Shawn Van DaeleShawn Van Daele
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Video · Motion · CopywritingSt. Joseph's Hospice2020

St. Joseph's Hospice — Hike for Hospice Promo

“Promo reel for Hike for Hospice — the video anchor of the fundraising campaign that doubled the program's best year.”

Client
St. Joseph's Hospice
Year
2020
Discipline
Video · Motion · Copywriting
Best for
Fundraising + Community Engagement, Marketing + Communications Leadership
Skills appliedfundraising + donor communicationsdonor storytelling + case for supportintegrated marketing + campaignscampaign concepts + hero assetsvideo direction + broadcast scriptscopywriting + editorial voice

The short version

Thirty-second read
The mandate
Hike for Hospice is the signature fundraising event for St.
The insight
Wrote the script to focus on the quiet, emotional realities of hospice care rather than generic event marketing language
My role + craft
Video, Motion, Copywriting · for St. Joseph's Hospice · 2020. Concept, direction and hands-on execution.
The result
Video anchor of the campaign that raised 3x+ its goal and doubled the program's previous best year
AI + workflow

The craft on this project is traditional: strategy, writing, art direction and production, finished by hand. Where AI carries real weight in my practice is the work around the work - interrogating briefs, drafting and stress-testing copy, exploring visual directions before committing budget, and automating the mechanical middle. The judgment, voice and final calls here are all mine. I break the whole system down on the How I use AI page.

Where AI fits in work like this
Brief interrogation and audience researchConcept ideation and creative explorationCopy drafting, variants and pressure-testingImage generation and visual directionVideo and motion generationTemplating and reusable systemsAutomating repetitive production workProject tracking, status and documentationQA, metadata and asset passes
Craft and production
Adobe Creative Cloud

Curious how the whole system works? How I use AI to improve efficiency, creativity and momentum, or see the full toolset.

01Brief

Hike for Hospice is the signature fundraising event for St. Joseph's Hospice of London, a community end-of-life care organization that depends on community giving alongside provincial funding. With COVID-19 closing the in-person event weeks before launch, the promo reel became the campaign's main emotional anchor: the one asset that had to explain a brand-new virtual format, hold the dignity of grief and caregiving, and still ask clearly for money.

02Approach
  1. 01Wrote the script to focus on the quiet, emotional realities of hospice care rather than generic event marketing language
  2. 02Edited archival footage and original motion graphics to build a narrative arc that paced naturally with the soundtrack
  3. 03Recorded and mixed the voiceover to ensure an intimate, conversational tone that respected the sensitivity of the subject matter
  4. 04Designed simple typographic overlays to keep the call to action clear without distracting from the visual storytelling
03Outcomes
  • Video anchor of the campaign that raised 3x+ its goal and doubled the program's previous best year
  • Carried the campaign across social, email and community channels as the primary asset during a fully virtual event year
  • Reached both long-time supporters and first-time participants, contributing to 15 to 25% growth in donor onboarding and reactivation across the program
  • Set the emotional register the organization reused for later Hike campaigns
Credits

Concept, art direction & execution - Shawn Van Daele for St. Joseph's Hospice, 2020.

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