Greater Dayton RTA - Caring for our Community

Target Audience: RTA's target audience for this campaign is the community. So often, public transit is painted in a negative light. This campaign was meant to bring attention to the side of public transit most people don't know about. When most people think of public transit they think of us providing essential transportation for people to get to work, home, doctors appointments or the grocery store. While we do all of those things, our drivers sometimes are the eyes and ears of the community, from first on scene when there is an accident, helping lost children find their way home, to helping someone who is thinking of taking their life. The idea is to show the community, not only do we move you but we're here for you. We also used this external campaign, internally to highlight above and beyond employees.

Strategy Objective:The objective of this campaign was to keep up a positive image of public transit in the community, while also building a positive image among our employees. The campaign started with the Caring for our Community videos, which highlight heroic things our drivers have done on the job. From there, we created the Caring for our Community engagement bus, which goes to events as a cooling/heating center. On board the bus are interior cards that explain what the drivers featured on the bus are being recognized for. In addition, all the caring for our community videos play while people are on the bus. We also did a total of 4 billboards along RTA routes, highlighting these drivers, which not only sends a good message to our community but to our drivers as well.

Situation Challenge: While we don't have anything on the ballot this year, we thought it was important to still keep up the positive view of RTA in the community. Throughout 2020-2022 we really focused on how essential public transit is to get people to work, school, grocery store, doctors appointments and other essential trips. We wanted to take that a step further with this campaign,. This campaign highlights aspects of public transit people might not think of. For example, our drivers have been first on the scene of an accident, or witnessed an apartment fire and knocked on the doors of individuals inside. As they move people from place to place, our drivers have really become the eyes and ears of the community. We wanted to drive home to the community that you can trust a bus driver.

Results Impact: This campaign was very effective and well received by the public. When the commercials first started airing, we had people from the community calling in to say thank you to our drivers. In addition to airing on TV, the commercials were also put up on our social media channels. To this day, the video of a driver helping someone who was about to take her own life is our video with the highest reach at nearly 500,000. This campaign also boosted morale internally. Our drivers loved seeing other employees recognized.

Why Submit: This entry should win an AdWheel Award because it highlights what is often the "untold" stories of public transit. This campaign had an impact far beyond our expectations. The RTA accomplished showing the community that our drivers care about our community. Even if you don't ride our buses, we are still here for you. The community reaction was more than we could have imagined. We had people calling in just to say thank you and how much they liked our commercials. We've had people post on social media about the good work our drivers do, even coming forward with their own stories. For that reason, we're keeping this campaign going. We hope to highlight more drivers as part of this campaign moving forward.