Creative Campaign - Swap It Dont Stop It - Essay Example

Creative Campaign- “Swap It Don’t Stop It” Student’s Name Institution Affiliation Creative Campaign- “Swap It Don’t Stop It” Campaign Overview The “Swap It Don’t Stop It” health campaign was created to promote healthy living and improve the overall wellbeing of Australians (National Swap it Campaign, 2014). The campaign is just one of the phases of the Measure Up Campaign initiated by the Australian National Preventive Health Agency in March 2011at an estimated cost of forty one million dollars. Its purpose is to inform the people that carrying excess weight around the waistline increases one’s chances of developing chronic lifestyle diseases such as type two diabetes, specific type of cancers as well as the heart diseases (National Swap it Campaign, 2014). Such findings made the organizers decide to take an interdisciplinary approach rather than tackle the issue alone, Diabetes Queensland Australia decided then partnered with organizations such as the Cancer Council Queensland, The Heart Foundation, Nutrition Australia and received the support of the Government of Queensland. The selected organizations were perceived to have a common goal, and therefore, were likely to offer the campaign all the support it needed in order to be successful. The catchy campaign slogan, ‘Swap It Don’t Stop It’ was coined to entice the public to change their eating habits. It is difficult to convince people to abandon their familiar eating habits, hence, the reason why the campaign sought a subtle and convincing way of encouraging Australians to adopt healthier lifestyles. Ever since health and wellbeing became a national concern, the Australian people have seen numerous healths and fitness campaigns each recording different levels of success. The organizer’s of this campaign decided to take a slightly different approach. The first was to involve as many like-minded partners as possible. Secondly, they chose a concept that plays with people’s perspectives rather than impose change. To increase the chances of success, this public health campaign chose to take a unique strategy and introduced Eric, an animated blue balloon character. The organizers felt that Eric’s character would appeal to the general public and was an interesting way of passing the message. Therefore, his pictures could be seen everywhere; in print, TV, outdoor advertising and radio voice-overs. Eric was to demonstrate how to start swapping hence reinforcing the message “change is easy, it starts with small steps that make a big difference and this does not mean giving up everything you love” (National Swap it Campaign, 2014, p.4). According to Good Business Guide (2013), any creative campaign needs to establish a contact strategy. This strategy ensures that the campaign’s objectives are met. In addition, it creates awareness and educates the target audience its purpose. Swap It Don’t Stop It chose mass media tools as its preferred contact strategy. The information was relayed through print outdoor advertisement, television, and radio. Since the campaign had a lot of information to relay, it had to be precise about what it hoped to achieve. This is the reason its organizers chose to work with popular media tools. Any good creative brief has to focus on the brand’s character and the target audience (Berman, 2012). The creators of the campaign were clear that its target audience was Queenslanders aged 25-50 (NGO Swap it Program, 2014, para. 2). This age group was targeted because according to Queensland Health Statistics (2014), in every three adults, one is overweight and one in every four adults is obese. Other relevant information that informed their decision included most people do not eat enough fruits and vegetable and sixty percent did not exercise enough. Swap It Don’t Stop is creative, unique, and memorable. Dahl (2013) notes that the elements can make any creative campaign successful. He points out that the idea does not need to be earth shattering rather; all it needs is to be different and memorable enough to capture the attention of the target audience. To achieve this, the organizers had to consult with all relevant stakeholders such as the media, partner organizations, nutrition experts, the government as well as the general public. Dahl (2013) claims that during creative sessions, all participants should trade information as much as possible. Working with several partners must have yielded a lot of valuable information for this campaign culminating into a perfect creative answer. To ensure that the session achieved the intended goal, it was important that the organizers recorded all availed ideas and information. As earlier noted, the campaign chose TV, Radio, Outdoor advertising, and Print to pass the message to the public. This decision was influenced by factors such as cost, circulation, target group, and the nature of their message. Pilbeam, Rodseth, and Singh (2008) note that some media are more expensive than others are; however, looking at their cost was not a hindrance to the campaign. The organizers chose to go all the way as long as their message was communicated. The fact that they were targeting wide group of people was necessary that they selected a media that Australian adults listen to. The Australian Media Stats (2010) reveals that 96% of Australian households own a television set. This shows that their choice was backed by statistical facts thereby increasing the chances that the target audience would receive the message. Taking a different approach was one of the factors that the organizers felt would increase the success chances of the campaign. Instead of feeding the public with information on healthy eating or exercises, they decided to organize a series of activities to show that it was easy to lead a healthy lifestyle. One of the events organized under this approach was ‘The Swapper Healthy Lifestyle Presentations’ by Swap It Ambassador Duncan Amstrong (NGO Swap It Program, 2014, Para. 4). Failure to strength relationships between partner organizations can cause withdrawal of support consequently compromising the campaign. Many initiatives fail because of partners’ decision to withdraw prematurely or donor organizations stop funding the projects. The cause of such drastic measures is usually broken down relations. Events such as breach of agreements, lack of cooperation, or poor communication can be disastrous to any creative campaign. That is why organizers should foster good working relationships with all the partners. One of the ways that the Swap It campaign managed to keep all partners happy was supporting each other’s activities. This sense solidarity created good