As a small creative agency, we were hit pretty hard by the financial crisis. All around us, brands were nervous about spending money. A lot of clients were waiting for this nasty period to pass, in the meantime freezing innovation budgets. Risks were avoided, agencies were dropping like flies and there was no room for gutsy creative concepts. We saw our numbers drop and realized that waiting nervously for this crisis to pass was exactly the wrong idea.

Challenge

How to make clients lose their fear of investing in creativity?

How to replace that fear with trust, so we can go back to rocking the universe (in Holland)?

Objectives

Find new clients and make a point:

Investing in creativity is crucial. Especially in a crisis.

Strategy

Fear of losing money put the market in a deadlock.

So to get things moving, we took money out of the equation.

During the traditional 40 Days of Fasting, we worked for free, for anyone in need of a creative solution. And afterwards, people could give whatever they could spare.

Execution

This is a tiny campaign, by a very small company.

But a single press release was enough to split the Dutch ad industry in half.

Some wanted our heads on a spike. Other became our best buddies.

Within a couple of days, we became the most talked about ad agency in Holland.

We made sure we reached the press by physically sharing our results in 'The World's Longest Newsletter'.

It's over 12 meters.

Big Hairy Audacious Goal:

Kick a Crisis in the balls.

Down to earth practical goal:

Get new clients, show them what we can do under pressure, and make a point: it's a good idea to invest in creativity. Especially in a crisis.

I would like to keep our annual turnover confidential if possible.

In 2012 we made just over 500K.

In 2013 we flatlined.

And on average, the rewards we received during 40 Days of Fasting were very low at first.

Then, after numerous appearances on national TV and radio, more serious clients approached us.

After the campaign our turnover went up drastically (we made almost 600K in the months following 40 Days of Fasting), and the clients changed as well. We landed our first retainers and have returning business from clients that would not return our calls a year ago.

152 leads (i.e. briefings received during the 40 days of fasting).

33 pressure cooked campaigns completed for new clients (among which Oxfam, Tony's Chocolonely (the coolest Chocolate brand in the world), the Belgian Olympic speed skating team, Red Bull, Bacardi, but also an out of work office manager who just needed a job). These campaigns were all documented on the fly on the Crisis Schmisis website and in 'The World's Longest Newsletter'.

In short:

Over 300.000 euro of measured free publicity.

Almost bankrupt in the short term.

Almost doubled in size and turnover after 6 months.

Now working for bigger, more relaxed and even slightly more ballsy clients than we did a year ago.

And getting paid to do it.

We launched with a press release to leading advertising media and sent out a simple video with a call for challenges. We received 17 briefings on the first day. Every time we finished a challenge, we blindly picked the next one out of a big top hat.

Dozens of creatives (formerly known as 'the competition') volunteered. Rewards and credits were of course shared.

We sent another press release halfway through the campaign.

Finally, we sent out the (insane) results with 'The World's Longest Newsletter', containing all the work we did in 40 days. To make sure we reached the right people in the press, we physically brought it to the editors. It was over 12 meters.

BTW: 40 Days of Fasting was the best team building method ever.

Everyone was on fire 17 hours a day. Bags under our eyes. Grinning from ear to ear.

Problem: Crisis. Greed. Fear.

No budget. No innovation. No cool work.

The general consensus among creative agencies was:

If there's no money, there's no work.

And among brands (our potential clients) there was a lot of fear. There were cutbacks everywhere. A lot of brand managers were walking on egg shells, trying not to get fired. Understandably, they weren't taking any chances.

So, on the one hand we had nervous clients reluctant to invest in ideas that could get them fired.

And on the other, we had creative agencies fighting over scraps. All because of money.

This is a zero budget campaign.

As our first client, we did a strategic session for a PR agency ('Het PR Bureau', Amsterdam).

They paid us by getting the word out to national press.

Then, we launched a press release and a video inviting people to challenge us.

We invited fellow creatives to join in.

The idea of 'free creatives' enraged the more conservative advertising creatives. Some wanted us to be 'booted out of the business' for poisoning their business. We actively fed the debate on twitter and professional blogs (which was fun).

Finally, we sent out 'The World's Longest Newsletter', containing all of the cases we finished.

By physically bringing this monstrosity to the most important Dutch media editors, we were sure they would take notice.