Sound It Out

adsoftheworld.com

“Sound It Out”

Ad Council and Pivotal Ventures campaign launched April 29, 2021 to help parents and caregivers of middle schoolers, with an emphasis on Black and Hispanic/Latinx families, talk about emotional wellbeing. Artists including KAMAUU, Tobe Nwigwe, Lauren Jauregui and Empress Of turned conversations with middle schoolers into songs, paired with conversation resources at SoundItOutTogether.org.

Years: 2021–now
Country: United States
Topic: Mental health
Asks people to: Talk to someone
Strategy: Entertainment education Self efficacy
Channel: Entertainment placement Social (organic)Social (paid)TV
Audience: Parents Youth
Parents and caregivers of middle schoolers, especially Black and Hispanic/Latinx families; English and Spanish.

Evidence

NoneUnknown

Sponsor (who paid)

Ad Council Ad Council (pro bono), campaign producer
Pivotal Ventures (Melinda French Gates) Foundation, partner/sponsor

Credits (who made it)

McCann New York Creative, 2021 source

Executions (individual ads)

Sound It Out album (KAMAUU, Tobe Nwigwe, Lauren Jauregui, Empress Of) 2021 · entertainment-placement
When You Can't Say It, Play It (with Amazon) 2023 · social-paid
Sound It Out ad, Sep 28, 2022 2022 · social-paid · meta-ad-library · >1M impressions · spend $10K - $15K

Related campaigns

Seize the Awkward 2018–now

Sources

Sound It Out: About sponsor
The Ad Council and Amazon Break the Ice When It Comes to Conversations About Teen Mental Health (Ad Council) sponsor · 2023
Addressing the Teen Mental Health Crisis: The Ad Council's 'Sound It Out' Campaign (ANA) reference · 2023
Kids' mental health (theGrio) news · 2022

Research notes

Credits checked 2026-10-22 against fetched pages: McCann (Ads of the World, published April 2021: 'Agency: McCann'; quoted release says PSAs were 'developed by McCann with support from Casanova//McCann, EGAMI Group and Mass Appeal', and quotes a VP creative director at McCann NY). Supporting agencies are not credited separately because their roles are not stated. Media partners (Bustle Digital Group, Facebook, Pinterest, TikTok, ViacomCBS) donated media. Links and resources (#82) checked 2026-10-23 against sounditouttogether.org/resources, /emotions-and-topics, /podcast and the Ad Council cause page. Resource descriptions are paraphrased by Claude, not yet reviewed. Podcast episode pages share the /podcast URL (no per-episode page).

Record cases/sound-it-out.json, updated 2026-10-23· Link to this campaign