CASE STUDY / ANIMAL RESCUE KHARKIV
NGO
Animal Rescue Kharkiv (ARK)
An organization that stayed when others left, 34,000+ rescues from the front lines, and almost no awareness beyond Ukraine.
SERVICES
Video Production, Social Media Content, Website Development,
Fundraising Strategy, Brand & Communications Consulting, Visual Direction Services
Animal Rescue Kharkiv was doing extraordinary work on the front lines, rescuing and caring for thousands of animals, but lacked a clear system to communicate that work beyond its existing audience.
The goal: build an international presence that makes the scale and impact of the work visible, understood, and supported.
The work: create and implement a complete communications and fundraising system, including a new website, structured social media content across Ukrainian and English-language channels, storytelling that brings forward the people behind the work, and targeted fundraising initiatives designed to turn attention into action.
Urgency.
Compassion.
Action.
Introducing the world to a rescue operation like no other, and to the people and organizations who will support it.
How do you make people care about animals being rescued thousands of miles away, after four years of war? How do you turn chaos into credibility?
We replace it with structure, clarity, and professional craft.
Weekly rescue work, captured properly by documentary filmmakers. The people behind the work brought forward. The full scale made visible, from frontline evacuations to professional veterinary care, cat rehabilitation, and a 16-hectare sanctuary.
Documentary replaces disposable. Systems replace noise. Clear language, a modern website, and press-ready materials establish legitimacy.
When the work is seen this way, it stops being background noise and becomes something people take seriously.
VIDEO
Docuseries videos that people want to watch
Docuseries content, designed to function seamlessly in both long and short form, is storyboarded and crafted for how people consume content today.
Filmed across the full range of ARK’s work, from frontline evacuations to veterinary clinics and long-term care, each piece is structured around a clear human center. The hero’s story is the framework. This isn’t coverage. It’s narrative storytelling.
Extensive B-roll and environmental context are captured to support each narrative, allowing a few days of filming to generate months of powerful, cohesive, story-driven content.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Where the outside world meets the work
For the entirety of the conflict, ARK’s presence has been reactive. Constant posting, no structure. Important moments are shared, but the full picture doesn’t land.
We brought clarity to it.
The goal is simple: show people who Animal Rescue Kharkiv is, what they do, and why it matters, in a way that can be understood immediately and remembered.
The content now reflects the full reality of the organization. Rescues, the people behind them, the risk, the scale, the care, and the outcomes. Not as isolated moments, but as a coherent, ongoing narrative.
Ukrainian-language channels continue to serve the existing audience, now supported by supplementary content that helps round out and clarify the broader story. In parallel, English-language platforms are built to reach new audiences, with a structure familiar to international NGOs: clear storytelling, consistent messaging, and practical information, not only about the work ARK is doing, but how people can meaningfully engage with and care for animals in their own communities.
What was once constant output becomes a defined presence. And that presence begins to reach the people who can carry it forward.
STRATEGY
One coordinated system, proven day after day
A clear website establishes immediate understanding. A press kit creates access for media and partners. “ARK by the Numbers” translates scale into something people can grasp quickly, and is used not only across social media, but at international conferences where people need to understand, quickly, how and why to support ARK.
Because Animal Rescue Kharkiv is not a U.S.-registered nonprofit, fundraising requires a different approach. We developed practical workarounds, including direct campaigns and platforms like GoFundMe, to make support possible for international audiences.
Each piece is intentional. Each piece reinforces the others.
What was once difficult to follow becomes clear, credible, and ready to grow.
EXCERPTS FROM ARK - BY THE NUMBERS
RESULTS
From local presence to global reach
Initial results, five months in (as of April 2026)
ARK already had an established presence within Ukraine. The shift was in what began to happen beyond it.
Ukrainian audiences started to engage more deeply, particularly with human-centered, interview-driven pieces, which generated significant spikes in attention, response, and conversation, and led directly to increased donations.
At the same time, international audiences began to enter the conversation. As the work reaches further into the United States and beyond, a new foundation is being established for broader support.
After four years of war, local attention is naturally limited. The next phase is expansion. The building blocks are now in place, and that transition is underway.
Fundraising is gaining traction. Support is no longer confined to a single base. The organization is beginning to attract the kind of attention required for long-term sustainability.
This is early. But the direction is clear.