THE OBJECTIVE

• Educate residents about proper sorting for the most commonly missorted items (“contaminant”) in the City of Oakland, CA.
• Develop a series of short videos to share with the public.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Sketch and vectorize unique characters for each contaminant.
• Collaboratively with client, draft accompanying catch phrases to express each character’s personality.

THE EXECUTION

• Develop short animations for each character.
• Include transcreated versions (Spanish, Chinese).
• Share via YouTube, socials, ads.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Develop materials to promote education about the Green Seattle Partnership and recruit participation for its biggest event of the year, Seattle Forest Week. 

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Identify popular and significant native species that live in Seattle forests by looking at past blogs/materials from GSP, popular social posts, etc. 
• Develop illustrations that capture the intersection of Seattle forests and human communities and attract engagement from GSP members.

THE EXECUTION

• Use illustrations in postcards, posters, stickers, bandanas, socials, etc.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Develop materials educating residents and businesses about what not to flush and/or pour down their drains to keep local water systems healthy.
• Ensure creative translates well across ages, cultures, and languages.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Develop creative visual and messaging concepts illustrating exactly how and why certain items (fats, oils, grease, wipes, toiletries) can clog pipes and create issues.
• Perform focus group testing with different audiences in different case scenarios.

THE EXECUTION

• Apply creative on door hangers, flyer, social media posts, and stall posters.
• Distribute broadly to residents and businesses in affected neighborhoods.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Write engaging ad hoc and evergreen content for the Green Seattle Partnership’s (GSP) blog and monthly newsletter, highlighting GSP’s mission and impact while keeping membership and public audiences informed with event updates, program information, and general educational material about Pacific Northwest ecosystems.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

For the blog:

• Develop a quarterly list of blog topic assignments with input from GSP advisory and volunteer staff with community and field topical expertise.

For the newsletter:

• Continually research and compile information on local events hosted by GSP partners and community organizations to feature in alignment with seasonal topics.
• Continually accept community submissions, partner contributions, and client content requests.
• Each month, compile relevant on-theme content to develop a cohesive, on-message issue that combines current information with relevant content to send to an audience of more than 22,000 subscribers.

THE EXECUTION

• Draft content and rely on Cascadia’s in-house Editorial Board for quality review and QA/QC.
• Cross-promote blog posts and other curated material in the monthly newsletter. Promote each newsletter publication across Seattle Parks’ distribution channels.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Develop social media graphics to encourage residents not to pour fats, oils, and grease down their drains during the holidays.
• Put a special focus on utility crews who have to fix back-ups during the holidays.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Develop 3-5 unique visual concepts/angles to the messaging.
• Weave in humor and a slightly irreverent tone.
• Draft associated copywriting.

THE EXECUTION

• Distribute via socials, as ads, and on Seattle Public Utilities’ website.
• The media campaign generated, collectively, 1,403,588 impressions and 1,216 clicks. The campaign-wide click-through rate was .09%. The view-through rate for the video ads was just under 80%, which is very strong, especially given the increased competition for attention during the holiday season (YouTube’s benchmark VTR is 31.9%, according to Strike Social.)

THE OBJECTIVE

• Develop an updated messaging framework for the Port of Seattle’s Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (OEDI) to serve as a functional, usable tool that staff would reference on a normal basis. OEDI wanted the framework to accurately reflect its theory of change and equity work to date, as well as use messaging that felt accessible, relatable, and true to its users.
• Develop a 2-year Communications Strategy.
• Develop and design a 5-year Impact Report.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Review existing materials and the original messaging framework.
• Lead a client ideation session with a live Mural board activity.
• Coordinate interviews with internal employees and external partners to assess the effectiveness of OEDI’s communications, level of trust among audiences, and opportunities to increase usability of the messaging framework.

THE EXECUTION

• Prioritized plain language, clear content structure, and user-friendly design.
• Created a comprehensive tool that was navigable and adaptable for a wide range of needs, from developing a deeper understanding of equity principles to simply copying and pasting talking points.
• Developed a high-level 2-year Communications Strategy for OEDI, including communications goals, strategies and tactics, guidance on channels and cadence, and key performance indicators (KPIs).
• Created a comprehensive, highly visual, public-facing impact report summarizing OEDI’s first five years of operations through personal quotes and anecdotes, metrics, and engaging graphics.

Since launching these materials, OEDI has increased their messaging about their workforce development programs, experied a heightened interest in and celebration of their work, and successfully received approval for an expanded program budget.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Design, implement, and evaluate a five-month community-based social marketing campaign to increase the number of Eastside (Bellevue, Redmond, Kirkland, Issaquah in Washington state) coffee shops accepting reusable cups; increase the number of people using reusable cups; and increase the consistency and frequency among people already using reusable cups.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

• Conducted initial research via a business and a resident survey to understand the motivators, benefits, and barriers to “Bring Your Own Cup” adoption.
• Developed a campaign approach informed by this research and CBSM best practices.
• Launched development of unique campaign branding via ideation with the client team and program partners.
• Conducted outreach to identify partner coffee shops.
• Developed messaging and collateral, including: customer “passports” and custom stamps that encourage customers to visit participating coffee shops to earn points toward high value rewards; campaign pledge; incentives prize pack; interactive map of participating locations; outreach flyers and rack cards; and a campaign website.

THE EXECUTION

• Secured paid media promotion to launch the campaign.
• Delivered promotion packages to each participating location.
• Planned, promoted, and hosted in-person events.

Data from post-campaign engagement surveys showed that residents increased, in one way or another, their engagement with BYOC by 54% after taking the pledge. In total, our team supported 14 outreach events across the four cities, including five at partnership coffee shop locations, and directly reached around 1,000 residents. We collected 686 pledges through this outreach. The media click-through rate exceeded the industry standard of 0.30%.

THE OBJECTIVE

• Develop communications materials for Washington’s statewide Priority and Comprehensive Climate Action Plan development processes (PCAP and CCAP processes) through the EPA’s Climate Pollution Reduction Grant program, including branding, a messaging framework, and a statewide communications strategy.

THE IDEATION PROCESS

For branding

• Facilitated an ideation process with all participating partners
• Prepared and populated an interactive Mural board with prompts and initial ideas to support collatorative brainstorming

For messaging framework

• Used outcomes from the ideation session to identify key statewide audiences, core program topics, and critical program messages within each topic.

For statewide communications strategy

• Working with the partnership team, identified the key communicators working on behalf of the program, along with the key communication channels.

THE EXECUTION

For branding

• Used outcomes from the ideation session to iterate on a brand identity, including a logo, tagline, color palette, typography, and style guidelines

For messaging framework

• Developed a living messaging matrix that aligned messages and audiences to enable each message to be tailored to each audience for maximum communication effectiveness.
• Supported the partnership team in keeping the messaging matrix updated and active throughout the course of each plan development process.

For statewide communications strategy

• Developed an implementation approach that paired audiences, topics, communicators, and channels in a strategic approach to ensure that critical messages were being delivered to key audiences at ideal times by appropriate messengers using the best available channels.
• Incorporated paid “Community Connectors,” representatives of local community organizations with close ties to under-represented communities, as a critical component to ensure inclusivity in outreach and engagement.
• Supported the partnership in working through the communications strategy and making modifications as needed.