The challenge

Bookstart is very worthwhile scheme. Its mission is to encourage parents to read with their children and it provides free books to help them do this.

The challenge for the charity is that while many parents do this as a matter of course, the groups that would really benefit from doing this are hard to reach.

Although the scheme traditionally reaches 90% of parents there is a hard core where it fails and previous communication strategies had failed to make much headway.

Those missing out include single mums, non-native English speakers, teenage mums, travellers and ethnic minorities. Mosaic analysis revealed nine groups who fall into these categories with cross-referencing of media consumption on TGI revealing key must-see media opportunities.

The TV solution

The media analysis revealed that many daytime TV shows are must-watch for the target groups. These include Jeremy Kyle, Trisha, Loose Women and Ricki Lake.

Eighty percent of the ads ran in daytime with just 20% running in peak in shows such as Coronation St and Dancing on Ice.

Three animated 30-second commercials were created, all prefaced with a title frame saying: “A tiny story about books” to distinguish them from the rest of the ad break.

Three different styles of animation were used and none of the films communicated any specifics regarding age, socio-economic group or ethnicity.

The use of animation enabled Bookstart to take the audience on a magical journey, akin to the power of a book.

The ads ended with an online call to action but also importantly a mobile shortcode as this target group rarely have access to email and often don’t have a home phone line. The incentive to respond was the chance to get a free book.

Results

The advertising received 74,000 text responses, a response rate of 0.05% (greater than many government campaigns). Furthermore analysis of the locations of respondents found they were 65% more likely than average to come from the nine Mosaic types identified by the initial analysis.
Cost per response was just under £5, significantly ahead of target.

“What might appear on the surface as a very traditional TV campaign succeeded precisely because of the data analysis that underpinned the strategy. We used daytime TV to deliver a incredibly hard to reach audience and the response rate from our core groups is testament to the power of our communication.”

Simon Timlett, Partner, Trinity Communications