About Sixteen By Nine
Untold Stories: Long Term Missing Persons Campaign
A TV commercial production project in Perth built on a simple, powerful truth: every long-term missing person had a life full of passions, interests, and moments people remember. Working with WA Police, we created a television campaign to remind people of their Untold Stories.
Client
Crime Stoppers Western Australia
Partner agency
WA Police Force
Sector
Government / Public Safety
Services delivered
Market
Perth & Western Australia
the campaign
Not about the disappearance.
About the person.
The brief
The challenge —
and why it mattered
Crime Stoppers Western Australia came to us with a brief that carried real weight. Families across WA had been waiting years — in some cases, decades — for answers about missing loved ones. New investigative technology and fresh public attention created a genuine opportunity to surface new information. But the brief wasn't simply to raise awareness. It was to unlock memories.
Traditional missing persons campaigns focus on the disappearance — the date, the circumstances, the last known location. We took a fundamentally different approach. Every long-term missing person had a life rich with personality, passions, and habits. Those details live in the memories of people who knew them — a footy teammate, a neighbour, a regular at the local café. People who might not even know they hold a piece of the puzzle.
Challenge 01
How do you create a campaign that's emotionally compelling without being exploitative or re-traumatising for the families involved?
Challenge 02
How do you move beyond awareness and actually unlock specific memories in people who may not know they hold a crucial piece of information?
Challenge 03
How do you tell multiple missing persons' stories without reducing them to case files — while keeping each execution tonally consistent?
Challenge 04
How do you extend a television campaign into earned media that families feel comfortable participating in, without adding to their pain?
What we delivered
The work
Campaign Strategy — Untold Stories
A campaign built on a single strategic insight: that people remember people, not cases. Untold Stories centred on who each missing person was — their passions, habits, personality — before they disappeared.
Script development
Scripts written to place the audience inside a moment from each person's life — scenes full of character. Then, deliberately and abruptly, the story stops. The writing had to earn that silence.
Full video production
End-to-end video production across three distinct scenarios — two 30-second TVCs and an extended 45-second digital cut — including pre-production, casting, shoot, edit, colour grade, and audio mix.
Television broadcast delivery
Broadcast-ready master files delivered to WA's major free-to-air and subscription networks, with technical compliance across all formats for both metro and regional broadcast.
Digital & social edits
Platform-optimised cuts for Facebook, Instagram and YouTube — extending reach beyond the broadcast schedule, with a dedicated landing page on the Crime Stoppers WA website.
Media strategy & placement
Audience-led media planning with significant bonus airtime negotiated on top of paid placements across Channel 7 Metro and Regional (GWN).
The creative idea
People remember people.
Not cases.
Each TVC opened mid-moment — a man restoring a classic car in his garage, a drummer lost in a rhythm. Scenes full of character and passion. Then, abruptly, the story stops.
No dramatic reveal. No photographs. Just absence. The message was quiet but unmistakable: their story didn't have an ending. Someone out there might be the one to help complete it.
Open mid-moment — immerse the audience in who each person was, not how they disappeared.
The abrupt stop — no crash, no drama. Just a life interrupted. The silence does the work.
PR extension — families shared real untold details that became the campaign's earned media engine.
Campaign edits
Three stories.
One campaign.
Each execution placed viewers inside a different moment from a missing person's life — a separate story, a separate silence. The same strategic idea, told three times.
Campaign TVC — Edit 02
Untold Stories — The Musician
30" · Channel 7 Metro & Regional
Campaign TVC — Edit 03
Untold Stories — The Teacher
30" · Channel 7 Metro & Regional
Results & outcomes
What it achieved
Campaigns like this are measured differently. Success isn't always a click-through rate — it's a phone call to a hotline. A memory unlocked. A family getting an answer.
The media strategy delivered exceptional value — nearly three times the return on the media investment in bonus airtime alone, putting the campaign in front of WA audiences far beyond the paid schedule.
Measured in memories
Every element of this campaign — the strategy, the scripts, the PR approach, the media buy — was built to lower the barrier to making that call. The 22 reports received represent 22 opportunities for families who have been waiting years for answers.
22
Reports received
Missing persons reports to the Crime Stoppers WA contact centre from campaign launch through to end of July 2025
22,998
Landing page views
Views to the dedicated campaign landing page — exceeding traffic to the Crime Stoppers homepage during the same period
350
Total broadcast spots delivered
Across Channel 7 Metro and Regional (GWN) — 257 of them bonus placements worth over $58,500 in additional broadcast value, against a total media spend of just $20,000. Almost 3× the value of the buy returned in bonus airtime.
"Jarrod and the team at Sixteen By Nine understood immediately what we were trying to achieve — and more importantly, what we needed to avoid. The campaign struck exactly the right tone. Sensitive, purposeful, and effective."
Behind the Production
On set.
Behind the campaign.
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