Case Study 2018–24 Nonprofit · Digital Marketing

GBRF

Dom

Sea turtle swimming over coral on the Great Barrier Reef

Audience growth

2K → 2M

Campaign reach

40M people

Climate pledges (o

800,000

Overview

Dom spent six years as Senior Digital Manager at the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, building the digital marketing system from scratch. The audience grew from 2,000 to over 2 million. A Snapchat AR campaign reached 40 million people. 800,000 climate pledges were generated in a single launch weekend.

The Foundation had an audience of 2,000 and no structured digital marketing system. No attribution, no CRM integration, no content strategy. The digital presence was an afterthought in an organisation focused on science and policy. Corporate partners like McLaren, Qantas, and Snapchat needed a digital ecosystem that matched their expectations.

What was built

✓Full digital marketing strategy and infrastructure from zero
✓Attribution system connecting campaigns to donations and pledges
✓SEO program that tripled monthly site traffic
✓Multi-award-winning Snapchat AR campaign reaching 40 million people
✓Campaign systems that generated 800,000 climate pledges in one weekend
✓CRM integration and audience segmentation
✓Content strategy and editorial calendar
✓Corporate partner digital activation frameworks for McLaren, Qantas, L’Oreal, Snapchat

Approach & Tools

Key decisions

Leapfrog the audience with AR and partners
Growing from two thousand followers one post at a time would have taken a decade. The bet was reach by association: a multi-award-winning Snapchat AR campaign and activation frameworks for McLaren, Qantas, L’Oreal, and Snapchat put the Foundation in front of audiences it could never have bought, and converted that attention into pledges.
Wire attribution in before scaling spend
A science-and-policy board does not fund vanity metrics. Every campaign was tied through to donations and pledges in Salesforce from the start, so digital could prove its contribution in the language the board cared about and earn the budget to keep going.
Build for compounding, not campaigns
An editorial system and an SEO program that tripled organic traffic meant every new campaign launched off a growing base instead of starting from zero. Six years of compounding is how two thousand became two million.

What the client said

“Over six years Dom grew our audience into the millions and led a national-scale AR campaign that reached an enormous audience. His ability to manage major global partners while reporting to our board was genuinely exceptional.”

R. Heron Executive, Great Barrier Reef Foundation

Inside look

Clownfish in an anemone on the Great Barrier Reef

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