We used one disaster, the US Presidential Election, to draw attention to another disaster, the Syrian refugee crisis.

Using Google trends, we noticed that Trump’s nomination was causing a huge spike in the search term “Move to Canada”.

So, we set out to hold up a mirror to Americans considering fleeing the US because of an orange man in an ill-fitting suit – and see the parallels to the plight of the Syrian refugees, who were fleeing for their lives. 

How?

With Google AdWords we hijacked the moment Americans were searching and directed them to our site: ImMovingtoCanada.org

In addition, we launched a social campaign responding real-time to the debates and news, to further drive people to our site.

Once there, we compared Americans fleeing due to the election, to the Syrian refugees who were fleeing for their lives. And gave visitors a reason to donate towards the cause.

We had almost no budget so our campaign would live or die based on a smart data-driven approach.

Using Google AdWords, we targeted Americans who were looking to flee to Canada due to the US Presidential election.

We also launched social content responding to debates and news stories.

Trump talks about building a wall, we post about moving to Canada before they build a wall. Trump talks about grabbin’ em by the pussy, we post about grabbin’ em by the moose knuckle.

Everything led to our website, ImMovingToCanada.org

Our website brought Americans face-to-face with the people who were forced to flee their country, the Syrian refugees.

On the site, they had the opportunity to buy the medical supplies the Syrian refugees desperately needed.

2016 was a shit year. Like really, really shitty. But we managed to turn something negative (Trump’s hate) into something positive (aid for refugees).

Throughout our campaign, click through rates crushed ad-word norms, with 12.96% click-through rates, rather than the average 1.72%.

Donations increased by 190%, with 90% of them coming from first-time donors. And the average donation amount doubled.

Finally, on election day, when the unthinkable happened and Trump won, the Canadian immigration site crashed. But we were ready, and our site traffic went through the roof.