Word of Mouth on the street

Today I’ve been reading about the most popular iPhone app of the minute, and one of the most clever, innovative and provocative ideas I’ve heard in a long time. Tom Ewart of Publicis is right. The public *have* grown tired and bored of the shock tactics used by charities to jolt us into donating to the plethora of good causes out there, (and don’t even get me started on the clip board people that stalk me in the street and make me feel guilty as hell).

Publicis, working on behalf of Depaul, is the agency behind iHobo. Like the good old fashioned Tamagotchi, iHobo is your very own interactive homeless man, whose life you are responsible for for three whole days. Like Tamagotchis, this high maintenance iHobo needs you to provide food, clothes and small change at any time of the day of night or he could end up buying drugs or worse still, dying.

This 'game' with a message brings to light some of the key issues the charity wants its key demographic to think about, but in a creative way which really provides the user with a more tangible connection to the people it needs to help.

Depual, the largest UK based youth charity dedicated to preventing homelessness, needed a way to tap into young, affluent donors after discovering that their average donor is 65 or older. This has clearly influenced the decision to utilise powerful word of mouth techniques, social media, and a little bit of controversy.

Ultimately though, whilst this has brought the charity well and truly into the public eye, will the app make a significant difference to donations? I haven’t seen any stats on this as yet, but my guess is it will be a success. With the option to donate £1, £3 or £10 at the end of the three days, it seems almost guaranteed that anyone interested enough to download the app (210,000 as of last week) will be interested in donating at least £1 to this worthy cause.