WWF launches global Earth Hour campaign

News

30 March 2012

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has teamed up with Mindshare UK and global media and technology company AdGent Digital for a global ad campaign to raise awareness for Earth Hour.

For the campaign, WWF is using AdGent Digital’s newly-launched tablet-based ad platform AdTouch. Currently the ads are only trafficked to iPads, with plans to expand the technology to other tablet providers in the future.

The WWF ad unit, AdTouch + Slide, allows users to open the ad by sliding it from right to left, revealing new content on top of the existing page without taking the user away from the current page they are on.

WWF’s Earth Hour is a global environmental initiative asking individuals, businesses and governments to switch off their lights for one hour on March 31 at 8.30pm (GMT) to show their support for environmentally sustainable action.

Earth Hour’s ‘I will if you will’ concept challenges individuals to reduce the environmental impact in their daily lives through recycling, taking public transport and installing energy-saving light bulbs. Earth Hour began in 2007 in one city and by 2011 had reached more than 1.8 billion people in 135 countries across the globe.

“WWF is the perfect brand to launch our new tablet-based ad unit with, especially because it is close to our hearts at AdGent,” says AdGent Digital chief executive and founder Cameron Yuill. “Tablet users will be able to engage with the brand and publishers as well as advertisers have the chance to deliver interesting content creatively to their target audiences. With tablet sales increasing, creating ads solely for tablets is a logical step for us.”

WWF has also worked with the Create team at Clear Channel to launch a digital campaign in the UK as part of the initiative. Three interactive units offer consumers the chance to 'turn the globe on and off'. Consumers will also be able to engage with QR codes, directing people to the Earth Hour website to encourage them to sign up. Clear Channel will participate itself, by switching off its Piccadilly Lite at Piccadilly Circus as well as in key office locations around the world.