Objective: To increase the number of ethnic minority applications and ultimately recruits in the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, by building positive awareness and encouraging response.

Strategy:  To increase awareness of the Royal Navy as a positive career choice for young people from ethnic minorities, by combating its low profile and negative factors such as perceived lack of relevance, general cynicism, and peer pressure. Focus on role models – serving ethnic minorities in the Royal Navy and Royal Marines – and highlight both substance (especially the variety of jobs and skills) and style (smart, confident appearance and symbolic role of uniforms), and build emotional benefits e.g. self-esteem and achievement.

Campaign: Key elements were a poster campaign ‘Local heroes’ featuring real people from Royal Navy and Royal Marines, highlighting different jobs and skills, and building the idea of a team – the public face of the campaign also actively influenced opinion leaders and gatekeepers; and a radio campaign “Phone home” that tackled peer pressure and highlighted social and travel benefits as well as achievement and skills. The line “How far could you go?” underpinned the campaign as both a challenge and a call to action. Media complemented creative strategy e.g. ‘Local heroes’ targeted key conurbations across UK and key ethnic minority areas within those conurbations, while ‘Phone home’ used key music/DJ shows to target individuals and their peers. Support media included barbershops, postcards in cinemas, London Underground etc.

Results: The campaign was tracked using pre and post quantitative research, and steadily built awareness among its target audience as well as moved them towards action. It successfully communicated key points e.g. “there are people like me in the Royal Navy”, as well as specific benefits, positive career choice, and teamwork. The research showed that we were moving people towards active response, and that the ethnic minority campaign was the key factor, as it was more likely to be seen and to be found relevant and appealing. The research also showed that the Royal Navy campaign was more successful in reaching and persuading young people from ethnic minorities than other forces or service campaigns, some on much higher budgets. Numbers of applications also moved up significantly in this period and targets were successfully met.