In order to raise awareness and most importantly funds for AIDS treatment in Africa and India, Keep A Child Alive (a charity started by Alicia Keys and Leigh Blake, a renowned charity worker), in association with world famous celebrities created the Digital Death campaign. Celebrities as well known as Lady Gaga, Justin Timberlake, Alicia Keys, Usher, Ryan Seacrest, Kim Kardashian and Elijah Wood all died digitally, leaving their twitter accounts and Facebook pages silent.
Impact:
The only way to get them back was to ‘buy their lives back’, by visiting a website and donating money. Once one million dollars in donations was received, these celebrities would start their digital lives again, sharing with their fans. This amount was reached in just five days, with fans donating $500.000 and noted pharma billionaire and philanthropist, Stewart Rahr, matching the amount.
By this inventive use of ‘creative blackmail’, Keep A Child Alive was able to raise awareness through the more than 30 million followers that these celebrities were connected with on Twitter. At the same time, other twitter users were encouraged to die digitally to raise awareness, with over 3.600 people doing so; extending the reach of this campaign even further.
“From the bottom of my heart, thank you to all of the fans, friends and artists who joined this cause. I’m incredibly inspired by all of the donations that have been made to help us achieve our goal and so humbled by the outpour of support from everyone.” Alicia Keys
Video Case:
