Fall Canopy

Campaign

The Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management (DFFM) fosters sustainable communities through urban forestry awareness and local action. Arizona’s urban forests, though only covering 5.3% of the state’s land, host approximately 85% of Arizona’s population. They encompass private properties, urban parks, street trees, landscaped boulevards, public gardens, washes and wetlands, greenways, and nature preserves.

DFFM partnered with ANDERSON to develop a campaign highlighting the benefits of trees and green spaces across Arizona. The goal was to educate the public on the importance of increasing and maintaining tree canopy coverage and its role in creating healthy communities.

What We Did

STRATEGY

ACCOUNT PLANNING

MEDIA

Digital

Creative

SOLUTION

This campaign posed a unique challenge in several ways. First, there were three distinct objectives:

Encouraging behavioral changes through educational awareness
Increasing understanding of the role Arizonans play in reducing energy consumption.
Boosting overall tree canopy coverage while maintaining healthy trees throughout the state.

Additionally, there were three areas of focus, each requiring distinct messaging:

Tree Care
Water Management
Urban Forest

Given the complexity of the ask, we knew our approach had to be strategic, impactful, and clear. The ANDERSON team leveraged our expertise to ensure our campaign not only educated the public but also debunked common myths about tree care. People often assume they know the best ways to care for green spaces, so setting the record straight was key. DFFM provided specific feedback throughout the process, which informed our messaging decisions.

RESEARCH & STRATEGY

Our audience is a diverse group of private homeowners, renters, and “canopy-curious” community members who are conscious of the shared green spaces that benefit all. Given the wide net we needed to cast, the ANDERSON team chose a strategic funnel approach. This guided target audiences from initial awareness (the importance of trees and green spaces in Arizona) to a decision-making point (supporting initiatives to increase and maintain tree canopy coverage).

We dove deep into the learning process, conducting thorough research that resulted in multiple collaborative decks and calls with government department stakeholders. Armed with both internal and external perspectives, we were able to understand the complex specifics of the science behind tree care. Our goal was to make this information accessible to the everyday person, ensuring our messaging was both educational and relatable.

Through it all, we aimed to keep our consumers in a constant state of consideration, knowing that would be the key to building retention and ensuring ongoing engagement and support for our initiatives.

BRANDING

Though DFFM had embarked on small-scale marketing efforts in the past, they had not done anything measurable or ongoing. This campaign would be a template for all future efforts. Considering that one of the primary goals was to educate, the team developed a voice and tone that put the onus squarely on the general public. Using “I” statements and first-person facts as part of our communications strategy gave the creative an approachable, relatable feel, and the overarching messaging kept it simple: Trees are good.

We delivered a new visual system that was highly adaptable to each campaign category. Our consistent look across multiple tactics set a precedent for additional document overhaul, consolidation, alignment, and voice and tone adjustments. This approach was applied to tree care, water management, and the urban forest and laid the groundwork for other areas where DFFM wants to draw awareness down the line.

Additionally, we worked with multiple departments to ensure that the hierarchy and awareness of all core DFFM brands were represented clearly and concisely. This collaboration promoted ownership and a sense of community while maintaining a cohesive brand presence.

CREATIVE EXECUTIONS

Not only did the established campaign branding unify all DFFM tactics, it created a recognizable visual structure for multiple messages across various media platforms.

We drew inspiration for the visuals from close-up beauty shots of Arizona trees. The use of a cool, soothing color palette across the campaign echoed how we wanted our audience to feel under a canopy of trees. Custom pattern systems and shapes abstractly represent the campaign’s categories (tree care, water management, and the urban forest) and differentiate the individual benefits of green spaces. The overall look is playful and upbeat, with a clean, consistent space for the “I” statement headlines to stand out.

MEDIA

Using media consumption data and travel trends, we determined that out-of-home advertising would effectively boost brand awareness. But as consumer habits have changed in recent years, it was also important to integrate digital initiatives. Therefore, our media plans focused on omnichannel and cross-device campaigns, including programmatic audio, paid social (Meta), and native advertising.