Opinion: How integrated comms can drive societal change
Alexandra Marsh, associate director at Ketchum London, explores how the agency’s Cannes Lions winning #bloodnormal campaign shows that integrated comms can drive societal change.
#bloodnormal is a very special campaign for several reasons; it triumphantly broke perceptions and taboos about periods, it generated worldwide coverage and it demonstrated how integrated communications can drive societal change.
The campaign has been recognised across a number of industry platforms, most recently at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, where it won a Titanium Lion and a Glass Lion for Change Grand Prix.
We are lucky to have brave clients in Libresse. They have a strong brand purpose and aren’t afraid to push the boundaries. At every corner, they were willing to keep pushing the needle to truly communicate their brand purpose; breaking the taboos that hold women back.
Driving societal change is a huge task; your insight must ring true, a mission and strategic direction must be established, you must be brave and prepared to weather the storm and you have to be in it together. And that we were, with our Omnicom sister agency AMV BBDO.
Ketchum and AMV BBDO partnered seamlessly on #bloodnormal, the first ever ad campaign to show period blood in popular culture, to overcome the many challenges that are met with driving societal change.
We worked together to commission a worldwide research piece to ensure we had the right insights, collaborated on the strategic direction with other agency partners to ensure we had a common and achievable mission, continuously updated and amended our messaging in response to challenges like being banned from broadcast TV.
We presented a united front both internally, so that our client had complete confidence in their agencies to achieve this common goal, and externally to execute such an impactful campaign.
Nurturing a strong inter-agency relationship is absolutely key; work as one team, show the client that you’re bringing your individual expertise to the table for the good of the campaign, and face challenges together.
I am a firm believer in the power of communicators to drive positive societal change, simply because we are incredibly well-equipped to do so. By drawing upon the right skills and passion points within our teams, we, as communicators, can help purpose-led brands and organisations tell their story to hard to reach audiences and most importantly, get their buy-in.
There is no room for egos when you have a societal change to make. Working in a truly integrated fashion will reward you with trust and confidence from the client and a campaign that will shift the dial.
