If your Facebook news feed looks anything like mine lately, it’s probably full of videos of your friends participating in the #IceBucketChallenge. The Ice Bucket Challenge is a campaign to raise awareness for Lou Gehrig’s disease, which is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord, and there is currently no cure.
The campaign was started by a 28-year old man in Massachusetts who was diagnosed with the disease in 2012. He challenged his friends to either dunk a bucket of ice cold water on their heads and post the video to social media and donate $10 to ALS research, or donate $100 if they didn’t want to participate. It caught fire online and now the challenge has taken on a life of its own.
In a press release yesterday, “The ALS Association has received $31.5 million in donations compared to $1.9 million during the same time period last year (July 29 to August 20).”
Since the campaign started in July it has become a viral phenomenon that many celebrities and world leaders have participated in including, George Bush, Bill Gates, Jennifer Lopez, Oprah, Justin Timberlake, and many more. While reading about the buzz generated from the campaign, I came across this HealthLeaders article about three things it can teach hospital marketers. Not only is this relevant to hospital marketers, but anyone looking to incorporate a social media fundraiser in their marketing strategy can benefit from this lesson. Five ways the Ice Bucket Challenge applies to your marketing strategy:
If you haven’t been nominated to partake in the challenge yet, surely you’re next. Yesterday I was nominated by a friend for the challenge, check out my Ice Bucket Challenge video, and consider this my challenge to you—you have 24 hours!
Katelyn Fish is an Account Executive at Lovell Communications. You can view more of Katelyn’s blogs here. Connect with Katelyn at Katelyn@lovell.com, or @katelynfish.
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