80 days. 80 nights. Countless stories: A look inside the Live@YVR campaign

In early 2011, the Vancouver Airport Authority came to us with a request for a standard community relations program. We counseled the client to think different; we needed to create a reason for consumers and stakeholders to engage with YVR and once they did, we could deliver YVR’s core message that it plays an important role in the region and the economy. The timing for this work was in recognition of YVR’s 80th anniversary.

The result of our proposal and planning process was Live@YVR: a program what would engage the public in selecting aperson who would become an in-house YVR correspondent or storyteller, living eating, sleeping and reporting from YVR for 80 days and 80 nights. That’s right: this person would not be able to leave Sea Island for almost three months (Think Tom Hanks in The Terminal).

We launched the program through aggressive media relations, working with traditional media, online media, and bloggers. We took advantage of YVR’s owned assets (its web site received 11,000 visits daily and in-terminal screens speak directly to YVR visitors) to promote to contest. We established Facebook and Twitter channels and used targeted Facebook ads to promote the contest. We also established media partnerships with Breakfast Television (CityTV) and vancouversun.com (at no cost, as both these organizations are looking for innovative content to re-purpose) to extend our reach and audience.

We received more than 172 entries to thecontest (each entry was a three minute video), and a panel of judges created a shortlist of five finalists to take to public vote. More than 40,000 votes were cast, selecting a winner that began his 80-day odyssey August 17, 2011. To date we have garnered more than 200 million media impressions (with spots on theNational, BBC, MSNBC, Canada AM, CNN, AP and more); an engaged community of 3,700 people on Facebook are interacting with our storyteller on a daily basis; our own content channel (liveatyvr.ca) has received more than 99,000 visits and is distributing 2-3 videos a week on the airport authority and our story-teller’s experiences (more than 25 to date); blog posts and photos of the airport and his experiences; and yvr.com continues to connect their audience to the Live@YVR channel.

• Edelman responsibilities have included:
• Development of marketing communications plan
• Development of creative platform, including visual identity
• Development of online and print collateral material, including Facebook ads, teaser promotional video, posters
• Design and development of contest web site and 80 content channel/web site
• Design of social media channels including Twitter page, Facebook page, Vimeo and YouTube pages
• Online contest design and management, including development of rules and regulations
• All media and public relations
• Internal communications within YVR community
• Managing in-house storyteller on a day-to-day basis
• Social media strategy
• Social media community management
• Social media monitoring and issues management
• Media partnership development and negotiation (Breakfast Television, Vancouversun.com)

Check out the final days of correspondent Jaeger Mah’s experience at Live@YVR.