Case Study: IHL Fast Forward Mississippi Campaign
The Cirlot Agency was chosen as the firm to help Mississippi’s School-to-Careers initiative educate children on all their options for the future … from work to college or technical school, and everything in between. Several audiences were to be targeted through the campaign, including students kindergarten age and up, parents, educators, and business and industry leaders.

The Cirlot Agency began the project by holding a series of 16 different student and teacher focus groups across the state of Mississippi in order to gather pertinent information for marketing the program. Among the many elements tested were several program names and potential logos. The overall winner, by far, was the name “Fast Forward Mississippi” and a logo which depicts the fast forward button on a tape or CD player. Additional direction gained by the focus groups included how best to communicate the benefits of “Fast Forward Mississippi” to its various audiences.

The Cirlot Agency’s strategy was to use the Internet as a perpetual outlet for the program, so that “Fast Forward Mississippi” would live beyond its limited funding source. The Agency, therefore, designed one of the most comprehensive career guide websites in cyber space. The site, found at www.FastForwardMS.com, includes career information, college information, testing aids, career success stories, chat area for chatting with successful Mississippians and more. It is also used by the various School-to-Careers initiative partners across the state as a centralized communications outlet.

Media methods, including heavy radio and newspaper advertising, as well as television and magazine advertising, were used to drive children, parents, educators and other interested parties to the website. Various brochures and collateral support pieces were also created and handed out at school events. Within the first six-months of the promotion, the website received over one million hits. Also, as a testament to the program’s success, the website remains up and accessible despite a significant decrease in funding and the transition to a new state administration. Website hits and unique visitors continue to increase, as well.