Situation:

COP26 is one of the most important moments in the climate debate amongst world leaders. For Gen-Z, climate change is the defining issue of our time but their voices are largely unheard.

Brief:

Give young people a ‘Seat At the Table’ at the political table both in the climate debate and at COP26. Given the importance of the campaign, we worked with partners already renowned in the Sustainability space. To create the series we partnered with Silverback films, an award-winning production company that celebrates the natural world while also understanding its fragility. We also partnered with Don’t Panic for our Sustainable activation and gave them an open brief to use some of our media spend for good.

Objectives:

Our goal, to give Gen-Z a voice and drive the conversation across social and into COP26, highlighting the issues and solutions through innovative story-tellying and a host of famous faces.

As part of a global goal, YouTube created ‘Seat At The Table’ to give young people a voice. The 11-part digital series follows YouTube Creator and climate activist, Jack Harries, on a trip to uncover the unheard voices whose lives are being most affected by the climate crisis globally. Featuring solutions to help curb climate change. The series culminated at COP26, where Jack presented these unheard voices to global leaders and filmed the final 2 episodes of the series. The series features star-talent including David Attenborough, Jane Goodall, and Sadiq Khan.

We also partnered with ‘Don’t Panic’ and The Wildlife Trusts and together purchased an acre of land in Cheshire. We created the world’s first seeded & sustainable paper billboard which will turn into a rewilding area for bees, butterflies and other insects and amplified this with a number of sustainable influencers across Gen-Z platforms.

Data/Audience:

Our research demonstrated that for our core audience (Gen-Z):

>“Ranks climate change highest as vital issue of our time.” (Amnesty International).

>“It's up to my generation to stop climate change from getting worse.” (YPulse).

>Internal YouTube trends analysis, and qualitative studies (concept and creative testing) not only reinforced the importance of sustainability but also that Gen-Z expect brands to drive meaningful change

Relevance/Approach:

Our strategic aim was to talk to our audience authentically, knowing they are not persuaded by “traditional” advertising. We briefed our agencies accordingly as follows:

>Media agency – Utilise platforms with high Gen-Z usage

>Influencer agency – although similar to media, we tasked them with some specific asks:

1) Engage a diverse range of TikTok (Gen-Z high usage/love) Creators and could speak authentically.

2) Deep research sustainability Creators to amplify our activation.

>Social and environmental agency - Touch Gen-Z in a meaningful way.

Implementation:

>‘Seat At The Table’ did indeed give a voice to many unheard voices across the UK and globally, including, Germany, Maldives, India, etc.

Timeline:

>Released episodes twice-weekly in the lead up to COP26, with the final 2 episodes being filmed at the conference.

>Paid media campaign ran at the same time

Placement:

>The show launched on YouTube

>The paid media campaign included Gen-Z social apps YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook & Twitter

>The rewilding activation was amplified with a number of influencers

Scale:

Our presence at COP26 was huge:

>David Attenborough’s opening speech featured clips from the show, with Boris Johnson and Joe Biden in attendance

>A ‘Seat At The Table’ installation in the official United Nations space

>Projected clips from the show onto the COP26 building

>Hosted an exclusive screening, for 150 key names & politicians

>Jack presented his hero film, full of unheard voices, to key figures.

Our campaign reached Gen-Z in a profound way:

>1B organic social impressions - more than BBC’s Green Planet (201.69M Impressions) and Netflix’s A Life On Our Planet (501M Impressions) combined.

>Multiple posts from top talent, including David Beckham, Barack Obama, Jane Goodall, Sadiq Khan, Simon Amstel, Jamal Edwards

>6.3M views on YouTube - YouTube UK’s most successful original of 2021

>100% positive sentiment in the show comments

>793% increase in Jack’s YouTube Subscribers (compared to previous period in 2020) - helping more people discover other environmental content from the activist

>Gave 8 young people a chance to be heard by over 100 world leaders at COP26 - providing them a ‘Seat At The Table’

>Our rewilding also saw high numbers on social media, driving 2.1M impressions but better than that, the land is now entrusted to The Wildlife Trusts and will stand FOREVER as a habitat for bees and insects.