π How CALM normalised suicide conversations
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Hey friend β Rob here. Let's talk about CALM today. They won Silver at the Cannes Lions Creative Effectiveness with this one. Warning, it's about suicide, but i couldn't not write about it as it's such important work. Give yourself 5 minutes, that's how long this is gonna take. Let's go! How CALM normalised suicide conversationsπ¨ Problem After the pandemic and cost of living crisis, UK suicides increased by 13 per week. This was particularly stark with teenage girls and women under 24. But people often assume what a suicidal person "looks like". In fact, most assume they always look visibly sad or distressed. When it happens to your family, the shock is real. "We never saw it coming." "But they looked so happy." In the absence of visible signs, people weren't intervening enough. So CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) needed to re-ignite a national conversation about suicide. How to notice it, prevent it, and how their life-saving services could help. β π€ Solution CALM created "The Last Photo" campaign. A simple thought: 50 final smiling photos of people who died by suicide. But they didn't just do some posters with them, that would be the standard way of doing it. Instead, they created a public exhibition on London's South Bank. They featured scannable portraits, so you could learn the stories behind each person.
They then did a media partnership with ITV, to launch the campaign on the "This Morning Show". That kicked off a week of suicide prevention programming. Eventually, yes, they bought standard broadcast media too. They aired a 90-second film on TV and cinemas featuring the final happy clips of suicide victims.
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OOH and press showed the portraits in cities, train stations, and newspapers across the UK.
They got influencers like Jamie Lang and Amber Rose Gill to talk about it too. And they created online resources on CALM's website to help people talk about suicide. A hardcore approach to a hard topic that softens your emotional barriers to talk about hard things. So, how did it work? β π€© Results Campaign:
Brand:
Business:
I know people who've died by suicide, so stuff like this hits hard. But it's also a testament to how an emotional understanding of real people can unlock real results. That's all for now. Don't forget to join our private group. And be kind to yourself and others. Appreciate your attention, Rob
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Salmon Theory, by Rob Estreitinho
Helping savvy strategists swim upstream.
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