Kenya: The Pitch - Beyond the Real Product
Traditionally, the communication of health-related issues has been left to governments. It has essentially consisted of a one-dimensional approach in the form of public service announcements. Over the past 10 years or so, this has rapidly changed with healthcare communication taking on a more complex approach similar to that of commercial brand marketing. This is known as social marketing.
As opposed to the previous manner of public announcements, which tend to be dictatorial, social marketing involves listening to the needs and desires of the society and using the information to compile a consumer-focused communication strategy similar to that of a brand sold by manufacturers.
The main difference between the two is the objective of the organisation. While marketing of brands aims at delivering financial profit to an organisation, social marketing seeks to influence social behaviour to benefit the target audience and the society.
Controversy Taints Choice for ANWR PR
Pac/West Communications, an Oregon firm the Alaska Legislature is about to hire to promote oil drilling in the Arctic, has run political campaigns for hunting and resource development that have been marked by two qualities: aggressiveness and success…
[Pac/West President] Phillips says it's time for Alaska to apply "social marketing" to the state's long effort to convince Congress to open the refuge to drilling. He wants to target particular areas of the country and tell people there why it's in their interest to open ANWR. The campaign would be directed at voters, and at their representatives in Congress, he said.
"It really is building awareness of the issue, educating people as to the 'why does this matter to me,' " he said.
University of British Columbia a Test Site on Hydrogen Highway
UBC’s Campus Sustainability Office (CSO) has proposed a $10-million suite of projects -- approved in principal by Industry Canada-- to test and showcase the efficiency of hydrogen fuel cells.
“Our role in the project is to integrate fuel cell technology into our plans for a sustainable campus,” says Jorge Marques, CSO energy manager. “We want to explore community-oriented applications for hydrogen technology.”
“We want the UBC community to experience concepts they may have only read about or seen on TV,” says Irfan Rehmanji, project co-ordinator for the UBC node. “The node will integrate a number of concepts that affect our daily life and will be a phenomenal outreach and social marketing tool.”
Togo: 'Condoms Are Good, But Abstinence is Better'
After consistently emphasising condoms in their prevention campaigns, organisations in Togo are advocating abstinence, creating confusion among young people.
"Yesterday they were advertising condoms, now they recommend abstinence. It now looks like those who doubted the effectiveness of condoms have been proved right," said Alfred, a security guard working in the capital city of Lomé.
Many other young Togolese are baffled by the shift to promoting abstinence rather than condoms as the best means of protection against HIV.
In July 2005, Population Services International (PSI), which specialises in social marketing, launched a massive advertising campaign in the media and on the streets of Lomé to promote abstinence, with slogans like "a true man knows how to wait" and "a true woman knows how to wait and does not yield to pressure".
WCB Wants to See Shift in Attitudes
A cultural shift taking several years is needed to make this province a safer place to work and stabilize the finances of the Workers’ Compensation Board of Nova Scotia [Canada], a board spokeswoman said Wednesday…
National surveys have shown well over half of Atlantic Canadians think of workplace injury as inevitable, Mary Kingston, director of communications for the board, said Wednesday.
"What we’re dealing with here is just a lack of awareness that there is something that can be done to prevent workplace injuries — that it isn’t inevitable," she said.
Gory print and television ads on the hazards of workplace accidents are a first step in a long-term campaign to get workers and employers to recognize the problem and address it, she said. The ads are beginning to raise people’s awareness of workplace safety, but reducing the number of injuries will take time.
"By the time it takes people to understand the issue,
change their attitudes and then change their behaviour, you’re looking at a
seven- to 10-year process," Ms. Kingston said… In addition to the social
marketing campaign, the WCB is working with employers whose firms experience
high rates of injury, in order to help create safer workplaces.
Technorati Tags: Abstinence Education, ANWR, HIV/AIDS Prevention, Hydrogen Fuel, Social Marketing, Workplace Injury
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