Being a working mother can seem like an Olympic event. That’s why Parents Together – a national nonprofit that provides a community for parents – launched a text message game called The Working Mom Challenge. Timed to the Olympics, the game raised awareness about the difficulties faced by working mothers in the United States. Most importantly, the quiz helped motivate people to take advocacy action.
“USA won big in Rio, but it’s losing the race to support working moms,” the campaign wrote over social media. “Play the Working Mom Challenge, a free, fun text-game to help spread the word about how USA can support working families.”
How It Works
The quiz offers people a chance to participate in competitions like the Pregnancy Marathon and the Work/Life Balance Beam. SMS athletes were asked to choose between the impossible hurdles that the US gives working mothers every day.
Like every good Olympic event, the quiz informs participants how the US is doing compared to other countries:
“Being on team USA is not easy. Over 80% of working first-time mothers-to-be in the US work up until the last month of pregnancy. Meanwhile, in places like France, moms can start their paid leave 50 days before they’re due.”
By staging their information in the form of a quiz, tied to a timely event, Parents Together educated thousands of people about a serious issue while engaging them in a fun game.
Results: Supporters Who Took the Quiz Were Twice as Likely to Take Advocacy Action
Parents Together found that people who took their Olympic Quiz were more likely to support family leave. Perhaps even more importantly, they found that those who had taken the quiz were more willing to take action in support of family issues.
Parents Together sent out a link to a petition to a group of subscribers who had taken quiz and to a random sampling of other supporters.
They found that people who took the SMS quiz were more than twice as likely to click on the petition link (a stunning 9% click-through rate versus 3.9%).
By using a fun text message game, Parents Together were able to educate and motivate people to take action on a crucial issue, identify those in their community who were most fired up, and follow up with concrete steps they could take.
Read About These Other Text Message Quizzes