CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL | VERB YELLOWBALL | 2007
A plain yellow ball once traveled 39,940 miles / CDC "VERB YELLOWBALL"
Just by numbering some plain yellow balls, kids ended up carrying them all across the country. One ball, one number stamped on it—that's all it took to take on childhood obesity.
The problem
Since 2002, the CDC had been running a campaign called VERB, encouraging kids aged 9 to 13 to get moving. The goal was to spread easy, casual play that didn't depend on time or place, and YELLOWBALL was planned as the culmination of that effort.
The insight
No kid exercises just because someone tells them to. So the thinking was: why not create a game kids actually want to recommend to their friends? With the goal of turning the kids themselves into the message, the campaign handed out 500,000 yellow balls, each stamped with a unique code, directly to children.
The idea
On the surface, it's just a ball. But each one is engraved with its own unique code. Kids who played with it would type the code into a website, post about it on a blog, and be encouraged to pass the ball on to the next kid. In shopping malls and movie theaters, there were also setups where kids could kick or hit a ball projected onto the floor. The campaign even brought in street performances and hands-on promotional vehicles—throwing the ball out into the world from every possible angle.
What happened
21% of the balls handed out got passed along to someone else. Close to 17,000 blog posts were written, and 168,674 videos were made. One ball passed through the hands of 31 different people, and another single ball traveled 39,940 miles. The campaign won a Gold Lion in the Direct category at Cannes Lions 2007.
Afterthought
A plain ball turned into a piece of media that traveled across the whole country. It feels like watching the exact moment advertising shifted from something you "show" to something you "hand over." With the right hook to make people want to pass it on, even a ball can become a powerful medium.
Awards
- Cannes Lions Gold 2007
