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Like many countries in the world today, a vast number of Australia’s youth is in the grip of mental ill-health.
CX Lavender partnered with Headspace to create a campaign to engage and educate young people about the help and different services they can access for support before their mental health issues reach crisis point.
With a clearly defined business problem, we started the process with an extensive research and strategic investigation program. The result was a rich insight that showed young people today really feel as though life has a lot of big expectations of them, making them feel like they have a lot to live up to. Over time, it can be daunting and overwhelming.
The creative challenge was to find an execution with enough “stretch” to talk to the many disparate subgroups within our audience. We needed messaging to address the general population, LGBTQIA+, regional and remote youth and First Nations.
Taking the unique insight and spinning it on its head in a humorous way, we came up with a creative idea that called “bullshit” on the unrealistic expectations life can seem to hold. Through a faux Awards ceremony called The Unachievys, we picked apart all these unrealistic expectations to demonstrate just how crazy they actually are. And how they can weigh heavy on our mental health.
Did the idea resonate? We asked our various audience segments to be the judges through rounds of stringent ‘qual and ‘quant research.
Their responses not only showed us we were onto a great idea, but they also helped us identify all the rich contextual nuggets that made the campaign so relatable and engaging, such as how First Nations young people are always expected to make their Aunties tea.
Through the celebration of the un-achievement of lofty expectations, the idea reinforced that we are all just a ‘work in progress’ and our ability to navigate life’s ups and downs can get better with time, patience, and with the professional support available through Headspace. Wrapping up each spot with “Ditch the expectations and just keep working on you.”
The campaign and its many extensions unrolled across various touchpoints – TV, social, digital, radio and print – and worked incredibly efficiently, managing to capture the attention of the audiences we needed to along with our strategic objectives.
But in the end, the real story is how we helped young people, and their parents take steps to improve their mental health. And if this campaign has helped even one soul from taking this tragic path, it will be well worth it.
