Every year, The Internationalist highlights inspiring case studies of how brands and their marketing initiatives aremaking a world of difference by creating awareness, changing behaviors, and driving results for the PLANET, for PEOPLE… and for BUSINESS.

WINNING CASE STUDY HIGHLIGHTS

PLANET: TRENDS IN SUSTAINABILITY

Orange – Phone2Gold | Havas Play France

Orange, the French multinational telecommunications company, is environmentally committed and aims to build a more responsible digital world. As an Official Sponsor of Rugby World Cup France 2023, Orange saw a way to increase mobile phone recycling. They created Phone2Gold, the first recycling program that transforms old smartphones into official Rugby World Cup Medals.

eBay – Twiggy Full Circle | EssenceMediaCom

Could eBay promote sustainability by establishing its pre-owned fashion

credentials? A partnership with Vogue and model Twiggy recreated her iconic shot from 1967 with the same vintage accessories found today on eBay. With fast fashion contributing 92 million tons of textile waste each year, circular fashion is more important than ever, and 64% of Gen Z look to shop secondhand before buying new.

REWE – The Switch | OMD Germany x PION3ERS

For generations, Germans have planned their weekly shopping with the help of offer flyers that often end up in the trash. Now, grocery retailer REWE is switching off this essential advertising, promotion, and communication channel to save more than 70,000 tons of paper, CO2, and the annual energy consumption of a small town. No other advertising channel has a comparable ecological footprint.

OzHarvest – From Waste to Taste | Havas Media Australia

Charity organizations like OzHarvest play a crucial role in addressing food waste and redistributing surplus food to those in need. Despite efforts to raise awareness, there are stigmas associated with accepting or consuming surplus food. Overcoming negative perceptions and educating the public about the importance of food rescue requires ongoing advocacy.

WWF – Bee Radio | MEDIAPLUS Germany

Wild bees are essential to the environment and human survival. But their humming is becoming increasingly silent: For decades, entire populations of wild bees have been disappearing due to pesticides, land sealing, and climate change. The WWF protects wild bees and makes their voices heard through new funding initiatives.

UNITED24 – The Donation Map | Havas Play France

UNITED24 was launched by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as the main platform for collecting charitable donations. To rally Fortnite enthusiasts to support Ukraine, a specially designed Fortnite map of Kyiv’s famous Independence Square was built into the game. When players connected to the map, funds were generated based on the map’s popularity and length of gamer involvement. The goal was to raise funds for the reconstruction of a bombed hospital. The money generated on the map is collected directly via the UNITED24 account.

PEOPLE: TRENDS IN SUPPORTING WOMEN

Ally Financial – Side Hustlers | EssenceMediacom US

Less than 2% of venture capital funding goes to women-led companies in the US, and less than 15% of VC investors are women. With so few women-owned businesses receiving financial investments, Ally wanted to showcase women starting and growing small businesses to inspire the next female entrepreneurs. With 70 million Americans having a side hustle on top of their 9-5, Ally created Side Hustlers – a TV series aiming to turn women’s side hustles into main hustles while elevating women by putting them in the startup spotlight.”

Alpine – AI Checking | Havas Play France

Alpine is a French automotive manufacturer and racing division of the Renault Group. It has built its brand on equality and diversity with initiatives like the Rac(H)er program. As part of an Internationalist Women’s Day campaign, Alpine posed two questions to an AI search: Why don’t women race in F1? And How do we bring women to the starting grids of F1? AI Checking captured people’s attention and sparked a social debate while highlighting new female racers.

PEOPLE: BUILDING GIRLS’ SELF ESTEEM

Dove x Nike – #KeepHerConfident | Mindshare US

Forty-five percent of girls drop out of sports due to low body confidence. Dove and Nike created the Body Confident Sport program to tackle this while helping girls stay in sports and feel good about themselves. The initiative reinforced Dove’s long-standing commitment to improving girls’ self-esteem and positioned Nike as a champion for inclusivity in sports. Understanding that mothers aren’t the only ones who play a part in a girl’s athletic experience, the brands, for the first time, widened their traditional paid target audience beyond women to incorporate “Girl Dads” and coaches.

Dove Canada – Cost of Beauty | PHD Canada

Dove wanted to reshape Canadian parents’ understanding and attitudes toward the dangers of harmful beauty standards perpetuated on social platforms in time for amendments to the Online Safety Act. The brand understood that mobilizing Canadians would necessitate challenging parents with hard truths, even if it meant discomfort.

