#PeoplePosters: Your ad on the streets of Manchester and London

By Alex Smith

How would you like to be the next Shepard Fairey?

Starting tonight, Labour HQ is asking its growing army of online supporters to lend your creative talents to the election campaign in an exciting new initiative to design the party’s next campaign poster.

The best one will be emblazoned on ten digital poster boards in London and Manchester throughout the long Easter weekend.

We’re calling the initiative #PeoplePosters.

There are two different messages you should seek to convey with your poster designs:

1 – Labour’s pledge to protect frontline services.

2 – David Cameron’s lack of substance.

And Philip Gould has three top tips for creating a great political poster: keep the message simple; use strong images; and try to weave in humour wherever possible.

The rest is up to you.

While this is the first time any political party in this country has asked its supporters to design a key election message for a major billboard, it isn’t the first time Labour has taken a lead from its activists in terms of campaign decision-making and messaging.

The #LabourDoorstep and #MobMonday initiatives, both started by activists, have been supported and encouraged by Victoria Street, and Twitter Queen Ellie Gellard’s campaign to put “Against All Odds” on national TV was heeded by Labour when it was broadcast as a Party Political Broadcast last year.

Labour has also asked people to tweet, email and Facebook pictures of their new local schools, hospitals and Sure Start centres in the Change We See campaign — a campaign that’s still running.

This time around, the party has been inspired by the user-generated phenomenon of MyDavidCameron.

LabourList has started a Twitter hashtag to help us share ideas — tweet to #PeoplePosters and we’ll publish the best ones here over the next few days. We’ll also publish your photos of the billboards once they’re live.

To learn more, and to begin submitting your entires, click here. The deadline for entries is Wednesday.

The party has published this poster to get the designs going: