Geofence Ad Brief

Geo-Fenced Digital Ad Campaign — Targeting & Creative Brief

Respect the Craft — Pay the Standard

Prepared for: Campaign coordinating committee, IBEW Locals 1, 2, 309, 453, 649, 124 Audience: Local 57 electricians and apprentices · UBC carpenter rank-and-file · pre-apprentice prospects and their parents Recommended budget: $15K–$25K / month, 6-month minimum flight Recommended platform mix: The Trade Desk (programmatic display + connected TV), Meta Ads Manager (Instagram Reels / Facebook), TikTok Ads Manager, YouTube (via Google Ads), Snap Ads. Avoid X/Twitter for this campaign — wrong audience density.

PART 1 — Why geofencing, why now

Traditional union digital ads buy demographic and interest targeting and waste 70%+ of the impression on the wrong person. Geofencing inverts the model: we serve ads to the specific physical locations where the people we care about already are.

For this campaign, that means:

Their device IDs are captured (anonymously, programmatically) when they’re standing on a Local 57 jobsite, at the UBC training center, or at a carpenters’ hall.
Those device IDs are then retargeted with our creative for the next 30–60 days, wherever else they go on the open web, on social, on YouTube, on connected TV.
Eventually most workers in the target universe see the campaign creative multiple times across multiple devices — usually first on their phone while at work, then at home on their living-room TV.

No one else in this fight is doing this. The cost is small relative to the campaign’s other line items. The reach into the exact right audience is unmatched.

PART 2 — Geofence Targeting

A. Tier 1 fences (the highest-value targets)

Active Local 57 jobsites.

Maintain a rolling list of all known active Local 57 electrical jobs in the six-local footprint.
Build a 100-meter polygon fence around each.
Refresh weekly.
Capture device IDs of any phone present on the polygon during work hours (06:00–17:00 local).

Carpenters’ training center & AEC facilities.

Geofence the campus, parking lots, and access roads.
Dayparted to capture during training hours (07:00–19:00 weekdays, 07:00–14:00 Saturdays — when apprenticeship classes run).

Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council offices.

Polygon fence on the building + immediately adjacent parking.

UBC Local 57 hall and any subordinate offices.

Polygon fence on the building + parking.

B. Tier 2 fences (the pipeline)

Vocational high schools and community college trade programs.

All institutions in the six-local footprint with electrical or general construction programs.
Fence the buildings, dayparted to school hours.

Career fairs and trade shows (event-based).

Spin up event-day fences for the regional career fair circuit, IBEW informational events, Skills USA competitions, and any UBC recruiting events you become aware of.

JROTC programs and military recruiting offices.

Veterans and military-leaning households are unusually receptive to “you’re being scabbed on” framing.

Halfway houses, reentry programs, and YouthBuild sites.

High-value direct-entry candidates who will be making a trade decision in the next 6–18 months.

C. Tier 3 fences (the household)

ZIP-code-level fences in identified Local 57 high-density residential ZIPs.

Identified by cross-referencing the campaign organizing database, voter file matches, and property records.
Lower precision but high reach to the household decision-maker (spouse/parent).

D. Audience exclusion (don’t waste impressions)

Exclude device IDs that have already clicked through to the intake form.
Exclude IPs and devices associated with known IBEW staff offices (or you’ll spend the budget advertising to yourself).
Frequency cap: 4 impressions per device per 7 days. People stop reading at 5+.

PART 3 — Creative Concepts

The campaign needs three distinct creative families, each running simultaneously against the appropriate audience. Don’t try to make one ad do all three jobs.

CONCEPT A — “The Number” (target: Local 57 electricians)

Strategic frame: The reader doesn’t need to be persuaded that wage cuts are bad. The reader needs to know how big the gap is for them, specifically.

Format: 15-second vertical video (TikTok / Reels / YouTube Shorts / Snap) with a big-number reveal.

Storyboard:

SECOND 0–2:  Black screen. White text fades in.
             "If you're an electrician under Local 57
              in St. Louis…"

SECOND 2–4:  Cut to: simple animated dollar counter,
             starting at $0, climbing fast.

SECOND 4–8:  Counter rolls up to $27,000.
             Voice (no music): "You're losing about
             twenty-seven thousand dollars a year."

