Project Understood is a data-driven, direct-response campaign that redefines the power of voice technology. Our campaign recruited people with Down syndrome to donate their voice data to train Google’s voice assistant to understand them – giving them access to the life-changing independence that voice assistants represent. Grounded in the insight that Google’s AI lacks sufficient voice data to understand the community’s distinct speech patterns, our campaign recruited this niche community to use their voice data to become Google’s teachers. Turning a direct response campaign into a rallying cry for the Down syndrome community to make voice technology more accessible.

With 8 billion voice assistants in use globally by 2023, the future will be voice-first, but that future doesn’t include people with Down syndrome. Voice technology often doesn’t understand the community’s unique speech patterns, leaving them behind in the voice revolution. As a marginalized community, their needs were never considered.

The Canadian Down Syndrome Society (CDSS) had two problems to solve on a minuscule budget:

1- Make voice technology accessible to people with Down syndrome

2- Shift perceptions of a stigmatized community by showing how access to voice technology can lead to life-changing independence.

Young adults in the Down syndrome community are entirely capable of living independently. But to achieve self-sufficiency, they require more reminders, structure, and routine– unique needs they normally rely on caregivers for but could be answered by voice technology’s tools instead. This meant that access to voice assistants could offer life-changing independence for an entire community.

To increase access to Google’s voice technology, we turned the Down syndrome community into Google’s teachers. We worked with Google – a technology that usually teaches us – and empowered people with Down syndrome to become their teachers.

Introducing Project Understood, a campaign that turns people with Down syndrome into Google’s teachers, using their voices, and voice data, to train Google’s speech recognition model to understand them. Making voice technology more inclusive, by including people with Down syndrome in creating the solution.

Project Understood, like all CDSS campaigns, humanizes a misunderstood community by showing the community advocating for their need to access voice technology. But this year’s campaign went further, by directly calling on the niche Down syndrome community to participate and donate their voice - giving a marginalized group agency over their future, inclusion in the voice revolution and utility for a more independent life, all at once.

Voice technology requires millions of data points (human voices) to perform optimally. Unfortunately, for those with Down syndrome, the small size of their community means these AI systems are lacking the data they need to reliably understand them. So the CDSS played an essential role in directly recruiting the niche Down syndrome community and collecting a large enough data sample that could recognize the unique patterns in their speech and retrain Google’s voice algorithm.

Data collection was critical, because it was the key to unlock voice technology for people with Down syndrome– giving them access to lifechanging independence. Adults with Down syndrome are fully capable of living independently but have a heightened need for structure and reminders to cook, clean and manage their everyday. Voice assistants would be an invaluable tool by allowing them to set reminders, build to-do lists, and easily access help– all independently without relying on caregivers.

Project Understood was a rallying cry for the Down syndrome community to donate their voice to Google and improve voice technology for everyone. The campaign launched during Canadian Down Syndrome Week, with social videos acting as a recruitment tool, mobilizing the community to donate their voices and empowering the community to be part of the solution.

With only $1000 in media, we targeted this niche Down syndrome community organically, knowing the more they engaged, the more we’d reach them. Through email and organic social, we engineered direct outreach to Down syndrome groups across North America to collect voice data, who in turn engaged another 735 international Down syndrome groups to participate. Participants were driven to Projectunderstood.ca where they received a login to enter Chit Chat– a platform designed to capture 1000s of recordings to train Google’s voice assistant technology.

Earned media further amplified our message, changing perceptions of the community.

Project Understood achieved global reach. ROI is incalculable, but on a cost per impression basis, 775,000 impressions per $ spent isn’t bad. Other campaign results:

Recruiting the community:

-826,107 organic reach on Facebook (a 678% increase from the CDSS’s best performing campaign) and 82,995 engagements - with just $1,000 in media

-30+ countries and 735 Down syndrome organizations participated

-Over one million voices were donated to Google’s speech recognition database

Changing public perceptions:

-775 million earned media impressions globally.

Project Understood is making voice technology inclusive for the Down syndrome community. Google and CDSS presented their research at the UN on March 20th, 2020, calling on all technology companies to make voice technology accessible. In the Spring of 2021, Google launched a new beta voice assistant, based on the data we helped capture, showing Project Understood’s long-term impact on a vulnerable community.