Facebook Community Summit (FCS) is Facebook's yearly moment to spotlight groups that build flat-out amazing communities on our platform. This past year, Facebook put on its FIRST-EVER community awards show. Dubbed the ‘Facebook Community Awards’, it featured 22 nominated groups (out of the 620 million Facebook groups!) and their indispensable admins.
Up for grabs was a total of seven awards and a 50k cash prize for each winner.
Our creative job was:
This body of work is a massive demonstration of many teams at Facebook coming together (Marketing, Product, Visual Systems, Creative) to build a best-in-class integrated product marketing experience.
Facebook groups are not happy accidents! From the world changing to the kinda weird, the greatest groups are built on purpose, by regular people who believe in a vision. These are real internet heroes, and they deserve major recognition.
Our work took a people-powered execution approach: the creative would be made by the community via only real admin stories and lo-fi group user generated content.
This executional approach helped with speed, authenticity, and emotional range — because it was truly important that our work capture the real, powerful, and diverse range of emotions of the 22 different Facebook groups. We needed to get people excited and invested in these groups in order to drive voting. The work of groups is personal and meaningful for all these admins, and we wanted to celebrate them in a way that honored their true ethos. The love in these communities is real, and it guided our creative at every step.
Now…licensing a gazillion user generated content meant having plenty of plan B, Cs, and Ds when things weren’t available. Lots of 11th-hour fires to put out, not to mention working remotely meant the communication between teams had to be airtight and immediate. Our team (across 7 timezones) was spread thin to accomplish all the different deliverables to ensure each group was properly represented.
In just 8 weeks (26 consecutive edit session days) we pulled off 27 unique films.
The body of work we created became the core creative direction for the actual Facebook Community Summit event itself. This ensured fluidity and consistency throughout the entire experience from campaign to actual award show moment.
In addition to this, because of the way our design ethos flexed, it raised the bar and changed the overall stylistic outlook for Facebook Consumer Marketing going forward.
The awards broadcast reached over 2.9 million people, shining a big ole’ spotlight on these communities and the admins who built them. It was really special to see the 44K votes pour in and the joyful reactions of the communities and admins who won.
Some of the groups were centered on social good (financial empowerment for women, underrepresented communities, adaptive sports) and the campaign was able to spotlight just how broad, and profound, people’s interests can be. This alone was a mark of distinction.
Our efforts also helped communities further build their missions with $350K in community prizes, adding real-world impact as well as important public awareness:
It’s Time To Rewrite The Wellness Narrative For Black Women, Blavity (op-ed)
The Wellness Industry Has An Inclusivity Problem. Black Girls Healing House Is Changing That., Refinery29 (interview)
From barriers to bridges: how these Latinx military families created their own safety net, Military Times (op-ed)
