. Included in the campaign were two key diary dates for the charity—its second birthday celebrations and the launch of the first ever mobile canine blood collection unit. 

                 

Objectives:

 Increase awareness of transfusion medicine amongst veterinary professionals

 Engage pet owners with the concept of blood donating

 Support activities to raise awareness of PBBuk’s work across all target audiences

(Vets, pet owners, general consumer)

                       

Strategy:

 Make people aware of PBBuk and the work it carries out

 Provide a call to action to get vets and pet owners to do something

 Underpin all activity with the educational key messages

Key campaign elements:

PBBuk second birthday celebrations

In March 2009, PBBuk celebrated its second birthday. In its first two years, the charity had successfully signed up 1,200 dogs to the register. But, with 7.4 million dogs in Britain, more donors were needed; therefore part of the birthday celebration strategy was to encourage more dog owners to sign up their pets to the cause.

It was vital that new recruits were found to assist with this life-saving service for dogs. Following an extensive media sell-in, the children’s TV show Newsround agreed to film a session with its young reporters. This provided prime-time TV coverage for the charity. It was backed by comprehensive online and print   coverage.

Launch of UK’s first mobile canine blood collection unit:

In May 2009, PBBuk joined forces with Royal Canin to launch the UK’s first mobile blood collection unit at Nottingham University. This activity presented Mistral with a unique opportunity to target the nation’s press with a good news story and one which would spark media interest and attention. 

As part of the planning process, Mistral worked with PBBuk, Royal Canin and Nottingham University to produce relevant press materials – a launch release for veterinary press, pet press and nationals; a photocall notice for regional and national media; a national broadcast notice; and posters for veterinary practice waiting rooms. On the day, we organised a photographer, arranged media interviews and followed up the press. Coverage was far reaching including South Africa and USA!

Veterinary education:

A key part of the campaign is the education of vets and vet nurses about the different aspects of pet blood transfusions. In particular, we needed to educate them about the importance of blood typing an animal before it is given a transfusion.  

Activity included press visits to the blood processing laboratory, bespoke features were written on

1) Blood transfusion medicine—searching for the perfect blood donor

2) Developing practice protocols for blood transfusions and

3) The importance of blood typing.

 In addition, we launched the planned extension to the service – a feline blood collection service.

Pet owner education:

The concept of pet blood donors is still new to owners and Mistral needed to employ some real-life news stories to not only show owners how blood transfusions have saved a pet’s life, but also how their pet could help save the lives of many others with just one donation.

Case studies and educational features have been placed in pet press and online to maximise awareness and interest. 

Results:

The campaign has sparked interest among the defined target audiences about the 

concept of pet blood donors. The national launch activity reached audiences, young 

and old, through a variety of print and broadcast media. 

For the period from January-June 2009, Mistral secured 117 pieces of known 

coverage (print and broadcast). This equated to 18,304,324 million opportunities to 

see / hear. The 10 key messages for the campaign, identified at the outset, were 

delivered through the media relations activity (see attached key message sheet). In 

just under half the coverage, more than three key messages were mentioned in each 

piece, with 14 pieces including over six. The average key message delivery was two 

per piece.

On my poster session I prepared hand draft chart to show the results in numbers. I compared how many dogs were registered before campaign and after. As brief said before the campaign (2 years) charity successfully signed 1200 dogs as a donors.  The campaign brought 800 more dogs in only 9 months that gives as the result of 35% more then years before. 

 My last slide was about SWOT analysis. 

In my opinion the strengths of the campaign was definitely key messages because they were showing how well PR company done they research.  They target all potential audiences. 

Weaknesses:

In my opinion Mistral should push more use of social media. They could create own facebook page. On this page they could keep uploading home made videos from laboratorium to show to people how blood transfusion lookalike. 

Opportunities:

Definitely the benefits which charity could use in the future. The media coverage was really positive that's why they can organisate in the future similar events like 3rd birthday celebration.    

Threats:

I believe the threats for this campaign could've be bad press. IF for example on the actual lunch celebration of the blood collection unit the journalist will spot bad threats for animals by the personal staff or dog injury during the blood transfusion  that could lead campaign to fail. 

I honestly think that campaign deserve gold award. The objectives meet results with 100 %. They were able to target all audiences and they spread successfully awareness of this unique service that charity provides.  The charity after the campaign can grove bigger and start helping other animals like cats. 

My question is guys;

1) Do this campaign deserve gold award?

2) If you have a dog would you register him as a donor after hearing about this campaign?

3) If you could change something as different key messages what that will be?