David C. Onley InitiativE, Carleton University

COVID-19 Marketing: Making a showcase virtual

How do you hold a showcase when no one is leaving their home? Our challenge was to quickly find an engaging way to share research insights that will help students and graduates with disabilities to find meaningful employment.

Quickly adapting to a new reality

Two years of hard work deserved a celebration. The initiative was a partnership between Carleton, uOttawa, Algonquin College and La Cité. It advanced awareness of, and created resources for, post-secondary students and graduates with disabilities in the Ottawa region. As the coronavirus pandemic grew, the possibility of holding the planned in-person showcase quickly evaporated. Instead, we spearheaded the production of a comprehensive Celebration Showcase webpage to live on onleyinitiative.ca.

“I appreciate the care that Stiff took to understand the issue and the stakeholders. They leveraged what they learned to bring a fresh and dynamic approach to employer engagement in our community.”

Shannon Bruce

Manager of Business Development,
United Way East Ontario's EARN

Ashley Heline

Argo Group employee

“I enjoy being a part of the social ambassador program because it gives me the opportunity to share company news with my peers and industry contacts in a quick and seamless way. As a marketing program manager, I appreciate the way the program is increasing awareness of the Argo brand and its value.”

Read the full case study

Read the full case study to learn how we adapted to rapidly changing environments.

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We can change that.
We are #AbleTo.

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“It was such an unusual time. We knew we wanted a way to share the achievements so many worked so hard for, but we had no idea what was even possible from COVID-19 quarantine. Stiff pushed us to not compromise on the scope of our ideal event. They worked seven-days-a-week to make sure it was a success.”

Julie Caldwell, Assistant Director,
Program Operations, READ Initiative

Assistant Director,
Program Operations, READ Initiative

Swift shift
to virtual

The event needed an online hub that encouraged interactivity and social sharing. Owing to DCOI’s primary mandate, accessibility was of the utmost importance. All design needed to adhere to AODA standards. There was a large breadth of content to showcase, so we had to be judicious with our use of space to improve accessibility. And we also needed the Celebration Showcase launched in time for the live virtual celebration event on April 27th.

We designed an accessible webpage with easy navigation, compelling graphics and a comprehensive review of DCOI’s two-year run. The page featured all of the existing materials planned for presentation at the in-person event as screen-reader accessible PDFs. We also coded a special functionality for a poster showcase on the page.

Inform and engage
all attendees

We built an outreach program to help DCOI promote the event to previously registered attendees and helped the initiative frame an online gathering to coincide with the originally scheduled date of April 27, 2020. In the end, this innovative and nimble approach served to enhance some of our attendees’ abilities to enjoy the showcase. In all, 109 guests attended the virtual celebration, and an additional 500 people visited the webpage in the first week post-launch.

Read the full case study

Read the full story of our COVID-19 response marketing strategy for DCOI by clicking the link below.

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