|
With the help and support of New Future Creative, Step Above Stigma was able to create an awesome Instagram Face Filter that initiated conversation around mental health during the week of Bell Let’s Talk Day. In April 2020, the new Step Above Stigma team was challenged with navigating the year ahead. How could we continue to spread awareness and advocate for mental health remotely? However, throughout the year, our team has created incredible online initiatives, where we have seen growth that we have never experienced before. Today, most students at Queen’s University know who we are as a result of social media and the creativity behind our events and initiatives. In December 2020, we met with New Future Creative. We were looking for an effective and fun way to advocate during Bell Let’s Talk week. After being connected with their company through the Queen’s University network, we were eager to partner with them to develop an Instagram face filter to initiate conversation around mental health in a unique way. As part of their mission to use business for good, New Future Creative partners with mission-based organizations like us at Step Above Stigma, creating free augmented reality filters to help spread awareness of their causes. Face filters are an awesome tool to engage your audiences as well as spread awareness of your cause. When one user shares their interaction with the filter, all their followers will also see it published in their story. Story posts also include the handle of the Instagram account that published it, redirecting followers back to your account to learn more about your organization. If the design is interactive and engaging, it will spread among social networks by itself, organically working to spread your cause even after the initial promotion is over. After meeting with the New Future Creative team, our goal was to reach the largest audience possible so that we could encourage users to speak about mental health and to share their own insights and stories. Storytelling is pivotal in breaking down the stigma around mental health and the filter was effective in engaging voices all around the world.
 Throughout the week, we encouraged users to tag us in their videos so that we could re-share them to our story. We also collected these videos and have created an awesome recap video to demonstrate the power of conversation and to help educate other users.
Through outreach and the utilization of this filter, we saw an increase in 100+ followers during Bell Let’s Talk week, and continue to experience significantly higher organic growth. In just one week, 129,300+ users saw the filter and almost 350 users had shared it. We are grateful that users are continuing to use it and are eager to spread this incredible message. We are grateful to our followers for participating and to the New Future Creative for designing such an incredible filter. The best part is that the filter remains on our profile so that users can continue carrying on the conversation beyond Bell Let’s Talk Day! Let's break down the stigma together. If you are involved with a cause or organization that would benefit from the viral power of Instagram filters, reach out to the New Future Creative team to discuss your vision. |