The Brief
For Mental Health Awareness Week in 2021, Lifeline Aotearoa partnered with mental health advocate and fashion designer Marnie Hillier from Ms Marnie for the third consecutive year to sell limited edition t-shirts. $25 from each sale went directly to supporting its crisis helpline service with each shirt emblazoned with an important message for New Zealanders: You Matter.

Wright Communications was briefed by Lifeline Aotearoa to generate exposure for the partnership through social media engagement and to boost fundraising efforts.

The Wright Approach

Wright Communications worked closely with Marnie Hillier from Ms Marnie and Lifeline Aotearoa to carefully select social media influencers and high profile New Zealanders who are aligned to mental health advocacy. Names in this list included Richie Hardcore, Hillary Barry, Matty McLean, Toni Street and Matt Chisholm. All content creators were contacted with information about the campaign in addition to their very own t-shirt and encouraged to share their personal stories of mental health to raise awareness.

Wright Communications coordinated sizes of the t-shirts, distributed the t-shirts and pitched to consumer media titles securing some excellent coverage through the week, with many sharing personal and heartfelt stories of mental health to help raise awareness for the cause.

Influencers took to their social channels to post pictures wearing their t-shirts, gaining excellent social coverage.

Outcome

With well over 30 clips secured, the total reach for this engagement surpassed one million, and a number of top-level New Zealand media personalities and content creators participated. Overall, the combined total reach of the campaign was 1,072,099.

Media highlights included mentions on SENZ radio to kick Mental Health Awareness Week off, followed by an online story in Focus Magazine.

Television personalities Toni Street, Matt Chisholm, Matty Mclean, Trudi Nelson and Erin Simpson all shared the t-shirt on their social media channels, and social media influencers Christian Newman, Leah Light, Richie Hardcore and Melissa Jack are among those who also shared through Instagram, Facebook and Tik Tok accounts.

Feedback from the campaign was very positive, with some influencers sharing discount codes that generated a large number of sales, and the campaign resulting in a total of $20,000 in funds for Lifeline’s services.

After the campaign’s official close, Ms Marnie and Lifeline extended the pre-order period to encourage more sales. More high-profile Kiwis shared their shirts during this period including Hilary Barry, Anika Moa and Sharde & Vaughan Smith.

It was a privilege to work on such a touching campaign and to see New Zealand influencers get behind an incredibly important cause.