The Long Run
- Brand
- Plan International
- Year
- 2011
- Objective
- Awareness
- Industry
- Other
- Mechanic
- Racing & Sports
- Platform
- App
- Agency
- Monterosa
- With
- Dist Creative
Objective
Plan Norge wanted to build awareness for its campaign for girls' rights in the developing world, and to turn an everyday Norwegian habit — running — into visible, collective support for that cause. The campaign also gave the charity a new way to reach supporters directly: the mobile phone, a channel Norwegian aid organizations hadn't built a campaign around before.
Solution
Runners download the free iPhone or Android app and go for their usual run; the phone tracks the route and distance by GPS as they go. Each run is logged to the runner's own history and added to one national tally, which is plotted as progress along a route through the 49 countries where Plan runs its programs, from Guatemala to the Philippines, against a shared target of 58,248 km. On top of the tracking sits a light competitive layer: runners earn medals for milestones, climb leaderboards, and can form teams to race each other. The campaign also had a live gathering point — Team Long Run ran the Oslo Marathon on 25 September 2011.
Results
Over autumn 2011, 8,052 Norwegians logged runs in the app, together covering 58,248 km — matching the campaign's full target distance across Plan's 49 program countries. The leaderboard's top participant, Mikael Ness Nilsen, alone logged 309 runs totaling 1,080 km.
- 1
Players download The Long Run for free on the App Store or Android Market, where they're introduced to a shared goal: run the collective distance of 58,248 km across 49 countries where Plan works, from Guatemala to the Philippines.
- 2
The core loop is a real run: the player starts a session before heading out, and the app tracks the route and distance via GPS as they run.
- 3
Each run's kilometers are added to the player's personal log, building a running history of all their sessions.
- 4
The same kilometers also feed a collective total shared by all participants, advancing a marker along a world map that moves through the 49 program countries; as the shared route progresses, the app surfaces information about the countries and regions it passes and the situation of girls there.
- 5
Milestones earn the player medals, which accumulate as a collectible record of their achievements.
- 6
Players compete on leaderboards ranked by accumulated kilometers, and can form or join a team to compete collectively rather than solo.
- 7
The campaign extends offline: on September 25, 2011, participants ran the Oslo Marathon together as Team Long Run.