SECOND 8–11: Counter keeps climbing.
             "Compared to the same work, in this same
              city, at the actual electrical rate."

SECOND 11–14: Counter stops. Slam-cut to white text on
             black: "See your number."
             URL beneath: respectthecraft.org

SECOND 14–15: Logo + "IBEW Locals 1, 2, 309, 453, 649, 124"
              Small text: "Confidential. No pressure."

Variations:

Counter rolls up to a lifetime number ($900,000) for the retirement-focused cut.
Counter rolls up to a weekly number ($550) for the immediate-pain cut.
A version where the counter stops, then a worker’s voice says only: “Yeah. I didn’t believe it either. Then I saw the math.”

Ad copy (display + social headline pairings):

Headline	Subhead
”You’re losing $27K a year."	"Same job. Same city. Different contract. See your number."
"Your retirement, side by side."	"It’s not what you think. respectthecraft.org"
"The carpenters’ contract isn’t the electrical rate."	"Most Local 57 electricians have never seen the comparison. See yours."
"There’s a way out. It’s funded. It’s confidential."	"Area Standards Transition Fund.”

CONCEPT B — “This Is About You Too” (target: UBC carpenters)

Strategic frame: A carpenter is not going to flip on his own union from one ad. But many carpenters can be moved to internal skepticism — to ask questions in their hall, vote differently in elections, talk differently at the kitchen table. That’s the goal.

Format: 15-second static + 30-second video versions.

Static creative — 4 variants, rotated:

[Visual: a carpenter's hand on a framing nailer.
 Plain text overlay:]

  "When your union cuts another trade's wage,
   they're rehearsing on us first."

  — A working carpenter

  respectthecraft.org

[Visual: a stack of two paychecks, the carpenters' on
 top, the electricians' below, lightly tinted.]

  "The carpenters didn't just sign a substandard
   electrical contract. They set a precedent."

  Defend area standards.
  respectthecraft.org

[Visual: a UBC training-center building, photographed
 plainly, no logo intrusion.]

  "Your dues are paying organizers to sell another
   trade's work below the rate."

  Ask why.
  respectthecraft.org

[Visual: two side-by-side journeyman pension projections,
 with one significantly larger than the other.]

  "If they'll do this to the electricians,
   they'll do it to you."

  respectthecraft.org

Video variant — 30 seconds, single-shot interview style:

A carpenter (face shown or shadowed, depending on consent) speaks directly to camera.

“I’ve been a carpenter for [N] years. I love this trade. I am not going to sit quietly while my union runs a cut-rate electrical program. That’s not solidarity. That’s the start of how they cut us next.”

“If you’re a carpenter and you’ve been wondering about Local 57 electrical — you’re not alone. Look it up. respectthecraft.org.”

Captioned for sound-off autoplay.

CONCEPT C — “The Real Door” (target: pre-apprentices and their households)

Strategic frame: Catch a 19-year-old and a 50-year-old parent in the same household with the same ad. The kid responds to the path; the parent responds to the pension.

Format: 15-second vertical video + carousel static.

Storyboard (video):

SECOND 0–3:  Quick cuts: young electrician pulling wire,
             working a panel, sharing a meal with family.
             Soft music up.

SECOND 3–6:  Title card: "There are two doors into the
             electrical trade in this region."

SECOND 6–10: Split-screen: two pension projections at age 62.
             Left side: $1,820 / month. Right side: $5,640 / month.

SECOND 10–13: Title card: "Same work. Same city. Different
             contract. Different retirement."

SECOND 13–15: Title card: "Pick the real one."
              respectthecraft.org
              "Apprenticeship info — free, confidential."

Carousel static — 4 cards:

Card 1: "Two doors. One real."
Card 2: "Door 1: Local 57. The carpenters' electrical
        program. Below the area standard since 2007."
Card 3: "Door 2: IBEW apprenticeship. The actual
        electrical trade. Set the standard, then enforce it."
Card 4: "See the comparison. respectthecraft.org"

Parent-targeted version of the headline (run only against Tier 3 residential fences):

“Your kid is about to pick an electrical apprenticeship. Make sure they’re looking at the right one.”

This single piece of copy is the highest-leverage creative in the entire campaign. A parent who sees the difference before their kid signs paperwork is a permanently closed door for UBC recruitment in that household.

PART 4 — Platform Allocation

Platform	% of budget	Why
The Trade Desk (programmatic display + CTV)	35%	Reaches retargeted device IDs across the open web; CTV catches the household at home in the evening
Meta (Instagram Reels + Facebook)	25%	Strong with the 25–55 cohort, including spouses and parents
TikTok	20%	The 18–28 apprentice and pre-apprentice cohort lives here
YouTube (Google Ads)	15%	Excellent for the “Concept C” 15-second pre-roll against trades content; also strong on CTV
Snap	5%	Cheap impressions in the 18–24 cohort; good for awareness top-up

Skip: X/Twitter (low audience density for this fight), LinkedIn (wrong audience for this creative).

PART 5 — KPIs & Measurement

A. Primary KPIs

Metric	Target (rolling 30-day)
Unique device reach within Tier 1 fences	75%+ of estimated Local 57 active workforce
Click-through to campaign URL	1.5–3.0% (display benchmark is 0.05–0.10% — geofenced should crush this)
Intake-form starts attributable to ads	5–10% of total intakes
Cost per intake start	<$150
Cost per verified intake conversation	<$400

B. Secondary KPIs

Brand-search lift for “respect the craft,” “IBEW Local 57 comparison,” “carpenters electrical St Louis” — measured monthly in Google Trends and Search Console
Direct-mail wave intake lift in households inside Tier 3 fence (combo effect)
Organic social follower growth on campaign accounts
Reduction in “what is Local 57” / “should I join Local 57” SERP impressions for UBC pages over 6 months (SEO companion metric)

C. Attribution caveats

Geofenced campaigns produce correlation with intake, not clean causation. A worker who saw the ad on Tuesday and walked into a local on Thursday isn’t tagged as ad-driven by default. Use:

UTM tags on every URL.
Unique phone number per ad concept (call-tracking via CallRail or equivalent).
A simple intake-form field: “How did you hear about us?”
Periodic survey of intakes about exposure.

Expect attributed conversions to undercount real influence by 2–4x.

PART 6 — Compliance, Privacy, Legal

A. Privacy

All device-ID targeting must use only IDFA / GAID / hashed IDs sourced from compliant programmatic exchanges. No grey-market location-data brokers.
No claim or implication is made in any ad that the campaign knows the viewer’s identity. The targeting infrastructure is invisible to the user.
All landing pages disclose data collection in a plain-language privacy notice.

B. Election & lobbying

This is not election advocacy or lobbying as a primary purpose. Campaign creative should avoid endorsing candidates by name.
If any creative does shift toward candidate endorsement (e.g., during an election cycle), it must be funded through a separate, properly disclosed political account — not the campaign’s general fund.

C. Defamation safeguards

No creative claims a named individual did anything illegal.
All institutional claims (Local 57 paid below the area standard, carpenters’ leadership signed below-standard agreement) are sourced and footnoted on the landing page.
“Cut-rate” and “substandard” are opinions of value, supported by published rate data, and are protected speech. They are not allegations of crime.

D. Right of reply

The landing page should link to a “Carpenters’ response” section that quotes (without spin) any public UBC response to the campaign. This is both ethically right and legally protective.

PART 7 — Launch Sequence

T–30 days:

Vendor selected (recommend pairing one programmatic specialist + one social-creative shop, not a single agency)
Tier 1 fences mapped and loaded
All creative produced; legal review complete
Landing pages live with privacy disclosure and attribution tracking

T–14 days:

Soft launch: 10% of budget against Tier 2 (vocational schools, career fairs) to validate creative performance and intake plumbing
Adjust based on early CTR and intake quality

T–0:

Full launch across all tiers
Companion direct mail Wave 1 in the mail same week (compound effect)
Press kit rolled out same week to investigative journalism targets
Bridge Fund announcement same week if not earlier

T+30:

First optimization pass: kill the bottom 30% of creative by CTR, double down on the top 20%
Second creative production batch begins (always be refreshing)

T+90:

First serious measurement review with the campaign committee
Decide on Year 2 budget posture based on cost-per-intake data

This brief is a working document. Specific fence coordinates, device-ID volumes, and per-platform CPMs should be reviewed with the selected vendors before final budget commitment. Final creative should be reviewed by counsel before flight.