My child is born to Rock, Dance, Cook, etc. but first he has to be born strong and healthy. This was the emotional premise behind non-profit March of Dimes imbornto® cause marketing campaign.

Having fulfilled its initial mandate – eradicating polio – March of Dimes’ mission today is to help women have full-term pregnancies, and babies be born strong and healthy. They do this by raising funds for community programs, advocacy, research and education, as well as supporting families with newborns in intensive care. But they needed more corporate partners to fund this mission.

We chose the period from Mother’s Day to Father’s Day – May to June – to execute the integrated campaign as it’s when families think about the hopes and dreams they have for their children.

We had the following objectives:

• Obtain five new corporate partners and drive campaign sales

• Increase year-over-year revenue

• Increase traffic to imbornto.com by 50%

• Increased intent to shop partners, intent to donate to March of Dimes

• Increase familiarity around March of Dimes purpose

Through a combination of paid, owned and earned brand and partner channels and a consistent brand look, feel and call to action, we exceeded all objectives:

• 8 new corporate partners

• Increased March of Dimes fundraising + 312%

• Nearly all partners had campaign sales +20% with one + 700%

• Site traffic increased +600%

• Consumers who saw the campaign were 3X more likely to shop our partners.

• Increased intent to shop partners (+10%), intent to donate to March of Dimes (+18%) and familiarity (+5%)

Goal: Obtain revenue by securing partners and increasing familiarity around March of Dimes mission.

We had the following brand objectives:

• Obtain five new corporate partners and drive campaign sales

• Increase year-over-year revenue

• Increase traffic to imbornto.com by 50%

• Increased intent to shop partners, intent to donate to March of Dimes

• Increase familiarity around March of Dimes purpose

Our approach involved:

• Owning the timeframe between Mother’s Day to Father’s Day as an annual March of Dimes event

• Using real mothers and fathers across earned and owned channels to bring the message home and encourage others to participate in our campaign

By harnessing an emotional time of year that had been unclaimed by causes, imbornto exceeded all its objectives for the 2 ½ month campaign:

Impact

• 8 new corporate partners

• Increased March of Dimes fundraising + 312%

• Nearly all partners had campaign sales +20% with one + 700%

• Site traffic increased +600%

• Consumers who saw the campaign were 3X more likely to shop March of Dimes partners.

• Increased intent to shop partners (+10%), intent to donate to March of Dimes (+18%) and familiarity (+5%)

Output

• Broadcast/print PSAs reached 460M+ consumers

• Earned media garnered 470M+ national, regional, print, broadcast and online impressions. Highlights: Huffington Post, Examiner.com, Shape, Life and Style Weekly, Today

• 900M+ impressions from ads in Martha Stewart Living, Weddings, Everyday Food and USA Today.

From Mother’s Day to Father’s Day we created a continuous flow of information across paid, owned and earned channels that encouraged parents to shop with our partners to drive funding for March of Dimes. Campaign featured:

• Retail/print/online initiatives executed by our partners - Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, The Bon-Ton Stores, Farmers Insurance, Kmart, Mud Pie, Bliss Carpets, ProFlowers, Famous Footwear, Oral B and First Response.

• March of Dimes digital, print, OOH advertising directing consumers to shop with partners in-store and online

• Earned and social media that used parents of premature babies and a celebrity to share inspirational stories. Our campaign included a satellite media tour and interviews with campaign ambassador families and Real Housewife Kyle Richards.

• A television PSA campaign that drove consumers to our web hub

• A web hub (www.imbornto.com) where parents could learn about the campaign, partner offers and make a donation

For over 75 years, non-profit March of Dimes has been helping babies, initially by eradicating polio and today by preventing birth defects, premature birth and infant mortality. But with the economic decline in the U.S. and increased competition, they needed additional revenue streams beyond their annual March of Babies events to fulfill their mission.

In 2013 March of Dimes decided to execute a national cause campaign – imbornto -- to secure additional revenue sources from partners. A secondary objective of the campaign was to create more familiarity around what March of Dimes does today.

One in nine mothers and fathers know having a child doesn’t always go as planned. Our strategy was to use the Mother’s Day to Father’s Day timeframe, when parents naturally think about their love for their children, to execute the March of Dimes imbornto campaign. By spotlighting parents’ aspirations for their children, imbornto educated and raised funds for March of Dimes’ work: ensuring more babies are born strong and healthy by preventing birth defects, premature birth and infant mortality.

As a non-profit, it was especially important that our campaign received a media multiplier effect across paid, owned, earned brand and partner channels to maximize dollars.

We knew a critical piece of this would be to ensure brand and partner executions had a consistent look/feel, message and one central call to action: shop, dine or donate to help all babies.