When parents learn their unborn child has Down syndrome, they have about 10 days to decide whether to keep the baby or not. Shell-shocked and overwhelmed, they leave the doctor’s office with a list of unanswered questions.
To make it worse, parents are confronted at every turn with the cold and clinical language of Down syndrome: Genetic defects. Developmental delays. Abnormality. Language that us far removed from the emotional reality of the agonizing decision at hand.
Canadian Down Syndrome Society (CDSS) was in a unique position to understand how incredibly difficult it is to receive a Down syndrome diagnosis. Because they receive parents’ urgent calls with questions everyday. The campaign’s goal was to be there for more parents facing this profoundly human decision by giving them the answers they were seeking.
With little more than a doctor’s perspective, lots of questions and no time, couples inevitably turn to Google for answers. In fact, research told us that expectant parents use search twice as much as non-parents. Knowing that our target would be turning to “Dr. Google”, we focused our strategy on Google AdWords so we could be there to answer parents’ questions in the exact moment that they needed answers. And by intercepting their searches, AdWords would give us the ability to target this very small and tough to reach audience that other platforms would not.
When parents turn to Google with questions, the answers they find can be at best unreliable, at worst frightening. So rather than leaving them to the wilds of WebMD, the Canadian Down Syndrome Society had the true experts answer their questions – people living with Down syndrome every day.
Down Syndrome Answers is a series of searchable videos that answer all of the top Googled questions on Down syndrome as answered by people with Down syndrome. Launched during Canadian Down syndrome Awareness Week starting November 2nd, 2016, the series covers everything from physical and intellectual development to the cause of the condition and life expectancy of those who have it. Our videos offer a simple, humanizing window into the lives of people who are often misunderstood. People who, just by their very existence, can dispel some common misconceptions. Not pro-life or pro-choice, the campaign is only pro-second opinion because every diagnosis deserves one - even Down syndrome.
An always-­-on campaign, this is meant to live far beyond its initial launch, providing expectant parents faced with a Down syndrome diagnosis a searchable resource to turn to, today and into the future.
To date, Down Syndrome Answers has achieved:
• 455 million media impressions
• 101% increase in organic traffic to site, of this over 50% was through Google Search
• 893% increase in referral traffic to cdss.ca
• Down Syndrome Associations in 10 countries now support our assets as a resource for parents
• A Think with Google Best-in-Class case for search-based marketing