Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors without Borders (MSF) is a well-renowned, nobel-prize winning, medical aid organization. In 2009, MSF identified a sharp reduction in relevance with a young target audience (18-35). These people do not have the economic means to make monetary donations, but they have the ability and latent motivation to contribute in other ways.The brief asked for a viral campaign to encourage a young audience to engage. Our main challenge was to communicate that one does not have to cross borders, be a doctor or give money to show support for MSF. The campaign is about raising awareness and activating young people. We designed a viral campaign that positioned MSF as a virus that you can get and transmit, I have MSF, because engagement is contagious. The campaign does not use traditional advertising, but rather spreads the message through events, actions, an engaged community of celebrities and young people. We communicated the engagements through an aggressive PR strategy.

Over the course of 2009, the campaign made 18 million contacts. We generated over 1.5 million Swiss francs of unpaid, PR coverage. There were a variety of engagements recorded on the campaign hub, i-have-msf.ch.

1. The campaign started with a t-shirt. Celebrities were engaged to promote MSF in traditional and non-traditional media channels by proclaiming virus infection and through organized events:2. A reading of Shantaram with Gregory David Roberts, 29/3/2009.3. Sponsorship of the Comic Festival in Lucerne, 28/3/2009.4. Sponsorship of the Zürich Film Festival, and an engagement ride with Peter Fonda, 30/9/2009.5. A hiking day with local Swiss celebrities in Grosser Mythen 13/9/2009.6. An I have MSF evening at Zürich club, Helsiniki, 25/11/2009.7. Ray Cokes has MSF proclaimation and press coverage.8. 20+ local Swiss celebrity engagements.The celebrity campaign has ran to plan, however the results of individual engagements is up to our community of supporters and not controlled by the campaign.

In 2009, MSF generated over 18 million contacts through the I have MSF campaign.

There were a plethora of engagements recorded on the campaign hub, i-have-msf.ch the campaign generated over 1.5 million Swiss francs of unpaid PR media coverage.

As a result, MSF saw a 7% increase in total awareness.