Challenge

Every year we are bombarded with breast cancer awareness and fundraising campaigns, but despite this, 1 in 83 Australian women will still develop this devastating cancer. More needs to be done to fight it and one angle had been under-represented in the cacophony of activity: self-examination.

Self-examination is estimated to detect about 40% more early cancers than mammograms, yet it is still not widely discussed or practised regularly by enough women to make a difference.

We needed to get the sensitive subject of breast cancer self-examination on women’s radars.

Inspiration

Behaviour change is notoriously hard to prompt and most women, despite their awareness of the disease, self-exempt rather than self-examine… thinking and hoping ‘it won’t happen to me’.

How could we get self-examination on women’s radar in a way that would cut through the clutter?


The conventional answer would have been to feature breast cancer survivors. To tell stories of women who detected their cancers early through self-examination through a social media campaign. However, we felt that stories of survival would be less effective at generating a sense of vulnerability – which was essential to encourage women to take their breast health into their own hands and self-examine. We needed to create that sense of vulnerability by focusing on the tragic reality that many breast cancers are not detected early enough and as a result, many women do not survive.

Women singing

I Touch Myself Project - 2014

The idea was to celebrate the life of an incredible woman who in 2012 died from breast cancer – Australian rock diva, Chrissy Amphlett of the Divinyls. Her biggest hit was called ‘I Touch Myself’ and touched millions of fans around the globe. Released in December 1990, the single reached number 1 on the Australian charts and Top 5 in the US.

We created the ‘I Touch Myself’ project. Transforming a song about female sexuality into an anthem for breast cancer self-examination, to once again inspire a generation of women to touch themselves.

To execute this idea, we brought ten of Australia’s leading female singers together to create a moving music video. From rock goddesses to indie pop sensations, soul singers to sopranos, the singers harmonise in an almost acapella version of ‘I Touch Myself’. The video features singers from their twenties to late sixties as a reminder that breast cancer affects women of all ages, shapes and lifestyles.

The project was launched to coincide with the anniversary of Chrissy’s death and the video drove women to a content-rich ‘I Touch Myself Project’ website that encourages women to self-examine while listening to their favourite singer’s mix. The music video launched to an audience of 2.2 million on Australia’s top-rating evening current affairs show Sunday Night and quickly became the most shared segment in the show’s history.

Growth in 2014

We generated mass awareness

  • Reached over 13.8 million – 59.6% of Australians through earned media;
  • Reached over 10 million through social media;
  • #itouchmyselfproject became a trending topic on Facebook for 2 days; and
  • International media embraced the campaign reaching audiences of 314 million plus.

We drove behaviour change.

  • 70% said they did not previously regularly check their breasts
  • 42.4% said this was their first time
  • 27.1% said they had not checked for ages.
Serena Williams Topless for Breast Cancer Awareness Month

I Touch Myself Project - 2018

In 2018, we launched a follow-up like no other. We partnered with Berlei to grow and evolve the ‘I Touch Myself Project’ to reach women in every corner of the planet. Women who don’t have easy access to resources. Younger women. Women of colour. Women who don’t present to doctors.


Berlei had an existing relationship with Serena Williams - the perfect super influence - and so our ambitious and audacious vision was pitched to Berlei: get Serena to sing ‘I Touch Myself’. Despite the ask being out of her ‘comfort zone’, one of the world’s greatest influencers agreed to front the campaign for free and post the video on her own social channels - complete with millions of followers.

And when Serena Williams sang, women listened.​

Growth - 2018

Serena's tweet quickly became the most re-tweeted post. It then became the most talked about campaign on Instagram, and the most watched video during International Breast Cancer Awareness Month – touching over 1.25 billion people across 95 countries and increasing the conversation about self-detection by 252% compared to October 2017.

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