Stockholm Pride: GOWEST

Credits & Description:

Website URL http://gowest2013.herokuapp.com/
Social Media URL https://twitter.com/teganandsara/status/334516267224530945
Social Media URL https://twitter.com/bjornborg/status/334644587916296192
Social Media URL https://twitter.com/maria_s/status/334631685247348736
Type of entry: Social
Category: Response/Real-Time Activity (including crowdsourcing)
Advertiser: STOCKHOLM PRIDE
Product/Service: STOCKHOLM PRIDE FESTIVAL
Agency: M&C SAATCHI STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

Client: STOCKHOLM PRIDE
Product: STOCKHOLM PRIDE FESTIVAL
Entrant: M&C SAATCHI STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN
Type of Entry: Social
Category: Response/Real-Time Activity (including crowdsourcing)
Entrant Company : M&C SAATCHI STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN
Advertising Agency : M&C SAATCHI STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

Creative Execution:
SOLUTION
Anyone could compose a tweet on gowest2013.com and invite Russians westward to Stockholm Pride. A festival that advocates tolerance and respect. 
The tweets were automatically translated into Russian and most importantly, the geotag was changed to a Russian city, as we were aiming for the hashtag to trend inside Russia.


After only 3 days, GOWEST became a trending topic. In Russia. And 2 days later international media and influential celebrities started to pick up the story.

An incredible wave of tweet-invitations was sent from the website reaching 3.7 million Russian Twitter-accounts. The festival itself was mentioned 10 times more in media then previous years. This resulted in a 33% increase of attendees to Stockholm Pride.

The campaign also inspired many other initiatives supporting the Russian LGBT-community. But even more importantly, what started as a single tweet contributed to placing a serious issue firmly on the global agenda.


PROBLEM
In 2012, Russia passed an anti-gay propaganda law and in Moscow gay parades were banned for a hundred years. Subsequently, Russia saw a surge of hate crimes motivated by homophobia. Assaults, violence and arrests became a daily reality for the Russian LGBT-community. No one reached out or came to their support.

INSIGHT
It was time to act. Since a strict control of media was imposed, we needed to find new ways of spreading the word…