2013 winner: DCLG, Not for profit - case study

Fire Kills is a Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) marketing campaign which aims to reduce the number of people who die in accidental dwelling fires in England. A working smoke alarm greatly increases the chance of surviving a fire, so the majority of ATL activity is aimed at encouraging people to test their smoke alarms. The challenge we faced was reaching a large amount of people on a greatly reduced marketing budget, while also identifying a message which would prompt action without frequent repetition.

This paper presents a behaviourally driven solution which closes the gap between people’s best intentions and their actual behaviour in real life. We created a memory prompt and a helpful contextual cue, which research has shown can significantly increase people’s likelihood of reaching their goals. In this case, the link was between testing your smoke alarm and changing your clock.

Saving lives

Results have shown that this campaign was seen as impactful, relevant and useful and most importantly it made people over 3 times more likely to test their smoke alarm. From a long-term perspective, this approach has the possibility of reducing reliance on marketing spend to prompt testing, as the date itself becomes a reminder to test.

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