Obama For America ’08

We’re very proud of our Obama For America work, which not only led to the team winning a Cannes Lions Titanium and Integrated Gold Lion, but also led to the election of a president with the greatest percentage of the youth vote in American history. The Obama for America [OFA] campaign believed that, properly engaged and employed, young voters would turn out for Obama and could even be the difference in winning or losing some key battleground states. OFA hired SS+K to drive the youth vote through an online-fueled registration process and to the polls.

The model aimed to channel the frustration and alienation among youth voters by granting them the power to express themselves – through social media, customizable, shareable art, terrestrial events, and ultimately, by registering to vote at voteforchange.com. The answer for the campaign and SS+K was to abandon convention and use a technology-driven grassroots approach to driving young people through the engage/register/turn out ‘mobilization funnel.’ More than 4 million of them did just that, motivated by 442,000 YouTube videos, 3 million Facebook friends and countless social connections that harnessed the enthusiasm for Obama and turned it into a movement. In the end, youth made the difference: Obama garnered 53% of the popular vote, and 68% of the youth vote.