How do you create a social media film that goes viral and gets more than 2.4 million views in a few short weeks?
You use universality of experience and include empathy and humour to put your point across. In this instance, we created a two-minute film based on the idea that everybody knows what four-year-olds are like – funny, random and totally unfiltered.
We asked well-known comedian Zoe Lyons to deliver a mock interview involving several children, showing how off-the-wall and unreliable they are at giving answers to a few simple questions. The whole piece was filmed socially distanced, with each subject shot separately and then put together in a clever edit.
The film was viewed more than 2.4 million times, spreading the message far and wide that it’s pointless to test small children in English and maths when they first start school. A petition accompanying the film now has over 120,000 signatures and 3,000 people have also written to their MPs opposing the government’s plans to introduce these tests in September.
Effective campaigning and mass awareness raising of what was, until now, a niche topic. In short, a win!