The idea: Use fake music stars to show just how disastrous fake medicine is.

The brief was to cause a stir, so butchering real artists’ music with fake versions made sense for our campaign. We convinced Africa’s music stars to accept being faked, before unveiling the trick to deliver our message. Our initiative snowballed and 17 of Africa’s top music artists pranked their fans with fake interviews and songs.

We created a real environment for our fake stars: fake interviews, fake radio shows, etc.

After this content was released and the public started to react, we held the press conference for the campaign launch. The videos of the prank were provided to TV networks, which broadcast them for free, representing €200k in earned media.

All the participating artists shared their pranks with their fans on social networks, reaching a total of 10.2 million people. The natural reach would have required a €150k investment.

We gave the media the possibility to broadcast the videos and recordings on their own, which they did. Between September 13 and October 15, the pranks were broadcast 437 times on 11 different continent-wide TV channels and 354 times on 2 different radio stations across the African continent between September 13 and February 1. All the broadcasts were free of charge.

Including press and radio, our campaign totalled €450k in earned media, and Fondation Chirac’s number of Facebook fans increased by 72% in one month, giving our cause the spotlight it deserves.