For the last two years, Ashby & Gabriel has worked on an extensive and collaborative effort with Gloo, the world’s first data solutions platform built for personal growth and development, and The Family Project, an organization committed to strengthening families in two rural counties of Missouri.

This area of the country is a well known family vacation destination, with world-class theme parks and entertainment. For locals, those industries come with challenges: work is often seasonal and financial stability and family success can be difficult. The Family Project exists to help support families by building relationships and providing resources through the local church and school system. From financial literacy to marriage retreats, the Family Project identifies churches with the ability to meet a need, and equips them with data services through Gloo, digital marketing through our agency, and ongoing support and training.

During the course of the project, we’ve managed Facebook campaigns for nine churches, marketing educational and enriching events that focus on building long-term relationships, strengthening marriages, and providing financial education. 

“The Family Project was created because we recognized that thriving communities start with healthy families. We see the local Church and School as foundational partners in developing and supporting healthy families, but all too often in rural communities these institutions are under-resourced and spread thin. By leveraging social capital, collective resources, and expertise from A&G and Gloo, The Family Project is able to support the great work that local Churches and Schools are doing, and help them impact many more families than they could on their own,” – Bradley Herschend, Program Coordinator for The Family Project

To reach the maximum number of people and create consistent, ongoing engagement, we developed a digital funnel that started with PSA style campaigns. We began by interviewing The Family Project and Gloo staff who had spent time on the ground in Ozark Mountain Country to understand what messaging would connect- and what wouldn’t. From there, our team developed concepts and pitched ideas for the campaign’s central theme. 

Rachel Morrison, our Senior Project Manager, has significant experience optimizing complex nonprofit messaging for digital campaigns. She created the concept for the PSA: Here for the Big Picture.

“Most parents struggle with feeling isolated and alone when dealing with personal family issues and with social media, keeping up appearances has never been more prevalent. The idea for “Here for the Big Picture” came from taking a snapshot of a happy family, something almost all families have displayed in their home, and zooming out to show the realities of day to day life: overdue bills, failed report cards,  medical bills etc. The sharp contrast in imagery hits home with the behind the scenes of many people’s lives and sends reassurance that The Family Project isn’t just here for your “best selves” but for all the challenges that come with raising a healthy family – They’re here for the big picture,” – Rachel Morrison.

Our team created image and video ads, ebooks, and landing pages to reach the community with the message that no matter what they are facing in their life, there are supports and resources available through The Family Project and local churches that can make a difference now- and into the future. 

After developing a sizable warm audience in the community, we had a clear path forward to market individual church events. For every campaign, we conducted Zoom meetings with the church staff to understand their church’s voice and values before we developed the creative assets.

For our team, this was a unique opportunity to provide substantial digital strategy to smaller churches that haven’t previously had access to any kind of marketing support, let alone a project of this caliber.

“The powerful results came from the combination of the nuanced input of local church leaders and our team’s specific experience. This project has been deeply relational- we developed every strategy and every creative asset through the filter of strong communication with local leaders and valuing their perspective. It’s been a great opportunity for us to really listen,” – Megan Berame, Co-founder and Special Projects Director.

The success of the campaigns depended on targeted audiences only available through Gloo. Gloo is the first data solutions platform built for personal growth and development in the world- and their unique system allowed us to activate audiences to Facebook that were customized for each church and helped us ensure no ad dollars were wasted- we were reaching precisely the target audience for each campaign. Churches also utilized Gloo’s data-driven assessments tool to measure the efficacy of their events, and calibrate their future efforts based on the feedback they received. 

“It has been so exciting to see the results in Ozark Mountain Country, facilitated by the excellent work of A&G. A&G is very responsive, creative with their design and messaging, very detailed while offering a big picture view, and cares deeply about the clients whom they serve. Would highly recommend them as an agency partner!”- Kim Moeller, Strategic Partnership Manager at Gloo