Ad Council came to us looking to drive awareness for their Middle School Mental Health initiative by helping parents check in with their kids about their emotional wellbeing. They wanted the solution to focus on Black and Hispanic teens—an often overlooked part of today’s U.S. youth mental health crisis.

Despite 39% of Black teens and 46% of Hispanic teens feeling persistently sad or hopeless[1], they’re about half as likely to receive professional help as their white counterparts[2]. Support at home is also a challenge; stigmas preventing parents from talking about mental health run deeper in these communities.

Sources: 1) Centers for Disease Control "Youth Risk Behavior Survey" 2) Science Daily

We used the universal language of music to give families a new way to discuss their emotions by building a digital tool that translates feelings into songs.

We conceived a 3-part strategy: "GET Black and Hispanic parents and caregivers TO normalize, seek education about, and address their kids' emotional wellbeing BY leveraging Amazon technology and tools to facilitate shared language and ease expression."

Insights about our audience led us to hone in on smart speaker technology and music as a solution—meeting our audience where they are. Members of the Black and Hispanic communities are more likely to use audio streaming services and smart speakers than the general public[1]. Music, a universal language, was the top mental health coping mechanism identified by youth during the pandemic [2] and a commonly-used form of expression within Black and Hispanic communities.

Source: 1) Crisis Text Line "Youth Resilience Report" 2) Nielsen "Total Audience Report"

We created a way for parents to check in with their teens—an interactive, digital tool harnessing the power of Amazon Music's catalogue of 100M songs and the reach of Alexa's technology.

Parents and teens can enter a feeling—in English or Spanish—and get a playlist to help start a conversation.

We launched with a film that modeled the new behavior starring a Hispanic mom struggling to connect with her teen. She breaks through after sharing a song—one we chose for its bilingual lyrics and comforting message.

We partnered with Black and Hispanic musicians who shared how they use music as expression.

The campaign launched in April 2023 ahead of National Mental Health Month—to refocus the conversation on groups normally left behind.

The story, the music, and the launch moment were intentional—we wanted to bring attention to the outsized mental health challenges faced by Black and Hispanic teens.

The campaign's message reverberated widely with 265M impressions and 100% positive social sentiment. We saw an entirely new behavior had been formed with 2.6M songs shared over the course of the campaign.

Popular Black and Hispanic musicians such as Carla Morrison and Ambar Lucid promoted the campaign, earning thousands of social engagements and a social reach of 19M in the first month.

But most importantly, now, caregivers can reach their teens in a whole new way—one that makes it easier to check in frequently, and demonstrates the expressive power of music.