• by Larissa Faw , April 13, 2021

Americares, the nonprofit provider of donated medicine and medical supplies, Zambezi and Hallwood Media, owned by former Geffen Records President Neil Jacobson, are seeking to move beyond the standard PSA to encourage those 18-34 to continue to embrace CVID-19 safety protocols.

The “Wear a Mask” effort seeks to “truly resonate” with teens and young adults by winning their hearts and minds through TikTok. The team at Hallwood and Zambezi produced an original hip hop track “Wear a Mask” performed by fictional rapper Young Vax. The tune intermixes humor with straight-forward tips, like wearing a mask and washing hands, over trap music.

TikTok influencer and choreographer Dezirea Saenz was brought in to develop an original dance to encourage others to join in and share the clip. This dance was seeded out to additional TikTok influencers, including Tallie B, Kara Cannella, Andrew Carrera and Nany Kessey.

The Zambezi team also created the album artwork, digital billboards, banner ads and interactive Snapchat filters to help expand the song’s message. Looking forward, the project will release a new music video later this month.

The intention is to educate and drastically shift the behaviors of young adults, a demographic that has been largely apathetic and resistant to COVID-19 health and safety protocols, while concurrently driving the largest number of infections in the U.S., explains a Zambezi representative.

To that end, the entire team — everyone from Hallwood Media to Zambezi to the artists —was in the target age group, 18-34, to ensure this work connected with this audience.