MINNESOTA COMMERCE DEPARTMENT

The Challenge

Develop an integrated marketing plan around the Minnesota Department of Commerce Energy Assistance Program's (EAP) main goals, including: boost the number of new EAP applications, increase awareness and applications among underserved and remote communities, reduce household disconnections and increase successful applications from households seeking crisis program benefits.

What We Did

Minnesota winters are no joke. It doesn't matter how long you've lived there, or if you live in a city or in the furthest corner of the state, there is nothing easy about winter. And, for people in poverty, winters are even tougher: bills get higher as temperatures get lower; daily tasks are harder; many don't have the luxury of not going to work; and the stress keeps piling up.

It doesn't take much to turn a hard winter into an overwhelming one - but there is something that people in need can do to help themselves. They can apply for Minnesota's Energy Assistance Program. Our campaign focused on key community attributes of empathy and collaboration, and on the values of friendship and sharing. We were able to show that there's nothing wrong with feeling overwhelmed, that there is something people can do about it, and that it's not frustrating or time-consuming to find out more.

By focusing on people caring about people, our campaign add necessary humanity to the campaign, while normalizing the daily realities of simply trying to make ends meet.

What We Achieved

Working collaboratively, it took less than seven weeks to go from researching multiple different audiences and communities, and teasing open shared attitudes, beliefs and areas of need, to creating and launching a winning advertising campaign in four different languages across ten different tactical platforms. When Minnesota’s Energy Assistance Program closed for applications for that season some amazing metrics emerged.