The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge
By leadership author and keynote speaker Ross Shafer
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Last week I talked about why the Louie, Louie campaign for Washington state song went viral BEFORE the Internet. And Today, I want to talk about what made the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge dominate social media. 17 million people dumped buckets of ice on their heads and raised over 220 million dollars in six weeks. First, the reason to get involved was that ALS is a good cause. ALS is a progressive neuro-degenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. It is also called Lou Gehrig’s disease. Famed scientist Stephen Hawking suffers from ALS. Second, the challenge was easy to do right from your home. All you had to do was a fill a bucket with household ice and dump it on your head.
Next, you challenged three of your friends to dump ice on their heads. The brilliance of the challenge was that it had a 48-hour time limit. Your friends felt time pressure to answer your challenge. And since your friend challenged you personally, the public dare compelled you to participate…or be shamed by your friend. What made it so interesting to me was that it wasn’t a brand new idea. The Ice Bucket Challenge is like the old “chain letters” we used to get as kids. Those letters always came with the threat that if you didn’t ask five friends to pass it on – something bad would happen to you. (Of course it never did – but you thought it would). In the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, it was a fun thing to post on social media. It got even better when celebrities got into the action. They looked like real people doing dumb things just like the rest of us. The publicity vehicles were everywhere. It didn’t matter if you posted your video on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, Instagram, or on blogs. The campaign was fueled by self-generating content that was funny and everybody’s reaction to the ice dump was different. It became FREE global marketing and raised over 200 million dollars for ALS. Just like in the Louie, Louie for state song campaign, the success of publicity that goes viral is to make your campaign about OTHER people….not just about you trying to promote yourself or your business.
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With my amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the first thing that happened almost 2 years ago now, was speaking as if I were drunk. I wasn’t. I initially did improve speech (articulating clearly but slow) but now I can no longer speak in an acceptable way. Then, a year later eating became problematic, I was biting my tongue and lips, and chewing became weak and less controlled. Soon after that some fingers started to fail me and things would drop out of my hands. Somewhere at that time bulbar ALS was diagnosed. The Rilutek (riluzole) did very little to help me. The medical team did even less. My decline was rapid and devastating.. We tried every shot available but nothing was working. There has been little if any progress in finding a reliable treatment, Our care provider introduced us to Kycuyu Health Clinic ALS/MND herbal treatment. The treatment is a miracle.i recovered significantly
Hope this is allowed here if not I understand. My husband was diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) when he was 63 years old 4 years ago. The Rilutek (riluzole) did very little to help him. The medical team did even less. His decline was rapid and devastating. His arms weakened first, then his hands and legs. He resorted to a wheelchair (Perbombil C300). A year ago, I began to do a lot of research and came across Health Herbs Clinic, I decided to start him on the ALS herbal protocol as I had nothing else to turn to; 2 months into treatment he improved dramatically. At the end of the full treatment course, the disease is totally under control. No case of dementia, hallucination, weakness, muscle pain and he is even learning to Walk again.