Without spending a single euro on media, this promotion made an ageing human rights NGO visible and relevant to a younger, social media-obsessed audience. So relevant, that over 2.000 people actively engaged in the fight for human rights by writing real letters to protect political prisoners all over the world.

Iran, Cuba, China, Saudi Arabia, Belarus – all over the world critical human rights activists are imprisoned by repressive regimes. One way to protect them from torture and repression is mail from abroad. It shows prison staff that the world is watching. International Society For Human Rights (ISHR), one of Germany’s oldest Human Rights NGOs, wanted to raise awareness and generate letters to amplify said effect on prison guards. The only problem: a budget of 0,- euro for paid media.

A simple insight: Only important people make it onto stamps! And an equally simple idea:

A series of stamps with portraits of 10 imprisoned human rights activists. Stamps that would show prison guards with every letter that the inmates are internationally respected persons.

To hit two birds with one stone, we collaborated with German artists who are famous on Instagram and had thousands of followers. For two reasons. Firstly, to generate truly unique portraits that would make the stamps appealing. Secondly, to have influential supporters who were willing to spread the word about our initiative for free.

The result of this collaboration was 10 unique portraits of prisoners that were turned into official stamps by a service of German Mail. The artists shared their portraits, the prisoners’ stories, and the actual stamps with their communities. Further artists, like world-famous illustrator Christoph Niemann, supported the initiative, calling people to order the free stamps and write to the prisoners.

VERY IMPORTANT STAMPS was one of the most successful promotions in the history of the German chapter of ISHR. Without spending a single Euro on paid media, it gained an organic reach of 2.2 million across relevant social media channels, increased ISHR followers on Instagram eightfold, and most importantly, over 2.000 people reached through social media actually engaged in the fight for human rights. They ordered our stamps and wrote letters to prisoners – turning the stamps into weapons against injustice.