Winner
Weber Shandwick and National Marrow Donor Program: 2007 Thanks Mom National Marrow Donor Drive

On any given day, more than 6,000 men, women, and children are searching for a life-saving marrow or blood-cell donor. This makes the National Marrow Donor Program's (NMDP) annual Thanks Mom National Donor Drive a crucial outreach program, as the organization reaches to fill demand with donors. With a budget of only $137,500, the NMDP challenged Weber Shandwick to develop a national strategy to recruit 20,000 new donors to the registry.

WS began by identifying three specific challenges during the planning phase of the effort: mobilizing a decentralized field staff from donor centers around the US around a common national project; developing and executing a complex national campaign within the five-month timeline; and tripling the previous year's results.

The team led live donor drives across the US, with an online sign-up page set up to encourage registration online. An e-mail blast went out to 60,000 people with a forward-to-a-friend capability, bringing increased attention to the drive, as well as the need for donations to the NMDP. Campaign communication materials were produced for various ethnic groups and provided to all donor centers, drawing in a new group of potential donors.

To get the word out through media outreach, WS developed pitches around 80 focus families who agreed to share their stories with the media. More creative tactics were used, including a flower giveaway and a recruitment drive during a weekly farmers' market to help build buzz around the effort.

"High results and incredible ROI," said one judge. "A first-class, intelligent program that could serve as a model for effective healthcare communications."

The campaign exceeded the NMDP's expectations on several levels. More than 40,000 donors were recruited, with 20% of those coming from communities of color. More than 700 drives were held in 38 states and nearly $18,000 was raised. National television coverage included ABC's The View and print coverage was attained in a number of publications. More than 550 media hits totaling 94.8 million impressions in local and national outlets were recorded.

Judges were impressed by the effectiveness of the effort, especially with the results pouring in despite a lack of resources.

"Amazing bang for the buck," noted one judge. "Great to see an agency providing so much for such a small spend."

Honorable Mention
Porter Novelli and Almond Board of California: Almonds: A Daily Portion For Health



What to do with all these almonds? That's the question the Almond Board of California was asking itself last year after a surplus in harvested almonds. So the group hired Porter Novelli to find a way to dramatically increase almond consumption. With consumers increasingly looking for foods that deliver health benefits, the team decided to emphasize the healthy aspects of almonds. That strategy served as the foundation for the program. The team developed ambassadors to promote almonds' health benefits and almond consumption to consumers. To further their efforts, the team set out to maximize the existing nutrition research on almonds, highlighting their ability to help promote heart health and emerging research on weight maintenance. The most important result came in above expectations: reported almond sales increased significantly, nearly 16% from 2006 to 2007. As a bonus, the percentage of those scoring almonds high for healthfulness increased to 82%, a record high.

Finalists 2008
Edelman and Consumer Healthcare Product Association Five Moms: Stopping Cough Medicine Abuse Before it Starts
HealthSTAR PR and GlaxoSmith-Kline Consumer Healthcare Sparking a Weight-Loss Revolution: the Launch of alli
Lippe Taylor and Digene HPV Testing: Cutting through the Clutter to Prevent Cervical Cancer
Porter Novelli and Almond Board of California Almonds: A Daily Portion for Health
Weber Shandwick and National Marrow Donor Program 2007 Thanks Mom National Marrow Donor Drive

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