Since 2011, Day by Day Shelter has served people who are experiencing homelessness in the Oshkosh community. While the organization initially launched to provide emergency shelter, it recently expanded into a new purpose-built facility to offer more services, education, and mental health classes. Needs have been growing in the community, particularly among people over the age of 50, many of whom find themselves experiencing homelessness for the first time.
Day by Day had recently quadrupled its reach, but to sustain that momentum, the organization needed a great campaign for its year-end fundraiser. Our challenge was to develop a storytelling campaign for Day by Day that not only helped the nonprofit meet its fundraising goals, but also built greater awareness about the organization’s mission. Furthermore, we needed to convey the complex reasons for homelessness, overcoming misconceptions about simple causes and easy solutions. That meant putting human faces on the issue.
In conducting our research, we learned homelessness among older adults wasn’t simply an Oshkosh problem—it was a trend occurring nationwide, fueled in part by a growing affordability crisis. We collected the narratives of four Day by Day shelter guests over the age of 50, sharing the unexpected challenges that caused them to become unhoused. We connected their stories to the larger trend happening nationwide. We also wrapped those stories into Day by Day’s end-of-year giving campaign narrative, which we titled “Finding Hope at Any Age.”
The integrated campaign of digital and traditional components included an article, video interviews, and sound bites from these stories for a comprehensive digital campaign. Our video included an interview with Day by Day guests, the nonprofit’s executive director, and service providers dedicated to helping people get back on their feet. We also developed traditional marketing materials centered on this narrative and sent it out as a part of the nonprofit’s year-end mailer.
Our result: The community showed clear interest, gravitating toward the campaign. We saw strong impressions, reach, and engagement across platforms, with the story generating over 65,000 views and 800+ interactions on social media alone. Website behavior reinforced this momentum - this article achieved 218.5% more all-time page views than the organization’s next most-viewed piece, alongside notable spikes in overall site traffic. All of these factors signaled to us that people were connecting with the content, and that they were invested in the stories.
Through “Finding Hope at Any Age,” Day by Day had one of its highest year-end giving campaigns they’ve ever had. Perhaps more significantly, we were able to help educate the public about what's happening in our community. We also were able to convey some of the personal stories of those who have found themselves experiencing homelessness, putting local faces on a growing nationwide concern. Lastly, we were able to communicate that Day by Day is a nonprofit helping those community members back on their feet.
