Making mental health a habit.
A global campaign utilizes interactive installations, clever artwork, and messaging to raise awareness and promote behavior change.
Services
- Visual Identity
- Copywriting
- Creative Strategy
- Collateral Design
In 2017, we created a campaign for Facebook to #OpenUp the conversation around mental health. People started sharing their stories, looking to one another for support, and coming together to address mental health in a new way.
In 2018, the goal was to build upon that momentum and empower employees to reach out for help. #OpenUpToMore is all about making mental health a habit, building resilience, and taking advantage of resources.
Facebook needed a campaign that was attention-grabbing, clever, and evoked the very perspective shift they were looking to make. We created a series of installations inspired by the little white lies we tell ourselves to cover up our inner worlds.
Phrases such as I’M FINE, ALL GOOD, and IT’S OKAY are slowly flipped—from colorless and upside-down to full-color and right-side up—to mirror the journey of mental health.
What We Learned Along the Way
It can’t be impactful if it’s not accessible.
By nature, Facebook is a very democratic company. That means everything we created had to work for everyone. All our work was vetted by dyslexic and colorblind communities, as well as teams of therapists, counselors, and content strategists. While daunting, it ensured that we would not exclude anyone from a sensitive campaign.
Meet people where they are.
Mental health isn’t an easy thing to talk about in general, let alone at work. It was essential that our approach didn’t seem forced, corporate, or overly optimistic. This campaign had to be rooted in real language and real emotion. That can be a scary thing for a company to embrace—but it’s necessary if you want to promote genuine behavior change.
The big, simple ideas are worth fighting for.
We came up with hundreds of different approaches for this campaign — some clever, some convoluted. But in the end, the most powerful idea was the simplest one: bold type, limited colors, and precise execution. Sometimes you have to ditch the frills and go straight for the heart.
Erin Lebe, People Communications at FacebookEmotive Brand crafted a brilliant campaign that walked the line between being emotional and directional. It’s a clever way to break the ice on mental health without ignoring the gravity of the subject matter.”
#OpenUp to More
Transformation doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time, openness, and effort for someone to embrace the help and seek the support they need to flip their worlds right-side-up. That’s why we took a segment approach to the campaign—3 segments that moved from upside-down, black and white type to right-side-up, color—to help people find their personal journey to more health and happiness.
Making Mental Health Visible, Accessible, and Personal
From bold posters that sparked self-reflection to tear-away flyers offering immediate support, the campaign met people where they were—visually, emotionally, and digitally. By embedding #OpenUp To More across physical spaces and internal platforms like the People Portal, the initiative invited employees to recognize their needs, access helpful tools, and engage with mental health in a more approachable way.
Turning a corner
Segment Two is where change starts to show. Type starts to flip right-side-up and gain color. Dynamic installations help people shift perspective and see the bigger picture at play. The corner installations can be read as one continuous story line to line or separately.
Progression of all 3 Segments
In Segment Three, people see a world in all color. This phase shows the progress, celebrates the right-side-up world, and encourages people to keep cultivating healthy habits. It will always be a journey.
Experience That Works
Behavior change doesn’t happen overnight.
Behavior change starts with awareness. The success of this campaign was a direct result of the work we did last year to raise awareness, break the stigma, and open up the conversation. Especially for sensitive subject matter, a phrased approach is the way to go.
Get comfortable being uncomfortable.
The only thing worse than ignoring mental health is brushing it off as simply a corporate initiative. If you’re going to do it, you have to go all in and be comfortable with the vulnerability that follows. Your employees aren’t expecting you to fix everything, but they are expecting an authentic conversation backed by the right resources.
Make it scrappy.
When designing for mental health, it’s crucial not to make things too slick, too polished, or too artful. To try and beautify the process would be a complete disserve to the hard work it takes to improve your emotional well-being. We felt an honest, down-to-earth, and scrappy approach was the most genuine.
Build off what makes you great.
In the beginning, we considered scrapping last year’s designs and coming up with something completely new. In talking with employees, we learned that they formed an emotional connection with the butterfly graphics from 2017, so we decided to string them strategically through this campaign. We were able to honor our previous ideas while still pushing them forward.
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