PUTTING IMPACT AT THE FOREFRONT OF STRATEGY
Campaign Overview
Since our first engagement in 2016, Yulu has become a consistent and trusted advisor on Red Bull’s social innovation initiatives, working with the brands’ various North American divisions and global team.
The Challenge
Creating meaningful impact is a top priority for Red Bull as they develop their global strategies. Tangible impact means different things in different markets: Yulu’s challenge has been to tweak our strategy and approach to appropriately cater to each of Red Bull’s key markets.
A prime example of this was our support for Red Bull Basement University’s Global Workshop, where we supported in coordinating a remote, four-day event for student innovators from 25 countries, seeking to improve student life by driving positive change through technology.
The Strategy
On the strategy side, Yulu has undertaken multiple industry and market research projects for the Red Bull team, including reports produced on Gen Z values in the US, the social impact media landscape in the US, and social issues within the Canadian market. We’ve also supported them with the planning and execution of several impactful events, including NOLA Connect, LA Connect, and Oakland Connect, and the Red Bull Basement University Global Workshop. Each event is designed to connect and “give wings” to social entrepreneurs and social innovators around the world.
Our support for the Red Bull Basement University Global Workshop meant developing a communications strategy, consisting of an international media trip, that would bring together 25 countries to drive positive change through technology innovations and solutions. We invited values-aligned media focused on Gen Z, tech and innovation to join us at the Global Workshop in Toronto, Canada, and engaged our media attendees to be a part of the event programming for example, having one of our media attendees host a live panel discussion on “How to enable future generations”.
By positioning Toronto as a hub for tech and innovation and creating a media trip itinerary that would both appeal to the diverse group of reporters (right before the Christmas holidays!), Yulu was successful in exceeding our attendee targets, both for media trip attendees and for local media who generated live, on-site coverage during the RBBU final pitch competition.
The Results & Impact
Our research findings have informed Red Bull’s broader communications strategies, ensuring authentic social impact is a clear, measurable factor in all of the brand’s global initiatives, and our event support has resulted in attendance and media impressions from outlets such as TeenVOGUE, Buzzfeed, NPR, Washington Post, Freethink and Upworthy.
Yulu’s role at the Red Bull Basement University Global Workshop resulted in boosting dialogue around important issues such as improving student life, using tech innovations for good, and a particularly key theme: building equal opportunities for women in tech. For this reason, it was important we demonstrate diversity and gender equality in the media we invited to join us. Our female student innovators were over the moon to learn they’d be featured on the Women in Tech Podcast that played a key role in inspiring many of them to excel in the traditionally male-dominated industry. We were proud to see two bright female co founders take home their well-deserved winning prize at the end of the competition.