What happened on 9/11 is forever etched in our memories. Unknown to many is what happened the next day. Just one block from Ground Zero, thousands of Verizon employees risked their lives on 9/12/21 to run toward a crisis to help reconnect New York.

Our brief was to understand the critical role Verizon played during 9/11 by showcasing the profound impact Verizon’s telecommunications headquarters and employees had on the recovery and comeback of New York, as well as the nation.

Our objective was to create an original immersive experience for current Verizon employees to share the heroic actions of their fellow employees and learn an important piece of the company history.

To commemorate the 20th anniversary of 9/11, Verizon created “9/12: The Untold Story of Reconnecting New York.” This one-day, real-time immersive MMS experience used AR, VR, audio, and interactive media to tell the stories of the Verizon employees who were at the badly damaged corporate headquarters that connected Lower Manhattan and Wall Street, and of the restoration efforts that became crucial for the comeback of the city and the nation.

It’s a story that’s never been told in a format that’s never been used before: text messages. In 2001, it was the latest way to communicate and in 2021, the most personal. The 1:1 nature of texting gave a meaningful platform to share the emotional employee stories that emerged in the days after 9/11, with every text documenting a moment, action or story delivered at the time the event actually happened 20 years earlier on September 12.

The core of our strategy was to communicate the critical role Verizon played during 9/11 by highlighting the profound impact Verizon’s telecommunications headquarters and employees had on the 9/11 recovery and comeback of New York, as well as the nation. Challenges included maintaining focus on the contribution of the employees, and not the brand, to reinforce the importance of a culture centered around “running toward a crisis,” and ensuring all work remained sensitive to the trauma experienced by those who were there. These employees were not assigned the daunting task of reconnecting and repairing service to Manhattan and reconstructing the devastated Verizon headquarters: they just showed up and risked their lives to achieve the unimaginable. The target audience was exclusively Verizon employees, to honor the dedication of thoses who were there in 2001 and also to share an important piece of our company’s history with our current employees.

This one-day real-time immersive experience was created for Verizon employees. We invited users to step into the timeline of 9/12, putting them in the shoes of Verizon employees who sprang into action that day. At 8 am on 9/12, hourly stories were sent in a 12 hour time period. Including eleven personal stories told through MMS native content such as, immersive phone calls reenacting historical moments , 360º interactive maps of downtown Manhattan, and AR “before-and-after” filters, youtube mini-documentaries, voice memos, SMS messages, archival photos. The use of text messages as a media platform was a nod to the basic tech of 2001, while featuring the cutting-edge mobile experiences of today—a story about the past told with a modern twist.

Over 300,000 MMSes were sent out on the launch day alone. Mobile messaging became a unique and powerful storytelling tool that connected to users on an intimate and personal level.

Our success stemmed from creating a meaningful brand experience for our employees, resulting in a 99.86% engagement rate. As a brand that puts innovation at the forefront of everything we do, we took extreme pride in the creation of an entirely new multimedia MMS platform. Existing phone apps became the springboard for immersive storytelling. Leveraging every native tool within a text conversation, viewers received a series of personal, poignant employee stories at the times the events actually happened in 2001. 9/12 pays tribute to the incredible resilience, courage, and willpower of the 14,000 Verizon employees who showed up and made a profound impact on our nation’s recovery in the aftermath of 9/11.