LinkedIn is the world’s professional community with more than 740 million members worldwide and 170 million in the United States. Its vision is to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. Its ability to do just that, requires that people have access to opportunity. And in March 2020, the economy came to a halt, opportunity was in crisis.

The big idea: Let’s Step Forward

Let’s step forward was a timeless idea brought to life at a time when it was needed most. It was designed to both encourage everyday member progress and inspire LinkedIn to step up to help through a seamless integration of innovative products and communications.

We targeted Career Builders who came to LinkedIn less than once a month. Many were still working from home, or as they put it in qualitative research, ‘living at work.’ Others had lost their job as a result of COVID-19. All were in an incredibly stressful period of uncertainty and transition. Those who had lost their jobs spent countless hours rigorously searching for and applying to black hole job sites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter, only never to hear back.

The Target Insight: Career builders felt overwhelmed and stuck by the velocity of change in 2020.

The Community Insight: No matter how overwhelmingly hard things got, the LinkedIn community kept stepping up to help one another.

The Strategy: Professional progress starts with a single step in your community.

Implementation: Let’s step forward started with shining a light on the incredible resilience and generosity of the LinkedIn community. It grew as we developed and drove members to products such as a COVID-19 relief hub and #OpenToWork that helped millions of job seekers get one step closer to opportunity with the help of a simple hashtag and updated profile picture. And it evolved with each and every step members of the LinkedIn community took.

Timeline: Q2-Q4 2020

Placement + Scale:

Paid Media: National TV, Streaming TV, Digital, Social, and Programmatic

LinkedIn product: LinkedIn newsfeed, LinkedIn profile pictures (for #opentowork and #hiring), LinkedIn COVID-19 Hub.