2021 Winner

CASE SUMMARY

Objective & Challenges

Sinai Health had never advertised to the public before.

Its goal was to strengthen aided awareness from 31% to 35% - an ambitious lift. Stakes were high given their limited budget and the highly cluttered and competitive category, with over 50,000 charitable organizations in Canada.

While the primary objective was to drive awareness, the organization also needed to increase donations (up $400,000) and drive email sign-ups among potential donors (up 8%), YOY.

A critical part of this challenge was to not only find a place on Canadians’ radar, but to find a place in their hearts. Sinai Health wanted Canadians to know about the unique and important work it did and invite them to learn more.

Insight & Strategy

The insight that drove the campaign was the idea that at Sinai Health, care knows no boundaries.

Focus groups uncovered that while Canada’s healthcare system is a source of pride, it’s also one of great frustration. Communication breakdowns and “compassion fatigue” among healthcare providers often leave patients feeling abandoned when navigating health challenges.

But, human-focused care has the power to improve outcomes, like reducing hospitalizations by 30%.

At Sinai Health, care isn’t a buzzword. It was encoded into its DNA over a century ago when four Jewish immigrant women overcame adversity to find a safe, inclusive place for their doctors to practice when everyone else shut them out.

Small and nimble, Sinai Health is where patients turn when their needs are too complex for other institutions. Inside, its culture is fueled by a unique brand of caring. Patients applaud staff for highly attentive service and experts are encouraged to challenge and improve the status quo.

The task was to reimagine and unleash the power of care.

Execution

When people think of “care” we think of tenderness, rarely strength. So the team deliberately reframed care as a force, and celebrated the doctors and nurses who champion it as heroes. The organization’s platform, “See What Care Can Do”, challenged the definition of care and invited Canadians to witness what care can achieve.

It didn’t need metaphors. The reality of the incredible stories happening in Sinai daily was powerful enough. The team embraced a documentary approach highlighting real stories of staff and patients to chronical their strength and grit.

Four documentaries followed individual patient stories for each of Sinai’s areas of care: women and infants, acute care/surgery, rehabilitation and research.

The team embedded a filmmaker in the hospital for 3 weeks, capturing pivotal moments like surgeries and births. The result? A spirited overarching story of the breathtaking power of care. Individual stories further drove engagement through both short and long form content and a precision content distribution strategy.

Sinai Health’s digital channels drove audiences to a digital hub to learn more and further engage with content. Interviews with patients and staff, personal quotes and statistics online reinforced the story.

Ultimately, the intent was to acquire and convert with prompts to sign up for the newsletter and to donate and support the life-changing care Sinai Health provided.

The agency maximized reach through an agile, supercharged media mix, building custom audience pools to re-engage captive audiences with lower funnel tactics to drive donations. Media leveraged Sinai Health’s prospective donor characteristics and reached qualified high-income audiences. Though the budget was small, these highly targeted and re-targeted social and online video campaigns maximized the impact of every investment dollar.

Results

Sinai Health’s first campaign, creating a bold new stage for itself, was an outstanding success, eclipsing awareness and donation targets: Drove aided awareness up a whopping +16% (from 31% to 47%) – versus +4% goal; Achieved a phenomenal $40.2MM in donations, a 78% increase YOY (44x over target); Generated 37,893 new emails, achieving a 49% increase in donor base versus the previous year.

Critically, the campaign significantly strengthened key affinity measures: achieving an 8% lift in Favorability and Donation Likelihood, laying the foundation for future support

Credits

Sinai Health
Vice President, Brand Strategy & Marketing – Danielle Donadio
Chief Executive Officer – Louis de Melo

UM
Senior Director, Connections Planning – Joanna Janisse
Senior Connections Planner – Brooke Goldenberg
Connections Planner – Kenady Ellenson

HUGE
Managing Director/Engagement Director: Matt Di Paola
VP, Strategy: Michelle Campbell
Senior Strategist: Kareen Sarhane
Executive Creative Director: Allen Oke
Sr. Copywriter: Tracy Wan
Sr. Art Director: Amy O’Neill
Agency Producer: Sarah Moen
Project Manager: Jane Forbes/Michelle Toomey