For a nonprofit, virtual brand marketing can help maintain your connection with supporters. By continuing to share stories virtually, your audience will be encouraged by your commitment and feel called to act, support, and to give.
In early 2020, as Chicago’s shelter-in-place order continued to extend, our customer, UCAN made the decision to hold their largest fundraising event of the year virtually. To do so, they sought our strategic and creative advice to rethink fundraising, storytelling, and event planning in a virtual environment.
Without the luxury of fullscale production to tell the stories of UCAN’s youths and employees, we remotely connected 1-1 with each individual over the course of several weeks. The unique nature of this year’s video production allowed us to show aspects of these people’s lives that had never been captured before.
Instead of a perfectly manicured set, interview backgrounds included childhood bedrooms, the inside of parked cars, and makeshift home offices.“Quiet on set” was not possible as we heard youths’ siblings playing in the background or the children of UCAN’s leadership team watching cartoons.
While unconventional, all of these elements added layers to the stories that never would have been possible to capture otherwise. For the first time in 21 years, Youth Leadership Award “attendees” saw the reactions of youths as they were notified that they had been chosen to receive a college scholarship and they saw UCAN employees working hard from their homes to prepare for the event. This would not have been possible without strategic virtual brand marketing.
On June 4, 2020, UCAN held its first-ever, virtual Youth Leadership Awards. The video assets brought the youth’s stories to life, forged connections, and carried UCAN’s brand and mission throughout the entire program.