One of the biggest barriers for homeless people to get help is the stigma around them. People tend to assume it’s their fault they ended up in that situation. But the reality is that there are many life events and stories that can lead to homelessness.

Depaul believes homelessness has no place. Neither do the stereotypes and preconceptions around it. But in order to break the stigma, we first had to face another challenge: how to make people listen?

If people won’t listen to homeless people, we decided to tell their stories using something people do listen to: music.

In partnership with Spotify, we created playlists telling real stories of homelessness as you read the songs’ titles. Each playlist ended with a podcast in which the homeless person talked about the experience more in depth.

Jecoliah, Fatos, George, Kristina and Emma shared their own experiences of homelessness with the world through music, reminding us that there are many other stories out there that go unheard.

We served these playlists to the audience through ads on Spotify, Facebook and Instagram, targeting the fans of the artists featured on the project. This way, we turned a message they usually avoid into a relevant content to them. Literally, music to their ears. We also joined the conversation about these artists on Twitter, leveraging the active followers of the bands to spread the word about the project.

By using an innovative storytelling method, Depaul Unheard managed to get people to give attention to stories they usually ignore. Offering to the audience something as simple as the songs they already listen to in exchange to their attention, we managed to get them to engage with a subject they usually avoid.

The unheard stories encourage empathy, which is the first step towards helping.

The 5 playlists were written in partnership with the 5 young people featured in the campaign. These went live in December 2018 on Spotify. Paid media in Facebook, Instagram and Spotify would drive people to the playlists, so they could read the stories told by the songs’ titles, and also listen to the podcast in the end of each playlist, for a more immersive experience.

What was a campaign for the UK market went on to hit the headlines in the press of different countries, sparking the conversation about homelessness in different parts of the world. Sony Music and BBC’s Introducing Artist of the 2018 Tom Grennan also joined the campaign. In total, there were more than 1 million impressions.