Common Bond

The Challenge

As a state, Colorado’s seat belt use rate sits at 86%, below the national average of 90%. In 2019, 196 unbuckled drivers and passengers were killed in crashes in Colorado, accounting for more than half of the state’s 377 total passenger vehicle deaths.

Each year, hundreds of unbuckled injuries and fatalities occur on Colorado roads. With an average 120,000 crashes each year, that means there’s a 1 in 33 chance that you will be in a car crash. Despite our best intentions, we are all at risk when on the road, and regular seat belt use is the single most effective way to prevent severe injury or death in a crash – reducing the chance of harm by 50%. Yet, 14% of Coloradans still report not wearing a seat belt.

In 2020, CIG worked with the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) to develop a campaign to help improve Colorado’s seat belt use rate and ultimately reduce statewide unbuckled crashes and fatalities. Using the concept of traffic safety citizenship, our goal was to leverage the strong, positive road safety culture that already exists to impact the small minority of risky road users most resistant to change.

 

Our goal was to leverage the strong, positive road safety culture that already exists to impact the small minority of risky road users most resistant to change.


Our Solution

We live in a polarizing world. Whether it’s lifestyle choices, sports loyalties, political differences, or even a simple preference of cats vs. dogs, there is no shortage of topics that demonstrate our differences. Recognizing that, as humans, there will always be things on which we don’t agree, CIG set out to create a lighthearted campaign on behalf of CDOT that captured the public’s attention by highlighting some of the playful disagreements commonly debated by Coloradans – CSU Rams vs. CU Buffs, city vs. mountains, cowboy boots vs. stilettos, Colorado chiles vs. New Mexico chiles, among others. But regardless of our different interests, passions or whatever else separates us, there’s one thing we can ALL get behind: seat belts. Because when it comes to buckling up or not, there’s only one choice that keeps us and our loved ones safe.

In a clever double entendre, the tagline “We’re ALL behind seat belts” expressed a common bond despite these differences — representing both a figurative collective outlook on seat belt use, as well as a literal, physical interpretation.

CIG enlisted the help of an illustrator and music production company to help execute our vision for the campaign creative, building a series of custom images and animations that were used in digital ads, social media, billboards, bus tails and radio.

In addition to paid media placements, CIG developed social media tactics to increase the campaign’s organic reach and engagement on Facebook. We created a series of interactive polls and quizzes that CDOT pushed out to its followers, asking users to vote on contrasting opinions or answer seat belt trivia questions. CIG also designed a custom Facebook photo frame that users could activate on their profile pictures to show support for CDOT’s campaign and the importance of buckling up.

The Results

CIG worked alongside CDOT’s ad buying agency to implement various pieces of the campaign. In total, the Common Bond campaign received more than 36.5 million impressions across radio, billboards, posters and bus tails across Colorado. CIG also deployed both organic and paid placements on social media and conducted earned media outreach that yielded an additional 126,815,899 impressions across print, online and broadcast television with a publicity value of more than $1.15 million.

In total, the Common Bond campaign received more than 36.5 million impressions across radio, billboards, posters and bus tails across Colorado.

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