Unsung Heroes
Agency
EngineClient
Fire KillsMy Role
Creative
Smoke alarms are one of the most disliked things in our lives. We measured sentiment online and discovered that Piers Morgan was more liked than smoke alarms.
Previous campaign messaging for Fire Kills was focused around the negative consequences of not testing your smoke alarm. Research claimed that you were most likely to survive a fire if you were alerted in time to escape. Most alarms fail, due to lack of testing.
Our goal was to reframe the messaging of how we see our smoke alarms and celebrate them as the unsung heroes they really are.
The orignal insight for the campaign came from the idea that your smoke alarm was "longing for your touch". Even though you ignore them, they'll stand by you no matter what. Randomly, for me the inspiration for the campaign came from a clip of Futurama. Where Fry's dog waits for him.
By personalising the smoke alarms it made it easy to anthropomorphise them and give them faces, by tapping into "pareidolia". Where people see faces in things.
The campaign consisted of ads in print, radio and OOH. We also have an exciting technology innovation that will hopefully be rolled out soon. There are plans to continue the campaign this year in other forms of media.
Fire Kills became a new client for Engine and the final pieces of work hardly changed from the pitch. We pitched for the work against several big agencies and won.
I'm personally proud of this campaign for several reasons. I come from a family of fire fighters, so it was a way of me connecting with my family. But also the process made me want to get involved with creative work and try and make a difference in peoples lives.
Overall, the campaign was well recieved and results showed that people started testing their alarms more often.