The Danish Defence needed to attract more conscription applicants. To do so, we helped create a campaign that appeals to adolescents’ feelings and desires to become independent. We used humour to meet them in a new way.
Play with fire
The small voice
Sleep tight
Ear child
Insight
Most adolescents have a profound need to gain independence from their parents, and conscription is an opportunity to do just that. It’s an encounter with a completely different worldwhere young people build strong friendships, get to know themselves better and learn how to work under pressure. A short and yet life-changing experience. That message was important to communicate to the target group who has many options and roads to choose from.
However, parents might not always be as ready to let their kids fly the nest, and nothing is more embarrassing than when your parents treat you like a child to be praised, protected and cared for.
These insights became the starting point for the campaign "Luckily, your parents are not here" for the Danish Defence.
Solution
Humour is far from what one associates with the Danish Defence, but it allowed us to promote conscription and meet the target group in a new way. And because conscripts can’t be deployed, there wasn’t much at stake.
We thus created an integrated campaign with four humorous films in which the young target group could recognize themselves and their parents. Here, overprotective parents burst in on the military conscription training and embarrass their teenagers.But instead of being helpful, they end up putting themselves on display, making the young conscripts appear like the mature ones. In the end, the awkward scene is released by the message “Luckily, your parents are not here”, and the irony thereby portrays conscription as the direct opposite of living at home with mum and dad.
The campaign was also supported by interviews with real conscription role models, so that those interested could find out more about conscription and what opportunities it offers from a personal point of view.
Results
The campaign has performed significantly better than campaigns in previous years in terms of views and website visits.
Compared to 2020 and across platforms, the campaign generated:
The campaign especially performed well on Facebook and Instagram, where the CTR almost doubled and the VTR increased by 243%.
