Join The Police

Linas Migonis: Creative Director Jurgis Ramanauskas: Art Director Jolita Katkutė: Project Lead 

Lithuania needs police officers. We've got briefed to increase young peoples’ interest in enrolling to Police Academy and raise their profile as an attractive employer. The challenge was to create authentic and engaging content that would resonate with the audience without appearing artificial. Research offered us video games as the right medium for our audience and we didn't have to look far to find the right game. The world's 2nd most popular game, GTA V, which is also well known to many Lithuanian teenagers, perfectly reflects the everyday life of the police in a caricatured and smiley way.  GTA V Online offers a myriad of options and ways to play. One of these is roleplay. A popular roleplay in Lithuania is to work as a policeman and keep order in the game. This means that in a world where you can break no rules and be anyone, someone still wants to keep order and be a policeman, which even came into a pleasant surprise not only for us, but for the client too.  We created unexpected stories from the lives of virtual police officers and broadcasted them on social media. In collaboration with streamers, we made 3 gameplay videos showing policemen work in GTA V. To attract even more attention, actual TV show Cops voice commented on these stories. A dedicated web was launched, and educational materials were disseminated. Real police officers also conducted an organized raid within the game. Popular podcasters were also involved to boost visibility and generate conversations about police work. 4 videos have gone viral online. 1.3M impressions and 640k views (all achieved with zero media budget). Most importantly, a sharp YoY rise in police academy application count: +18.2%.