Every year in New Zealand, up to 3,000 babies are born with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. And millennials are most at risk – often drinking while unaware they’re pregnant. With 40% of NZ pregnancies unplanned, and the majority of those deciding to keep the baby rather than abort, the Health Promotion Agency needed 18-30 year-olds to avoid alcohol if there was even the slightest chance of pregnancy. No easy feat since our country has a terrible binge-drinking culture where girls often succumb to pressure and drink - even if they think they might be pregnant. So, our brief was two-fold. Encourage girls to avoid alcohol if potentially pregnant, but also make it easier for them to say no to alcohol. And, as no millennial wants the government telling them to not drink, do it all without being told to get stuffed.

We recognised that a friend’s support makes it easier to stick to your guns and not drink when potentially pregnant. We also acknowledged young women would be far more receptive to a friend telling them to not drink than the government. So, we got girls telling their mates not to drink, for us – by creating the ‘Pre-Testie Bestie’. An anti-booze wing-woman, if you will, who stops friends drinking alcohol.

We inspired girls to become Pre-Testie Besties by writing an online series that followed character Dillon as she kept potentially pregnant Bex off alcohol. To keep viewers engaged, we gave girls a classic cliff hanger. Is. Bex. Preg?! Viewers had to wait 21 days, the length of time it takes before you can accurately test, before they finally found out. While exaggerated for comedic effect, each episode showed how to be a supportive friend and modelled the non-drinking behaviour we

Pre-launch, we worked with social media influencers to popularize this all-new concept of being a Pre-Testie Bestie. This insured that when our online series started appearing in the social feeds of our audience, they’d be more receptive knowing it had the tick of approval from the influencers they follow. We then targeted young female Kiwis aged 18-30 with our first episode across Instagram and YouTube and asked them to tag who they’d be a Pre-Testie Bestie for. Instagram provided the perfect platform to kick-start conversations about being Pre-Testie Besties and the personal topic of pregnancy as the comments are far less public than Facebook comments. Girls who showed interest in the first episode were then pulled into our official audience pool – and using sequential retargeting, were taken on a 21-day journey where every day we served them a brand new episode or social post following Dillon keeping Bex booze-free.

In September 2018, our ‘Pre-Testie Bestie’ series launched on Instagram & YouTube with ‘The Stick of Destiny’; a 50-second episode featuring Bex testing for pregnancy just days after unprotected sex. Dillon brings up the fact it’s far too soon to test, and that Bex shouldn’t drink until 100% sure she isn’t pregnant. Dillon then vows to keep Bex off booze until she can test again in 21 days. The opening line ‘Piss on a stick, cos you got some d**k’ instantly defined the series as one written by girls for girls – not by a stuffy government body.

We then released a new episode or update each day over the next 21 days. We treated Youtube and Instagram like Dillon’s personal journal, complete with captions ‘written’ by her. This ensured girls felt like they were witnessing a real-time, real-life journey unfold which kept them coming back for new content each

Within hours of launching, thousands of young Kiwi women started pledging to be ‘Pre-Testie Besties’ for friends, should the occasion ever arise.

At the end of the 21 day campaign, not only had we exceeded the Health Promotion Agency’s targets but smashed industry norms:

- We reached 90% of Kiwi women aged 18-30 (surpassing the 70% target)

- Initiated over 7,000 conversations between Pre-Testie Besties

- Received over 11 million views across YouTube and Instagram

- Achieved a video completion rate 49% above YouTube standard

- Ad recall was 978% above industry norms.

Moreover, YouTube dubbed it the best performing social PSA campaign they had ever seen in Australasia.

But, most importantly, we got thousands of girls tuning into a serious message – Don’t know if you’re pregnant? Don’t drink.

We see this as the campaign’s most defining result, as it’s the first step to reducing FAS in New Zealand.