Southern Water
Bringing about behaviour change for a sustainable future in the South East.
We partnered with Southern Water to make a lasting impact through a full-service campaign
At the heart of it, the root of the problem is that the South East is water-stressed.
Southern Water partnered with Mediaworks, drawing on our extensive industry expertise and previous expertise in executing full-service campaigns.
In the southern and south-eastern regions of England, water scarcity is a pressing issue exacerbated by climate change and population growth. Southern Water has initiated a program to expand capacity, reduce leakage, and lower daily water consumption from 140 to 100 litres per person by 2040. Their aim is to instigate a lasting transformation in consumer water usage habits.
We think
Saving water in the South East required an impactful campaign that would show just how important and easy it is.
To develop an effective behaviour change model for Southern Water we centred our approach on the COM-B model, supplemented by principles from Nudge Theory. The COM-B model ensures that individuals possess the Capability, Opportunity, and Motivation to modify their behaviour. Nudge Theory, on the other hand, focuses on encouraging small behavioural changes through subtle interactions.
Our research extended to examining strategies employed by water companies in the UK and globally to address similar challenges, as well as academic studies regarding attitudes towards water consumption.
Southern Water had already created six audience personas internally, which served as our foundation for shaping both creative and media strategies. These audience profiles were further refined using our primary in-house planning tool, Global Web Index (GWI). We recommended prioritising three out of the six personas:
Time-poor and future-focused families
Conscientious sustainability enthusiasts
Savvy, responsible, and mature individuals
To ensure minimal wastage and prevent encroachment on neighbouring water companies' territories, we cross-referenced our channel choices and geo-targeting capabilities with Southern Water's complex geographical footprint.
We devised a focused media plan, encompassing TV, OOH, Audio, Social, Display, and Search, driven by defined audiences and geo-targeting. A gap analysis on digitally disenfranchised audiences led to physical advertising on pharmacy bags, increasing our emphasis on OOH advertising.
Our planning team collaborated with client services and Southern Water for final proposals. To address reputation issues and adopt behavioural science, our customer-centric campaign emphasised five key actions, which if adopted by customers, would help us reach our water reduction goals:
Turn off the tap while brushing your teeth
Take shorter showers
Utilise a water butt for gardening
Load your dishwasher to full capacity before running it
Regularly inspect toilet for leaks
We do
To ensure comprehensive customer reach and tailored messaging, our media plan adopted a multi-channel approach, allowing us to customise our messaging for each channel. Our in-house team have direct relationships with all mainstream media companies from the likes of DAX, Global, ITV, Channel 4, and Sky Adsmart, through to wider traditional media partners including Ocean, Clear Channel and Bauer media.
Our final channel mix included:
Out of Home (OOH): Deployed 3 distinct creatives in two waves across 48-sheet and 6-sheet sites throughout the region.
TV/AV: Utilised Sky AdSmart and ITVX for precise targeting within the Southern Water supply area
DAX/Instream: Utilized 5 different creatives in 30-second ads
YouTube: Leveraged 5 creatives, featuring edits from TV/AV content, formatted as 15-second and 6-second ads
META: Employed 5 creatives distributed across various static images and carousels
Google Display: Utilised 5 creatives in multiple formats
Google Search: Implemented a paid search campaign geographically targeted to key search terms
Influencer: Executed a paid influencer campaign across various social channels
Pharmacy Bags: Sponsored Pharmacy Prescription bags across the entire region
We measure
The campaign effectively communicated the importance of water conservation and practical steps for daily life, fostering a community-wide effort to reduce water consumption, aligning with Southern Water's goal of sustainability and resource management.
The campaign, running from May 2023 to August 2023, achieved an impressive 39 million impressions across all channels.
Changes
75%
change in claimed action after viewing campaign
Sentiment
58%
positive sentiment (liked or loved the campaign)
