Helping Experience Camps Tell Its Story With TrueGiving

At Infillion, we believe that our resources and technology can have purpose beyond our work with corporate clients. Our pro bono arm, TrueGiving, was founded as a way to harness the power of targeted advertising to help nonprofits advertise alongside the big for-profit players.

Recently, TrueGiving had the privilege of partnering with Experience Camps—a transformative non-profit that offers free, one-week summer camps for children grieving the loss of a parent, sibling, or primary caregiver. Here’s how we worked with them.

The Heart of the Mission

One pillar of TrueGiving’s mission is to support organizations our employees are involved in and passionate about. Infillion’s team was connected with Experience Camps by our Managing Director of Client Partnerships Matt Liebhaber, who’s volunteered as a counselor at the camps since 2017. We spoke to Matt about his time working at Experience Camps and his passion for the organization. Having lost a family member himself at a young age, Matt can approach these campers with empathy, understanding, and–most importantly, according to him–knowing how to join in on the fun.

After all, while Experience Camps is an environment where campers can connect with others who understand their journey of grief, it’s also intended as a place where kids can be kids. Matt explains that the heart of the camp is a combination of traditional activities and tailored grief support to foster healing, resilience, and hope. He mentions one activity where kids will write their biggest fear on the sidewalk in chalk then smash it with a water balloon. Overall, Matt shares that “the linchpin of the camps is being around people who just get it,” and feeling awkward when discussing death as there, everyone can empathize with one another.

The TrueGiving Impact

TrueGiving’s collaboration with Experience Camps centered on crafting a compelling digital campaign to raise awareness of the organization. TrueGiving’s process is to meet with the organization or non-profit and hear more about their mission, what they want to convey, and how we can help them do that through our platforms and technologies. For Experience Camps, the result was an interactive TrueX ad, designed to convey what this organization does and directing folks with a compelling CTA to “get grief smart” by heading to the website. This interactive ad was supplemented by programmatic display ads on Infillion’s NeXt platform, with similar messaging and tailored calls-to-action.

The Experience Camps campaign with TrueGiving drove statistically significant lift
in upper and lower funnel measures, increasing brand awareness by 17%, and driving nearly 4x more lift in brand familiarity as compared to typical performance in the non-profit category. Furthermore, users spent an average of 47 seconds with the ad, interacting an average of 2.1x. For this vertical, getting eyes on the impactful brand video is crucial to drive home the campaign’s mission for the user. Users interacted an average of 2.1x, indicating that their interest was indeed piqued.

Why It Matters

The work that Infillion’s TrueGiving does is about more than delivering creative services; it’s about building bridges between organizations and the communities they serve. Matt’s commitment to Experience Camps is so palpable and well-known within the company that he’s even gotten other Infillionaires involved – like Zem Rocha, a fellow member of the Client Partnerships team, who became a counselor as well and is referred to by staff as “the biggest kid on campus.”

When asked how he can be a resource to the campers, Matt says that he wants to provide them the chance “to be around adults who can listen and understand, for smoother transition back to the real world.” As he explains, “Experiencing one’s grief journey is ‘not a one-size-fits-all approach. It morphs and changes over the course of your time without your person.” He gives the example of a camp talent show where one of the campers did a comedy bit about his Dad passing away. Everyone seemed to not know how to react, until they burst out in applause and laughter. This is the type of safe space a lot of these children need, and humor paired with validation from those who empathize can be a powerful coping mechanism.

A Shared Vision for Change

Infillion’s commitment to social responsibility through TrueGiving reflects the company’s belief that businesses have a role to play in addressing some of society’s most pressing challenges. By supporting non-profits like Experience Camps, we’re not just helping tell their story—we’re empowering their mission to transform lives.

For Experience Camps, this means reaching individuals who can help sustain and expand their programs, ensuring that more children can find a place where their grief is understood and their hope is renewed. This organization currently supports eight locations across the country, and can always use more donations and support.

Interested in connecting another nonprofit with TrueGiving? Reach out to us here. To learn more about Experience Camps and how you can get involved, visit experiencecamps.org