Reaching Those on the Wrong Side of the Digital Divide

The Advertising Council and Connect2Compete, a nonprofit group whose goal is to eliminate the digital divide in the United States, are introducing a public service campaign to help those who are not digitally literate find free training to obtain these skills.

In remarks prepared for a speech in Washington about Connect2Compete’s efforts, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said approximately one in three Americans, or 100 million people, still do not have broadband in their homes, with low-income Americans and minorities “disproportionately on the wrong side of the digital divide.”

According to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, one in five American adults — about 62 million people — do not use the Internet. The 2012 Pew Internet and American Life Project said the main reason these people “don’t go online is because they don’t think the Internet is relevant to them.” To reach adults who share this sentiment, Connect2Compete approached the Advertising Council last year for help creating a public service campaign “with messages that get at the relevance of the Internet, how you can do something, or do something better that you may already do, by being online,” said Zach Leverenz, chief executive of Connect2Compete.

To that end, the Ad Council and the New York office of Young & Rubicam, part of the WPP Group, created a multimedia advertising campaign that begins on Thursday, a date chosen because its numbers (3-21) stand for a three-two-one countdown to get “everyone on” the Internet. The campaign’s Web site is EveryoneOn.org.