working relationships that protected the campaign from premature termination. In addition, the organizers sought strategic media partnerships. These alliances helped the campaign spread its message throughout Queensland, as well as made it possible to enlist swappers. There was open sharing of information, a factor that made it easy to effectively plan for resources. It also made it easier to implement activities such as enlisting of local swappers and creation awareness. All these required careful planning and numerous consultative meetings between the agent and the client. Although it appears tasking and time-consuming, the relationship between the agent and client leads to a good creative campaign. Measuring and Evaluation A report by ANPHA (2012) reveals that the Swap It Don’t Stop It campaign has achieved its objectives and can thereby be termed a success. The campaign was launched in March 2011 and since its inception, the campaign’s website had received more than half million visits from March 2011 to June 2012. The swap it app has been downloaded by over fifty thousand people, an indication that the campaign’s message has reached the target audience. The report also indicates that more than six thousand people had registered for the online planner and sixteen thousand five hundred people were following the campaign on Facebook. Looking at how the campaign has measured its performance, it has relied on statistics from various media to gauge if the public had received the message. They went a step further and used the number of downloaded swap apps to estimate the number of people who had decided to adopt healthier lifestyles. The correct choice of media is one of the factors that have been instrumental to the campaign’s success. ANPHA (2013) report states that there has been an increase in campaign activity during the 2011-2012 period because of the influence from television, outdoor and online advertising and good public relations. The report acknowledges that these media have helped the campaign record better performance. Mohan (2000) asserts that using a combination of various types of media, as the campaign has done, is likely to result in better performance. He goes on to say that this success would not be realized if the agency and client did not set clear and quantifiable advertisement objectives. One of the barriers that prevent effective evaluation of campaigns is the failure to identify the target audience (Batra, Myers, & Aaker, 2009). Swap It Don’t Stop It campaign steered clear of this pitfall right from the start. The organizers ensured that they not only identified the correct audience but also communicated to them using their preferred media. The campaign used the Internet and social media sites like Facebook to push its cause. This strategy proved effective and based on the statistics can be termed as one of the factors that made it such a success. Conducting surveys is one of the tools that the organizers used to evaluate the campaign. This exercise provided vital information that was used to monitor changes, especially with regard to the target audience. In addition, they used feedback forms to collect information that was used during evaluation. Participants were asked to name specific Swap It activities they had undertaken either individually or as an organization. They were also encouraged to list down some of the activities, awareness campaigns, resources, or partners who had the highest influence on their decisions. The second aspect the form focused on was public relations and promotion. The organizers measured the success of their initiatives by asking participant to give a brief description of the media or public relation activities that they had been involved in. Swap It Don’t Stop It has set a good example in the industry and shown what is required to conduct a successful health campaign. The result has not only been appreciated by the government but also the public. By adhering to good agency-client practices, the campaign has managed to demonstrate the importance of such relationships. It has also shown that organizers need to work with partners who share with similar interests. From their experiences, it is clear that building meaningful relationships with like-minded organizations leads to success. Proper planning, clear purpose, measurable objectives, and strategic partners appear to be the principle behind the campaign’s success. All other agencies, potential clients and other organizations can use this campaign as a benchmark in future. Agency-Client Relationship The Swap It program campaign has been termed largely successful. Since it is a long running campaign, the organizers appear to have established a good working relationship with their agency. The agency appears to have managed the organizer’s expectations very well such that the program has extended beyond Queensland. Working with agencies is a complex partnership that is critical to a campaign’s success (Gralpois, 2010). This relationship needs to be reinvented constantly and agencies need to build mutual trust and understanding with their client. The campaign has realized the benefits of good agency skills and is the reason it is running. All the involved parties are working towards a common goal thereby ensuring that none of them falls behind, which is one of the common problems most agency-client relationships face unclear program purpose (Lorat, 2009). When agencies begin to ask clients the right questions, it becomes easier to agree on a common purpose. It also helps agencies understand better the client’s needs, thereby creating concepts that suit their needs. Watson and Nobel (2007) note that long running programs tend to take a life of their own and sometimes agencies or clients fail to reinvent themselves to meet this change. Since this campaign is expected to run for some time, the organizers are expected to shift their approach or introduce new partners who are likely to redefine the campaign; therefore, it is the responsibility of the agency to ensure that the purpose of the campaign is not lost. They actions they take should be valuable to all stakeholders. Perhaps the challenge lies in trying to keep everyone on board. All agency-client relationships have to be evaluated periodically to ensure that the client is happy with the services. There is a three ways to approach agency-client evaluation. The first and common approach is client evaluates agency performance. This evaluation focuses more on the agencies general capabilities. During this evaluation, the clients assess the contributions of the agencies towards the success of the campaign. In most cases, clients analyze whether the agency’s