Dove (Unilever) – #TurnYourBack | Mindshare US

Social media has had face-altering augmented reality filters since 2015. Most are harmless; adding dog ears or a crown. With the advent of generative AI, the Bold Glamour filter used one beauty standard to airbrush a TikTok user’s face so much that some called it illegal due to its mental health effects. Bold Glamour maintained the impact even with a hand before a user’s face. As the creator of the No Digital Distortion movement and Dove Self Esteem Project, Dove needed to respond. #TurnYourBack was born.

PEOPLE: PROTECTING CHILDREN

L’Enfant Bleu – The Hidden Story | Havas Play France

L’Enfant Bleu is a French association that fights against child abuse, and is now tackling new challenges on social media. Unfortunately, 50% of the photos posted on child pornography forums are pictures taken by parents and publicly shared on their social media feeds. This practice, known as ‘sharenting’—a contraction of ‘share’ and ‘parenting’—is not without risks.

L’Enfant Bleu addressed this new risk by creating The Hidden Story, the first children’s book that secretly alerts parents to the dangers of sharenting.

McDonald’s – The Light of Courage | OMD Germany x Scholz & Friends

The charitable McDonald’s Kinderhilfe (Children’s Aid) Foundation offers families a temporary home near hospitals. Donations to the Fund were made in boxes at McDonald’s locations, but contributions were dwindling. The solution was not to ask people to give more – but to do so differently by activating the giving experience. The Light of Courage added an emotional layer to the donation process by enabling people to give money and courage to sick children through a night light. The Lights of Courage sold out in only 11 weeks, generating more than 2.2 million euros in donations.

PEOPLE: ENCOURAGING HEALTH

Bayer – Aspirin, The Official Sponsor of Fans’ Hearts | EssenceMediacom US

Heart disease is the leading cause of death for men, women, and people of most racial and ethnic groups in the US. Sports fans are 2x more likely to experience a heart event while watching their home team play. Heart health isn’t top of mind for most people, but this sports statistic helped identify a new audience likely to be at higher risk of cardiovascular disease.

The campaign’s strategic use of heart rate monitoring during games fostered a sense of urgency and personal relevance. By integrating a heart health message into the sports viewing experience, Bayer shifted consumer attitudes from passive to active concern so fans could reduce risks.

F/A/Q Health Foundation – Update HIV | MEDIAPLUS Germany

F/A/Q is an NGO focused on improving people’s sexual health and well-being. One of its central aims is achieving the UN Sustainability Goal of ending AIDS by 2030. Today, 38.4 million people worldwide are HIV positive. But it is not missing treatments that drive this number; it is the stigma associated with HIV. F/A/Q hopes to end this through a one-of-a-kind campaign to rename, rebrand, and rethink HIV by dissociating a medical condition from years of stigmatization. Inspired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s belief that “language creates the reality it describes,” F/A/Q launched a social campaign to spark a new conversation about HIV: CHANGE THE NAME. END THE STIGMA.

Novo Nordisk’s Thick Skin | Wavemaker US

Novo Nordisk’s Thick Skin documentary explores obesity in America through the lives of four obese Philadelphia women who pursue professional success and personal relationships. While the popularity of Ozempic and Wegovy has turned the Danish drugmaker into a household name, Thick Skin meaningfully opens a shifting conversation as more people understand that obesity is a chronic, progressive disease that requires treatment.

American Parkinson Disease Association –ParkinSex | Havas Health Plus US

Parkinson’s disease is a nervous system disorder with one of the highest rates of sexual dysfunction. However, sexual wellness is rarely discussed in the Parkinson’s community.

ParkinSex is a guide to intimacy– much like the Kama Sutra for Parkinson’s. ParkinSex launched on February 14th, Valentine’s Day, and by February 15th, ParkinSex sold out in less than 24 hours.

PEOPLE: ACCESSIBILITY

Dot Inc. – Dot Go | MEDIAPLUS Germany

Navigating new environments can be daunting for visually impaired individuals. While existing camera-based assistance apps provide some help, they are limited to object recognition and need other crucial interactions. Dot Go offers a comprehensive solution to these challenges. It combines applications, technologies, and functions and connects different brands, organizations, and institutions to create accessibility.

The app and content platform Dot Go, developed in partnership with Dot Inc., connects objects with individually selectable actions and is the first personalized object recognition app for the blind. This makes it a unique, innovative data and content resource bundled into an easy-to-use application that everyone can download.

Hiki – #AutisticOutLoud | Mindshare US

Hiki is the world’s leading app for friendship and dating in the Autistic community. Autistic people are 4x more likely to feel lonely than others. A contributing factor is the misrepresentation of those on the autism spectrum in media and advertising.

