THE 14TH ANNUAL SHORTY AWARDS

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Special Project

Special Project
From the 2nd Annual Shorty Social Good Awards

Charity Miles: Penguin #ProjectReadathon with Save the Children

Finalist in On a Shoestring

Entered in Business-NGO

Objectives

Make it simple for people to donate books to children in need—just by walking, running and biking!

We created a special experience inside of the Charity Miles app where people could do one of two things: 1. Get moving using our fitness tracker and we’d convert their miles moved into “minutes read.” 2. Read excerpts published to our in-app Content Hub.

20 Minutes (Miles) Moved = a 5 book donation. 1 Excerpt read (we pre-timed these to be 20 minute reads!) = a 5 book donation.

Charity Miles is an app where you earn money for charity whenever you run, walk or bike—or otherwise get moving! With over 40 charities, all you have to do is turn the app on, choose the charity you wish to support, and move. We wanted to help our members be even more involved and we hear from them all the time that they even more opportunities to give back.

Our community believes that children everywhere deserve access to the written word. Penguin Random House was the perfect partner to provide the opportunity to our community to unlock book donations, and Save the Children was the perfect partner to get the books into the hands of the kids in need. Together, we made it simple for people to donate books to children. We conducted the mobile event in one week, April 17th-23rd, 2017. By creating an experience where people could walk and earn said books as well as read excerpts within the app—in easy to do 20-minute increments. The book excerpts published in the app were from award-winning Penguin novelists and lasted only 24-hours each, to create a sense of urgency. This allowed you to earn 5 books via Save the Children. All these resources, one place. Not only does this raise awareness for Save the Children but it also brings attention to Penguin Random Houses authors. We wanted to get people interacting with their charity without having to leave the app, really expanding our organic participation and engagement around Charity Miles, Penguin, and Save The Children.

Strategy and Execution

Key Features:

1) Created a unique partnership & story between the Charity Miles app, Penguin Random House, and Save The Children.

2) Published pre-timed 20 minute excerpts best selling Penguin lists, and only published them for 24hours to create a sense of urgency

3) Every 20 minute read inside the app = a 5 book donation for children in need

4) Converted “miles” to minutes, and every 20 “minutes” unlocked 5 books for children in need.

5) Impact, participants were able to directly make an impact with Save the Children at no cost to them, by simply reading or moving with purpose thanks to corporate partner Penguin Random House.

6) Raised awareness for Save the Children and Penguin Random House authors, at the same time.

7) The miles ran by our members also equaled books for children in need as sponsored by Penguin Random House.

Results

In only one week, April 17-23rd, we were able to surpass all of our goals!

We got people moving for 25,928 miles (aka Minutes) and we blew our 10,000 minute goal out of the water!! That is 6,480 books that were donated to children in need!

For a $2000 budget, we guaranteed 1500 engagements. However, we did not cap the engagements to allow for maximum impact, and our community helped us deliver 7,249 engagements. That is a lot of workouts in only one week, all in support of Save The Children and the book donations.

Media

Entrant Company / Organization Name

Penguin Random House, Charity Miles, Save the Children

Links

Entry Credits