DOOHgood Update

November 24, 2011 by Dave Haynes

Thanksgiving Day (the US version, at least) seems a somewhat appropriate time to provide a quick update on the activities of DOOHgood, the industry effort to distribute video Public Service Announcements to Digital OOH networks who have remnant ad time available.

The effort started with the tsunami back in March, as DOOH4Relief, and transformed into DOOHgood when it was obvious there was a bigger role to play. We have also distributed spots for Red Cross tornado relief in the US and for East African famine relief.

Workloads, of course, often overwhelm good intentions, and we’d like to be more organized at this point. But the folks involved, with me kinda driving the bus, have had a busy few months. To move this along, we need more people to stick up their hands.

I had a great conversation over coffee this morning with Kathy Allan of the Humanitarian Coalition, an alliance of Canadian relief organizations, that DOOHgood worked with on East Africa. The coalition exists to streamline activities and reduce overhead for several groups that are all trying to provide help for common causes and catastrophes.

Her group totally “gets” the opportunity presented by DOOHgood, and is happily putting the components together to make it easy for Digital OOH networks in Canada to opt in on running spots when the need develops. They will even have a dedicated SMS short code for Digital OOH spots, which will help assess the impact of campaigns.

She surprised the heck out of me when she pulled a plaque out of her bag, which thanks DOOHgood for its help in the East African relief effort. A really nice, simple gesture, but very cool.

So, DOOHgood is still very much alive and full of good intentions. It’s had an impact and can do a lot more. But we could use some more hands to get things organized and move it along. Send me a note if you are game.

There are countless thousands of screens out there, and very few are fully booked out. It’s a really interesting and obvious opportunity to do some good through DOOHgood.

Happy Thanksgiving to my friends south of the border (Cnadian Thanksgiving is in October).