By 2050, the global population will increase by 35 percent — posing a unique threat to both our planet’s health, as well as our own. We burn fuel to keep warm, to light our homes, to travel to and within cities. We send about 8 million metric tons of plastic annually into the oceans. We use vast tracts of land to produce food, but waste about a third of it every year. Millions of working Americans don’t know where their next meal will come from, while others lack access to wholesome, affordable food. And despite the fact that we’re living longer than ever, health challenges continue to plague much of the world — whether it’s fighting diseases or lacking access to treatment.

The good news is these realities have sparked a new age of innovation. Aligned with this message we built the Chasing Genius platform to help uncover solutions for three of the most critical issues of our day — world hunger, a sustainable planet and global health. By inspiring people everywhere to unleash their inner genius and create innovative ideas to solve them, National Geographic has enabled positive global change.

Based on the belief that transformational ideas can come from anywhere and anyone, Chasing Genius is a purpose-based community designed to inspire, ignite and unleash the genius inside each of us to turn ideas into catalysts for positive change in the world.

National Geographic crowdsourced ideas to identify the issues the global community is most passionate about, resulting in an initial challenge aimed at generating solutions that address climate change, global health and world hunger.

To engage the global community, National Geographic developed a rich suite of content with inspiring stories, as well as probing questions and statistics, to help contextualize these three critical issues and generate both conversations and action. We then challenged the community to submit 1-minute videos that described their best world-changing, life-saving idea for a chance to win $25K to take their visions further.

The Chasing Genius Challenge was announced on May 9, 2017 and was maintained through a multi-tiered content and promotional rollout across broadcast, digital and social for three months. Consumers were encouraged to join Chasing Genius, submit one minute video ideas and share the challenge with their networks.

In addition to the 277 posts across National Geographic's social channels, the brand supplied social media assets and copy to strategic partners including 1K+ universities, innovation incubators and sustainability organizations — extending our reach beyond National Geographic’s social footprint, and generating an additional 8.7K+ posts with a potential extended reach of 50MM followers.

Voting began four months after submissions opened. Three winners from each category were then announced on September 18, 2017 after having their video idea judged based on innovation, creativity, viability and inspiration by the Chasing Genius council — with an additional “People’s Choice” winner voted on by the public.

The campaign generated a total of 225M+ impressions, 19M+ video views and 3M+ social conversations. 26K+ members joined the Chasing Genius community, with nearly 3K video submissions.

The four winning ideas included: a sustainable, bio-based fabric aimed at reducing pollution in the textile industry; an affordable vision correction kit that helps impoverished people get access to eyeglasses; a solar-powered device that helps women in sub-Saharan Africa produce more pearl millet to feed their families; and an enterprise that provides site-specific data and advice to help farmers in developing countries.

A clear success in both metrics and mission, Chasing Genius secured a level of engagement that is as rare as it is coveted, by tapping into consumers’ collective passions and the belief that anyone has the power to change the world — rousing the genius that we all have inside us, and putting it to work for positive global change.

Chasing Genius was built on the consumer insight that millennials believe they can make the world a better place. In addition to making the platform as accessible as possible, we focused communication on igniting and unleashing an idea — continuously gathering engagement data to fine-tune messaging.

We connected with this broad target audience via a multi-tiered content strategy, leveraging organic and targeted social, university and NGO outreach, as well as engagement with maker groups, Nerd Night events and influencers.

We further optimized participation with world-class storytelling focused on sustainability, world hunger and global health — including mini-documentaries, quizzes, articles, galleries and interviews — that we shared across our global social network as encouragement.

The strategy culminated with the community generating thousands of 1-minute videos, and four winners receiving $25K each to take their idea further — judged by the Chasing Genius council and voted on by the larger community.

National Geographic has been on the forefront of science and exploration for more than 130 years, investing in the cutting-edge sustainability work of scientists, explorers, photographers, and filmmakers so we can better understand the world, and our role within it.

Purpose has been always been a cornerstone of our business model — we seek to enable innovative work and engage consumers globally. It’s through our bold, dynamic sustainability storytelling we inspire new ideas, enlighten perspectives, provoke conversations and ultimately create catalysts for innovation and action.

In 2017, as part of an integrated partnership with GSK Consumer Healthcare Products, National Geographic created the Chasing Genius platform — a multi-disciplinary initiative designed to inspire and accelerate transformational ideas from consumers everywhere to make our planet healthier and more sustainable.

Through collaboration with nonprofits, government organizations, and universities, National Geographic created a wide network of Chasing Genius ambassadors who helped to spread the word, and ignite engagement within their networks.

Inspired by National Geographic’s first scripted series, “Genius,” the platform was envisioned as a purpose-based collaborative community that consumers could join, that encouraged them to share ideas and ultimately become catalysts for positive global change.