To overcome the lack of authentic representation of autism, Hiki and Getty Images partnered to create the first large-scale effort to reshape autistic representation in the media.

PEOPLE: UNDERSTANDING ISSUES OF DIVERSITY

Transklar e.V., Trans-Ident e.V., and Rosa Strippe e.V. – SAVED MEMORIES | MEDIAPLUS Germany

Childhood photos help us preserve beautiful memories. However, transgender individuals often find these images painful, as they do not reflect their true gender identity.

Three associations– Transklar e.V., Trans-Ident e.V., and Rosa Strippe e.V.– have supported this community’s challenges. These NGOs initiated the SAVED MEMORIES project to help transgender people feel comfortable with their childhood photos and memories. Using artificial intelligence, childhood photos are adapted to reflect the actual gender. SAVED MEMORIES generated over 757 million contacts with overwhelming praise from the LBGTQ+ community.

Dove (Unilever) – CROWN x LinkedIn: #BlackHairIsProfessional | Mindshare US

Black women’s hair is 2.5x more likely to be perceived as unprofessional. Hair bias and discrimination remain a problem in the workplace, impacting Black women’s employment opportunities and professional advancement.

Dove co-founded the CROWN Coalition to advance anti-hair discrimination legislation called The CROWN Act, or Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair. It is a law that prohibits racial discrimination based on natural textures and protective hairstyles.

Dove is now partnering with LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network, to end natural hair discrimination and create more inclusive and equitable workplaces for Black women.

Google – Google Pixel RePresents | EssenceMediacom US

Pixel set out to celebrate hip-hop’s 50th Anniversary and saw that female artists are overshadowed by their male peers despite making significant contributions to the genre. Female rappers comprise just 12.8% of all artists nominated for major music awards, and only 2.3% of them win. Pixel RePresents is a new content series highlighting five of hip-hop’s emerging female artists, each reimagining a classic track.

THE WINNERS IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER

Ally Financial – Side Hustlers | EssenceMediacom US
Alpine – AI Checking | Havas Play France
American Parkinson Disease Association – ParkinSex | Havas Health Plus US
Bayer – Aspirin: The Official Sponsor of Fans’ Hearts | EssenceMediacom US
Dot Incorporation – Dot Pad: The First Smart Tactile Graphics Display | MEDIAPLUS Germany
Dove (Unilever Canada) – Cost of Beauty | PHD Canada
Dove (Unilever) – #TurnYourBack | Mindshare US
Dove (Unilever) – CROWN x LinkedIn: #BlackHairIsProfessional | Mindshare US
Dove x Nike – #KeepHerConfident | Mindshare US
eBay – Twiggy Full Circle | EssenceMediacom US
F/A/Q Health Foundation – UpdateHIV: A Campaign to Rebrand HIV | MEDIAPLUS Germany
Google – Google Pixel RePresents | EssenceMediacom US
Hiki – #AutisticOutLoud | Mindshare US
L ‘Enfant Bleu – The Hidden Story | Havas Play France
McDonald’s – Light of Courage | OMD Germany x Scholz & Friends
Novo Nordisk – Thick Skin | Wavemaker
Orange – Phone2Gold | Havas Play France
OzHarvest – From Waste to Taste | Havas Media Australia
REWE – The Switch | OMD Germany x PION3ERS
Transklar e.V. | Trans-Ident e.V. | Rosa Strippe e.V. – Saved Memories | MEDIAPLUS Germany
UNITED24 – #TheDonationMap | Havas Play France
WWF Germany – Bee Radio | MEDIAPLUS Germany

Rather than ranking each case study as gold, silver, or bronze, the limited number of winners are simply shining examples of inspirational, authentic, and well-aligned purposeful marketing programs that drive growth and indeed make a world of difference. Each winner is quite literally a “grand prix.” This is the largest number of winners named since the program began thirteen years ago.

The Internationalist focuses on the continual reinvention of marketing by connecting the people and ideas in international marketing, advertising, and media through content, insights, case studies, peer-to-peer marketer Think Tanks, Awards, and Summits—all to better serve the needs of this community. Marketer-driven, The Internationalist is now in its twenty-first year and was founded by Deborah Malone, a former Ad Age and CNBC executive. Originally created as a trade publication, The Internationalist continues to serve an audience of 20,000+ with content, podcasts, and video.

The Internationalist is especially proud of its MARKETING MAKES A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE™ initiative, which represents a global revolution in purposeful and sustainable marketing objectives and possibilities. We’re also proud of our long-term Global Alliance with ANA (Association of National Advertisers), the world’s oldest and largest marketing trade groups.