ideas have had any significant impact on the campaign. They also look at other factors such as level of cooperation, communication, and degree of satisfaction. If the client is happy with the results, the partnership continues, otherwise, it is terminated. The second method of evaluation is the agency evaluates the client. Since the success of a campaign is a collaborative effort, agencies also find it necessary to evaluate their clients to find out if they are effectively working together. As noted earlier, long running campaigns tend to reinvent themselves with time and clients may shift their focus to other strategies that they believe will produce better results. Therefore, when agencies evaluate their clients, they are able to identify idea gaps. This also gives them the opportunity to re-consider the campaign’s strategy to add value to all stakeholders. The third approach is both agencies and marketers evaluate each other’s performance. Waller, Cusick, Matheson and Miller (2000), points out that it is an effective way of identifying and resolving perception gaps. However, for this exercise to be effective, both the client and agency have to agree on a common set of questions. They also have to avoid using languages or postures that seems to imply that the exercise is a competition. One of the benefits of this type of evaluation is that it instills a sense of ownership and commitment and eliminates the notion that the process output singly depends of either parties. I believe the swap it campaign has adopted this method of evaluation. From the onset, the performance objectives have been clearly communicated. It clear that the purpose of campaign is to encourage Australians to adopt healthier lifestyles by swapping their unhealthy foods with healthier options. According the ANPHA (2012) report, the objectives of the campaign have been met. This is an indication that the agency and the clients have had a successful relationship. Other factors that are used to evaluate agent client relationships include the level of participation, degree of transparency, and campaign outcomes. The success of any creative campaign depends on these and other factors. They represent a campaign’s critical factors. Recommendations One of the key factors that influence the success of any creative campaign is good agency-client relationships. This means that before a client settles for a particular agency, they should conduct a proper agency assessment. The purpose of the assessment is to establish whether they are compatible with each other. After going through the Swap It Don’t Stop It campaign, I am compelled to believe that good campaigns come from good agency-client relationships. Therefore, I would recommend that before settling for an agency, it is important to make sure that your chosen organization understands your needs and is capable to delivering the desired results. As an agency, I believe that clarity of purpose, settling on specific measurable objectives, evaluation, and participation are the most effect ways of dealing with clients. Once an agency has managed to do this, it becomes easier to do other activities such as idea development, building effective strategies and implementation. I would recommend that agencies establish a common goal with their client before proceeding to the next steps. Clients also need to agree to a common evaluation method. I believe the client and agency evaluation of each other approach should be adopted every campaign. The success of the campaign is the responsibility of both parties; therefore, there should be a collective sense of responsibility for whichever the outcome. Strategic media partnerships are important to any creative campaign. The Swap It Don’t Stop It program involved all the common forms of media to pass its message. This was an expensive strategy that I feel was unnecessary due to the numerous duplication of the message. Many will argue that it led to high publicity, but I believe it was not necessary to advertise in all the available media. A more specific and smart approach could have been taken. I recommend that future campaigns first study which media effectively communicates to their target population before selecting their preferred media. It appears that online platforms generated more interest than conventional media; therefore, the organizers maybe should have selected fewer channels that could give similar results. Being financially prudent is not necessarily a bad thing. The evaluation of campaigns should include other factors such as cost effectiveness and resource utilization in order to present a complete assessment. The swap it campaign based its evaluation on the attainment of objectives. This approach appears to support the phrase the end justifies the means, as it ignores the contributions of all the components of the process. In future, I would recommend that a standardized approach to campaign evaluation be taken. Evaluations should consider the contributions made by the entire process to measure success. The role of the agency, partners, resource management, and cost management should not be seen just as the ingredients of a successful campaign. Their contribution should be quantified and evaluated alongside specific objectives. In conclusion, I think that more campaigns can achieve the same level of success as Swap it if the clients chose to be more rational and imaginative. During the idea generation stage, clients need to open up their minds to new possibilities and learn to appreciate the role of agencies in effective creative management (Koslow, Sasser, & Riordan, 2006). I feel that, if clients allowed agencies to do their work effectively, then, there will be more original and creative ideas. The client also needs to appreciate that they too have a role to play in the success of any initiatives and assess themselves doing the measurement and evaluation process. 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L., & Riordan, E. A. (2006). Do marketers get the advertising they need or the advertising they deserve? Agency views of how clients influence creativity. Journal of Advertising, 35(3), 81-101. Lorat, N. (2009). Client agency relationship. München: GRIN Verlag GmbH. Mohan, M. (1989). Advertising management: Concepts and cases. New Delhi: Tata McGraw- Hill. National swap it campaign. (2014). Retreived from http://swapitqld.org.au/national-swap-it- campaign.aspx Pilbeam, E., Rodseth, A., & Singh, B. (2008). Advertising and promotions. Cape Town: Pearson Education South Africa. Queensland Health Statistics. (2014). Retrieved from http://swapitqld.org.au/media/7799/queensland_swap_it_health_statistics.pdf Waller, D. S., Cusick, D. J., