Social Marketing Panorama

Joy is Attending the CDC's Health Communication, Marketing and Media Conference!

Last week I attend the 5th occurrence of this conference.  It was one of the best conferences I have attended in a long time!  1,110 participants from 25 countries. Excellent content and relationship building.  To use professional jargon, I was as happy as a pig in mud!  It is difficult to identify all of the nuggets I gleaned from the conference, but here are a few.

1. J. Walker Smith of The Futures Company (formally Yankelovich) distilled 3 points from consumer research in the US:  Caution--consumers are cautious in how they approach decisions about financial markets and other matters.  This leads to Curation--people want to hear from citizens, not "authorities."  So they find networks that can collect and curate information they want.  All of this is in the service of Contentment--People want their decisions to led to actions and purchases that bring contentment.  Health communicators and marketers need to consider their work in the context of these themes.

2. Photovoice is a tool for formative research in which people take pictures of their everyday lives, review the pictures through a group methodology in which they identify themes and areas of concern, then use these findings to inform intervention strategies.

3. Tools to track social media:  Sproutsocial can track the purposefulness of engagement; Tweetercounter.com provides stats related to Tweeter posts; Topsy.com counts hashtag mentions; Klout.com--assesses your social media influence and engagement.

4. Ed Keller, of the Keller Fay Group, had these observations about social media:  a) Social media is made up of two words. 90% of the value is on the social side.  It is not technology that made us social; b) Social media is an enabler, not a driver, of stories.  What is our story?  Who can best tell it?  Then ask, what is the best channel? c) If we want to be "social," then we have to act "sociably"--listen before we speak, offer something on-topic about what people are interested in. d) The ethics of social media is about honesty, transparency, relationships.

5. To generate engagement in social media [and I think this is true for all relationships-sm1guru]:  a) give people something of interest to talk about--something that excites them [guess we have to listen and get to know them first-sm1guru]; b) give positive messages; give periodic updates on a topic; c) provide opportunities to interact and act--e.g., videos, games, questions.

6. Craig Lefebvre--long time social marketer and social change agent reminded us to listen; to get away from science and take a look at the popular culture most people experience; we need eureka moments of insight, not confirmation of our scientific thinking.

7. Many of our communication interventions has been based on the assumption that the paradigm for change is "Think, Act, Feel."  More and more research shows it is "Feel, Act, Think."  Emotion is the elephant in the behavior change room--focus there.  [This reminds me of a saying from my social work days, "Insight doesn't lead to behavior change, but behavior change might lead to insight."--sm1guru].

8. From Bev Schwartz, at Ashoka, in a panel on social entrepreneurship:  "Change makers live at the intersection of passion and drive."

9.  Big Concern--I did not attend every session that talked about social marketing, but every session I attended on it focused primarily on the Promotion P, or the speaker did not seem to understand social marketing process and the 4 Ps well.  And this from some people who should know better!  That should not being happening at this conference!

10. Big Announcement--CDC is developing a new decision support tool to help us create and analyze messages--including those for social media platforms--based on 10 evidence-based variables that are significant predictors for stated intentions and behavior.  The tool is like CDCynergy meets TurboTax.  For more information, send your contact information to:  messageworks@orau.com.

2 Es and a Pyramid—Back to School with Social Marketing!

By now all public schools, colleges and universities in the US are back in session.  In that spirit, I want to go back to school with you and review part of the alphabet and some geometry--2 Es, and a pyramid to be exact.

 

2 Es

In my reading and conference-going over the spring and summer, two terms kept popping up:  emotions and the environment.  Regarding emotions: discussions about how we make decisions based on emotion first, then find the facts to back up our decisions.  MRI scans from neurobiology, revealing that the emotional centers of our brains "light up" during decision-making, when presented with certain informational or advertising stimuli--before the cognitive centers of our brains light up.  Recommendations that we focus on emotional appeals, rather than on factual appeals.

Regarding environment:  if you are looking for fertile ground in which to grow, or to practice, social marketing, look no further than environmental issues.  More and more environmental programs are showing an interest in using social marketing.  I can think of protecting turtle breeding grounds on beaches, air quality, wise water use during droughts and lowering peak use power demand, off the top of my head.  Despite skepticism in some quarters about global warming, there are public and private sector groups proposing programs that have a product and benefit, that need people to act in some way.  Whether they are focusing on a technology product or on a behavior change, we should be there with social marketing in hand.

Perhaps social marketing needs "The 2 Es" to go along with
The 4 Ps!

 

The Pyramid

Dr.Thomas Frieden, director of the CDC, has proposed a pyramid to describe public health interventions, their level of influence (societal to individual) and their impact on life expectancy.  From bottom to top, the levels are:  socioeconomic factors; changing the context of default decisions; long lasting protective interventions; clinical interventions; counseling and education. Interventions at the bottom have more impact on the whole population, but may encounter political and other resistance.  Interventions at the top require more individual effort, and may not be as widely nor immediately effective.

I look at this and see a smorgasbord of opportunities for using social marketing!!  I think a social marketing approach can be applied at each level.  And I have heard one state health director comment that social marketing can be most effective in the lower levels of the pyramid!

So...If you are looking opportunities to grow or to use social marketing, consider the 2 Es and a pyramid.

Social Marketing Resources I Learned About on My Summer Vacation

Do you remember as a kid when you went back to school after summer vacation, and the teacher asked you to write about what you did all summer?  Well, this blog obviously has been on vacation for a month, and its writer actually got some time away, too! While I was away from the blog, I learned about a number of new resources (as well as being reminded of several "old" ones) that I thought you might be interested in.

Blogs
Social Marketing exCHANGE--From Ogilvy Worldwide Public Relations which, despite their name, does some whiz-bang social marketing programs.  Begun in April, the blog touches on a wide variety of current issues and problem applications, and brings to bear all of Ogilvy's brain power and experience.

Upstream--From UNC-CH's Interdisciplinary Health Communication Certificate Program. Pithy, interesting posts about current issues and findings in marketing and health.  Very interesting to see what is top of mind from the next generation of social marketers and communicators! (I know some of the "students" involved in this.  Their skills are such that I would hire them today!)

Pew Internet in American Life Project--As social media continues to grow as a fact of life and as an intervention resource we can use in social marketing, this blog becomes more indispensable!  Pew does all sorts of wonderful, real-time research on how people are using social media, who is using it, and for what (a lot of it for health issues), and they publish informative, wonderfully readable reports. A must read!

Memory Stick (yes, memory stick!)
The National Social Marketing Centre in London has created a series of PowerPoint slides and PDFs that teachers and trainers can use to, well, teach and train about social marketing. Called "A Starter for 10" (don't ask me about the name, its a British thing!), these ready to use tools offer concise definitions and examples of best practice social marketing, along with presenter notes. They explain some parts of the social marketing process with a different slant from what you hear in the states (if that is where you are located), in a way that I find refreshing and interesting.

Journal
The Journal of Sustainable Behavior--Begun by environmental social marketing guru, Doug McKenzie-Mohr.  Has an editorial board that is a who's who of social marketers and behavioral scientists.  Just announced, so the site will be populated with more information soon. Bookmark it now.

Books
Social Marketing and Public Health: Theory and Practice--by Dr. Jeff French and colleagues at the National Social Marketing Centre, with contributions from others.  Okay, here is what will become a definitive text about our field! It has everything a textbook should, and...a plethora of cases studies and examples that are excitingly new to me, a decidedly English take on certain things like "scoping" and "insight," and subjects not covered in other textbooks, such as doing social marketing on a shoe-string budget (how does that apply?), an overview of theories, a review of social marketing's effectiveness, and strategies for capacity building.  It ends by illuminating the art and nuances of practice by including interviews with social marketers from around the world.  (In the spirit of disclosure, I am quoted in there.)

Social Marketing for Public Health: Global Trends and Success Stories--by Cheng, Kotler and Lee. This is the new installment from what has become the social marketing printing press of Phil Kotler and Nancy Lee. Joined by Dr. Hong Cheng, from the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio State, the authors provide a deep, rich compendium of social marketing applications to health issues from around the world.  The book begins with an overview of basics.  Each case is set up around the phases and concepts of social marketing.  The book is eminently readable.  If someone has ever said to you that social marketing is some flash in the dark phenomenon, with limited application and no future--show them this book!!

Website
CDC's Gateway to Health Communication and Social Marketing Practice--Okay, I have mixed feelings about this resource.  On the one hand, it is a rich aggregation of many excellent CDC resources having to do with health communication and, to a lesser extent, social marketing.  Concise briefs on audiences, social media channels; case studies; tools to assist with planning, including the CDCynergy CD ROM based planning tools for health communication, risk communication and social marketing.  They have even added a "lite" version of CDCynergy-Social Marketing for people who are familiar with strategic planning and social marketing.  Wonderful stuff.

My concern is that they really smush together communication and social marketing as approaches to social change.  They sometimes appear to say that social marketing is a subset of health communication practice.  Other times they omit content about social marketing in sections where you expect to find it.  I believe they will sort this out.  However, for now, it adds to the existing confusion between communication and social marketing.

By the way, I did do more on my real vacation than find social marketing resources!  Check out these pics:

 

  

Kicking Around Social Marketing, Social Media and Communication #2

In earlier posts in December and February, I have been exploring the confusion about, and differences among, social marketing, social media and communication.  I looked at why the confusion exists, why change agents default to communication and why communication alone may not be result in the desired behavior change. Now, if you do choose to use a communication approach...

Where Can You Turn to Get the Most out of Communication Strategies?

We don’t have to struggle in the darkness!  Here is a brief review of when communication can be effective, from two good resources.

1. Communication alone is effective when:

Benefits are obvious; the audience already has a motivation to do the behavior; there is an opportunity in the environment to do the behavior; the audience has the ability to do the behavior—“Carrots, Sticks and Promises,” Michael Rothschild 

2. Communication-only can:

• Increase the intended audience’s knowledge and awareness of a health issue, problem, or solution;
• Influence perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes that may change social norms;
• Prompt action;
• Demonstrate or illustrate healthy skills;
• Show the benefit of behavior change;
• Advocate a position on a health issue or policy;
• Increase demand or support for health services;

— “The Pink Book – Making Health Communication Programs Work,” National Cancer Institute

 

When you get to the point of creating messages and communication programs…

1. A hugely helpful resource is “Simply Put,”from CDC.  It guides you through creating simple, easier to understand messages from more technical health information.  You can Google it.

2. NCI’s Pink Book, mentioned above, takes you through a step-by-step process for creating best practice communication programs.

3. The CDC’s “CDCynergy Communication Version”is an interactive desktop tool that guides you through creating a best practice health communication program.  It includes a variety of links, tools, resources, media examples, references and on-line tools to assist you.  There are disease-specific and audience-specific versions.

BUT WAIT!  When does communication alone not work, and what do you do then?  STAY TUNED!

Resources, Resources, Resources

Recovering from the long Memorial Day weekend, I offer this short post of very interesting informational resources I discovered last week!

1. For folks in North and Central America, and living in the Caribbean, hurricane season begins in just over a week. (Yes, in the midst of concern about H1N1 flu, there are other issues of concern!) The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers a number of hurricane safety tips and guidelines.

2. The Pew Internet and American Life Project has a fascinating typology of communication technology users! Pew also has a rich library of other Internet-related datasets for both reading and downloading.

3. CDC offers a free, self-paced Pandemic Influenza Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication course, online at: http://emergency.cdc.gov/cerc/CERConline/pandemic/index.html

4. Need health or public health images for you blog, web site or report?  CDC has two image libraries that you might find helpful:  a "Newsroom Image Library;" and a "Public Health Image Library."  Most of the images in each library are in the Public Domain.

I hope you find these resources useful!  Please pass them on to your colleagues.

Public Health and Swine Flu

With the outbreak of swine flu in Mexico, and in three states in the US(California, Kansas andTexas), CDC has stepped up communication and education efforts about symptoms, treatment and prevention. The latest updates are available at http://bit.ly/cnoT2.  Regarding prevention, handwashing is the single most important thing you can do to keep from getting sick.  Visit http://bit.ly/vhNpe for a great video on how to wash your hands properly.

(Photo:  CDC Image Library)

Way Cool Resource: CDCynergy-Social Marketing Edition Planning Tool

This is the second post in an occasional series:  "Way Cool Resources."  I use these posts to highlight resources for doing social marketing that I have found to be especially helpful, creative and/or strongly evidenced based--in a word:  "Way Cool!"  (Okay, two words...)

CDCynergy-Social Marketing Edition ("CDCynergy-Soc" or "Cynergy-Soc" for short) is a CD ROM based planning tool to help you develop, implement and evaluate best practice social marketing plans.  The CD ROM has over 700 resources, including a tutorial to take you through the social marketing planning process, four best practice case studies, numerous templates, guidelines and examples in a PDF format, relevant journal articles saved as PDFs, video consultants who provide the art as well as the science of social marketing, even a "Social Marketing 101" slide show. As you make decisions about your plan, you can save them to your desktop in one of two pre-formated Word documents. It is like having your own, private social marketing consultant sitting on your desk!

Development.Cynergy-Soc was developed jointly by the Turning Point Social Marketing National Excellence Collaborative (SMNEC)-described in yesterday's post, the Academy for Educational Development(AED) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cynergy-Soc is based on the CDC's series of CD ROMs for conducting best practice health communication efforts. The partner organizations utilized the social marketing process to create Cynergy-Soc. First, twelve social marketing practitioners reviewed the communications version of CDCynergy to determine if a social marketing version could be created, using the original as a model.  SMNEC then conducted audience research with over 400 people nationally, representing public health stakeholders and potential users, to determine how they used social marketing and the desired characteristics of a planning tool.  Content. AED and the collaborative reviewed existing models of social marketing to synthesize a logic model.  AED wrote the content, developed case studies and identified other "on-board" resources. Technology. The Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE), under contract with CDC, modified the computer architecture of the communication version of CDCynergy, and added the social marketing content.  Product Testing. The collaborative alpha-tested the new version with state and local public health personnel, and community based organizations, gathered by the Minnesota Social Marketing Collaborative.

Roll-Out. The collaborative rolled out the first edition of CDCynergy-Soc in August 2003 to Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Turning Point grantee states, through APHA, the Georgetown Social Marketing List serve, and social marketing conferences in the in US and Canada.  The collaborative also created a media-on-demand web site where users can order a copy of the CD.  Audience research revealed that users would welcome support, in order to get the most out of the CD.  Therefore, the collaborative, in conjunction with AED and CDC, developed a user training, as well as a train-the-trainer training to insure continued dissemination of the user training.  Staff delivered multiple trainings to Turning Point states and regionally in the US, and at APHA and at the University of South Florida's Social Marketing in Public Health Conference. The collaborative also created three publications keyed to the phases and steps of CDCynergy-Soc.

Monitoring and Revision.  Being good social marketers, the partners monitored use of, and reaction to, CDCynergy-Soc, through on-going anecdotal feedback for three years, and through a formal survey of over 800 users in 2006. Based on this information, the partners made changes to content and added navigational and learning aids.  They also update the trainings.

Roll-Out of the Version II.  The collaborative rolled out CDCynergy-Social Marketing Edition, Version II in the summer of 2006, through the same venues as version one.  To date more than 10,500 copies have been distributed in 34 countries and in all 50 states and the District of Columbia in the US! Users have utilized CDCynergy-Soc for program planning, grant writing and academic social marketing courses

Want your own copy of CDCynergy-Soc?!  You can order it from the media-on-demand web site.  You can also access the on-line version, and save resource documents and your plan to your own computer.  What if I have a Mac?  CDCynergy-Soc was quality controlled tested only on a PC.  Therefore, the creators can only vouch for its stability on a PC platform.  However, I know of several Mac users who regularly use CDCynergy-Soc without problems!

The target audience for CDCynergy-Soc are individuals and organizations that are already knowledgeable about social marketing.  It can also be helpful for users to have had an orientation to Cynergy-Soc, in order to make best use of the 700+ resources and planning aids.  If you want information on training and orientation opportunities, please contact me at sm1guru@yahoo.com!

CDC Center for Health Marketing Report

The CDC's Center for Health Marketing has become both a thought and a practice leader in the use of social marketing and health communication (which they term "health marketing") to bring about healthy communities.  They have especially taken the lead in using Web 2.0 and e-tool technologies to achieve public health goals! Their website is chock full of examples of applications and global initiatives; resources and tools; research and evaluation links; health marketing basics; and more--including a blog by Jay Bernhardt, Ph.D. center director, and my favorite, their e-Health Marketing Page!!  (Don't miss the e-Health Data Briefs--wonderful one-to-two page PDFs with audience research about who is using which e-technology!)

The center's great work is summarized in a recently released report, "Health Marketing for a Healthier Nation and a Healthier World."   It is available as a PDF from their web site.

Way Cool Resource: CDC's "Social Marketing for Physical Activity" Course

The post introduces a new occasional feature to the blog:  "Way Cool Resources."  I plan to use these posts to highlight resources for doing social marketing that I have found to be especially helpful, creative and/or strongly evidenced based--in a word:  "Way Cool!"  (Okay, two words.)

Last fall, CDC's Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity (DNPA) introduced a new on-line training resource:  their Social Marketing for Nutrition and Physical Activity Course.  The course is free of charge, and takes the learner through the phases of the social marketing process.  The interface is user-friendly, and beautifully designed. The site utilizes interactive scenarios with a fictional program planner named Rosa to help the user cement newly learned information.  People taking the course can receive continuing education credits. According to Jenny Kohr, the lead developer of the course, 300 people have registered for continuing education credits, and 100 completed the course.

I asked Jenny to tell me more about why and how DNPA created the course.  Here is her response:

"One of the things I’ve noticed about public health is that it’s easy to react to the crisis of the moment instead of determining the best and most effective long-term course of action. This is one of the reasons I became so intrigued with social marketing—if done well, it forces you to make plans and thoroughly understand the people you want to impact.

 

"In my time with CDC, several colleagues and I have provided guidance on the process of social marketing to professionals working in states and communities. Three observations led to the creation of the Social Marketing for Nutrition and Physical Activity course:

 

1. Need for assistance with planning:  Social marketing guidance usually morphed into guidance or help with planning skills (e.g., how to work with groups, how to get participation from partners, how to make decisions).  These weren't social marketing topics, but groups needed help with planning methods before they could begin to think about social marketing.

 

2. Common challenges:  There were some predictable challenges during the social marketing planning process.  People tended to have similar problems and common questions.

 

3. Inadequacy of current resources:  While accurate and valuable, current tools weren't necessarily practical or concrete enough for practitioners.  The tools did a great job of explaining the concepts of social marketing, but they fell short when people tried to implement them in the field.

"So we developed the Social Marketing for Nutrition and Physical Activity course. Along with instruction on the process of social marketing, the course provides ideas and tips for basic planning. It takes into account all of the common issues and challenges we heard over and over, and it’s designed to be as practical and concrete as possible.

 

"One feature that makes this course unique is our interactive scenario. If you take the course, you’ll meet Rosa in the first few pages. You get to follow her as she plans a social marketing program. She has to deal with challenges, such as a boss who isn’t inclined to think like a marketer and a planning committee member who is anxious for action. There are opportunities to offer your advice to Rosa, and we give you feedback on your choices.

 

"I hope this course can be something you use either to refresh your own skills or to recommend to people you interact with: a colleague, a partner, students, or someone else. I also hope this course becomes a way to not only help the field grow, but also encourage public health to take a step back, set aside the crisis of the moment, and consider where we’ve been and where we’re going."  (Disclaimers, From the CDC: "The findings and conclusions in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention." From Mike: I reviewed the content of the course during development.)

 

Interested in the Course?  You may contact Jenny at enj5@cdc.gov.  Click this hyperlink to view the course.  CDC's Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity also has an excellent collection of other social marketing resources, including segmentation guides, case studies, and a social marketing guide for obesity prevention coordinators.