Happiness Brussels is responsible for Rode Kruis-Vlaanderen’s/Red Cross Flanders’corporate communication. The agency came up with a new way of thinking. It translated the concept “reciprocity” into a new communication format: “Helping helps. In every direction.”

Helping is firstly associated with “doing something for free, for someone else”. That is correct, of course, but there is more. Helping is not a one-way street. Helping is a circle.

Helping does not only make the assited person feel good. Helpers also receive warm feelings (of gratitude, appreciation, acknowledgement, relief…). This “reciprocity” is the mechanism Rode Kruis-Vlaanderen/Red Cross Flanders and Happiness Brussels want to highlight and demonstrate. With real stories and shared experiences. Showing mutual exchanges of good feelings. From now on, all Rode Kruis-Vlaanderen’s/Red Cross Flanders’ communication will show the “Helping helps” message.

Happiness created different TV spots to spread the idea on different media levels. The purpose: to convey how “helping” can generate true, warm and mutual feelings. Each spot shows both helper and helped, who tell their side of the story. Viewers discover how both made each other feel good. Every spot also shows Rode Kruis-Vlaanderen’s/Red Cross Flanders’ committments (which go far and beyond the well know blood donation sessions, from Zorgbib/Take care librariesto Vakantiekampen/Holiday camps).

Rode Kruis-Vlaanderen’s/Red Cross Flanders’ well-known sticker campaign also got lots of air time on TV, radio and social. Its success was clear: a record breaking number of 661,000 stickers was sold during the organisation’s annual, most important fundraising campaign.