Public relations students find effective ways to share Christ’s “greater love” (John 13:15).
This spring The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints invited social media users to celebrate Easter by experiencing—and sharing—the “greater love” of Jesus Christ through a new video and campaign including messages, music, study resources, and art. The Church crafted this Easter campaign in part using research and insights gathered by students from BYU’s PR Intelligence Lab.
Since 2021 the lab has helped more than 100 nonprofits, businesses, and other brands with strategic communications, research and analytics, crisis management, advocacy, and engagement. “Students get the chance to engage in experiential learning, where they go and make discoveries about a community for themselves, . . . and they begin to see who they can help,” says PR Intelligence Lab faculty director Devin T. Knighton (BA ’05). “It transforms the students to be more outward focused and have that self-confidence that they can make a difference.”
At BYU the lab is woven throughout the public relations program, ensuring that every student takes part. Knighton says that integration—along with the collaboration of students, faculty, and professionals—is the lab’s “magic and secret sauce.”
This past winter the Church asked the lab to brainstorm ideas to help its Easter campaign resonate with young adults. Project manager Madie P. Hodson (BA ’25) led a team of five students in familiarizing themselves with existing research, conducting extensive interviews (including a focus group), and exploring ways the campaign could cater to young-adult needs.
Their research found that young adults wanted to reflect upon the whole of Easter week, not just the triumph of Sunday, says Knighton: “They said, ‘. . . Explain to us what Friday was like for Him. Because sometimes my life can feel like a Friday, and I need that reassurance that Christ understands.’” They also expressed the power of the message that, because of what He suffered, “[Christ] gets them and He understands them, that His love is sufficient.”
In a presentation to the communications team at Church headquarters, the students offered suggestions for ways to craft Easter messages that would most resonate with young adults. “This project pushed me to think outside the box,” Hodson says. “It helped me to refine not only my research skills but also my creative thinking and presentation skills.”
Student Rachel E. Schuler (BA ’26) believes that “we can be both believers and thinkers” and her experience with the Easter campaign deepened that identity, allowing her to “almost testify of the things that we learned,” she says.
The project made Knighton more acutely aware of student struggles. “I was surprised with some of the quotes that came out of the interviews the focus group had—how heavy things can feel,” he says. “But I was also so grateful to hear how many students want Jesus Christ in their lives. . . . There was a longing to have Him close. That gave me a lot of hope.”
