SNBTS

Every single day Scotland needs 450 blood donors to meet the needs of the NHS.

But right now, fewer people than ever are actually giving blood. And the donor base is at its lowest level since records began.

With our 2021 Christmas campaign, we were able to help recruit more donors with a new brand voice for The Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service, and new way of speaking to people.

But only 2% of the population regularly give blood. And 54% of Scots have never donated, at all.

So it’s clear there’s still a long way to go to getting it on more people’s radar.

With the opportunity to create a brand new TV campaign, we’re wanted to go further.

To ambitiously speak to everyone in Scotland, to show them how quick and easy it is to help save lives, and to encourage them to think “I could do that too”.

For most people, donating blood is just not front of mind. And for non-donors, a lot of them don’t think giving blood is for people like them. It’s something they’ve never done before. It feels quite big and scary. It’s a medical procedure. It’s something that other people do.

We needed to reach out to more non donors, from all age groups and walks of life, and persuade them they could make a lifesaving difference.

We needed to show them that yes, what happens with the blood you give is extraordinary. But that donors are ordinary people just like them.

So, taking the lighter tone of our successful radio and social campaign, we created two upbeat, energetic films that celebrate our character, quirks and passions with a bit of real life humour and attitude.

A rallying call to arms for everyone in Scotland, encouraging them to do their bit.

We showed real Scots, in all shapes, sizes and from walks of life, coming together to do some good.

We featured characters everyone in Scotland would recognise. Big Stevie from the Chippy. Football fans. Gamers and wild swimmers. Singers, dancers and phone scrollers. Using a diverse mix of characters, including real donors, to reflect modern Scotland and show that whoever you are, you can help Scotland’s patients.

So that all these potential donors out there can see themselves, and feel that it is for people just like them and they can donate too.

Our bold new creative approach and relentlessly positive brand tone really resonated with people. And we put blood donation well and truly back onto the radar in Scotland.

Reconnecting with old donors and welcoming the new in record numbers. Launched on June 14th (World Blood Day) last year, the new campaign had an immediate impact, and it’s fair to say it wildly surpassed expectations.

For starters, there was an immediate 118% increase in visits to the website on launch-day.

Over the total launch TV period, the number of new donors registering on the online portal leapt 57% compared to the previous period; on the same basis, appointments and new donors making donations both jumped 18%.

Appointments to donate were up by 53% on the previous year’s World Blood Day.

The number of new donors who registered was up by 380% on the previous week.

And there was an 87% increase in visits to the donor web portal.

The response-driving summer blood group O+ and O-, strong call to action radio campaign drove a huge 73% increase in new donors registering on the portal compared to the previous period.

We converted that into a sustained 5.7% increase of people giving blood every single week.

These efforts and results have helped to secure vital blood stock levels, increased donor responsiveness, and allowed SNBTS to increase their daily blood collection targets.

Giving SNBTS a new voice which is visible, impactful and effective enough to set up the future of blood donation in Scotland.