By this time next week, a new ad campaign and PSA initiative, “We Are the Countervirus,” could be running on nearly every major digital out-of-home (DOOH) network — encompassing hundreds of thousands of screens across the world.

The Digital Place Based Advertising Association (DPAA), in collaboration with independent ad agency Madwell, launched the brightly branded campaign online with the intention to further spread the message on DOOH screens across the globe. According to the DPAA, the association has, at launch, secured commitments from numerous OOH networks in the US and the UK to run the message; it expects the initiative to quickly expand to other European countries, Canada, India and Mexico over the next week or so.

The story of how the campaign originated is an interesting one: Madwell CCO Chris Sojka and DPAA president and CEO Barry Frey, who recently met on a plane (pre-virus, to our understanding), discovered that they shared similar feelings of responsibility to leverage the power of marketing to tackle the pandemic. They collectively came up with the idea to use the DPAA platform and its partners to host the message.

The big idea, or the “why,” of the DPAA-Madwell campaign: It’s on us, the public, to #FlattenTheCurve and make (sometimes difficult) choices that help stop the spread of the virus. Information-sharing, social distancing and supporting our medical professionals are some immediate actions we can take, according to the campaign. Furthermore, the illustrated website finds creative ways to showcase some key CDC recommendations to stop the spread.

Relevant to the AV industry, this initiative is a bright example of how digital OOH can reach people on a global scale — in this case, with a clear, timely and culturally relevant message: We all have a part to play in slowing the spread of COVID-19.

Images courtesy of Barry Frey, as shared on Twitter.

The WeAreTheCountervirus.com site ends with a call-to-action to ad-placement networks and organizations: “If you’re a media company with inventory to donate to this effort, please contact us.”