Supporting the UN High-Level Champions at COP27

COP27 was held in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, with financing of reparations for loss and damage high on the agenda.

Ahead of and during the conference, Empower provided full-service support to the UN Climate Change High-Level Champions, which included organic copywriting and content creation, design support, paid media, reporting and analysis.

COP represents a pivotal moment in the global climate agenda, but it also poses a significant communications challenge. The digital landscape during COP is intensely crowded and fast-paced, making it difficult to cut through with clear, impactful messaging.

Empower’s HLC team entered this space as part of a highly nuanced, international stakeholder ecosystem, requiring agility, cultural sensitivity, and strategic precision. Planning effectively for COP means starting early in the year, with narrative development and high-level goal setting. As COP draws nearer, preparations accelerate rapidly, requiring a shift from strategy to detailed execution under increasing time pressure.

Pre-COP

While our campaign reached its climax during the two weeks of COP, it was the culmination of many months of hard work from the Climate Champions and Empower. Our planning activity included:

• Preparing a detailed digital strategy and list of deliverables
• Running internal workshops on how to best operationalise the strategy
• Liaising with key partners on how we could support and amplify each other’s content
• Establishing a newsletter using native LinkedIn features and Revue for our Twitter audiences

During COP

Our support during the conference was hugely varied, and encompassed:

• Live posting: The High-Level Champions’ COP27 event calendar was a busy one, with no less than 40 events taking place over a two week period. We live-tweeted during many of the focal events, using digital assets, quotes, livestream links and more to provide a rich experience for online audiences.
• Paid media support: We strategically targeted audiences through our COP27 paid media strategy, ensuring that the High-Level Champions’ communications were seen by the most relevant people. Leveraging our in-house paid expertise (including across previous COPs), we more than halved the average cost-per-click compared to ad performance in 2021.

Post COP

We analysed social activity over two weeks of COP27 to prepare a campaign report. Utilising social listening and data measurement tools, we reported on the performance of the core social media platforms, paid media, audience sentiment, and more.

Our analysis was accompanied with a thorough narrative, insights and learnings to help inform the client’s social strategy looking ahead to COP28.