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We transformed an Instagram trend into instant awareness for the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Angel wing Instagram walls – colourful walls in urban areas painted with giant wings – have become very popular with our target group, who love to post pics of themselves standing in front of them.

But why just pretend to be an angel when you can actually be one? We created our own instawalls for sustainable angels. 17 pairs of wings based on the goals were specially designed and put on walls all over the country. Plus an augmented reality app with a Snapchat-like “wings” filter was created. People could now engage with the topics and turn themselves into the guardian angels of our planet.

The campaign tapped into the fun way our target group like to express themselves – with cool filters and social media. And every time they posted, the word spread even further.

Our target group was primarily Millenials and Gen Zs. Which made generating interest in a long list of tasks created by politicians a hard sell. Therefore, an essential part our strategy was to repackage the Sustainable Development Goals into a form young people could engage with. We had to make the topics accessible and cool. And we also had to reach these tricky target groups with minimal marketing budget. So we decided to make the goals insta-famous. We turned a popular instagram trend into a force for good. And with the help of influencers, as well as some eye-catching design, we not only got our target group to pledge to become guardian angels of sustainable development, but also managed to to spread the word about the goals organically.

We put our sustainable angel wings on walls all over Germany. Plus we engaged three of the country’s most relevant influencers, promoted the wings in cinema ads and launched an app to help people find their nearest wall. We even brought the campaign to life using augmented reality – users simply scanned the Shazam code to grow their own, beautifully animated wings. They could flip through the various stunning designs until they found the topic that was closest to their heart. And there was a prompt to find out more about the Sustainable Development Goals that linked to a microsite. The influencers also encouraged their followers to participate via Instagram Stories which included a link to the app and further information about the goals.

The wings did exactly what they were designed for: they took off. The public shared photos of themselves as guardian angels, Germany’s top influencers (many of them pro bono) got involved, and even the Queens of Spain, Denmark and Belgium had photos taken with the augmented reality wings. Overall there were over 50 million contacts across different media channels - two-thirds were generated through earned media. And the campaign had such an impact that the UN has decided to roll it out globally.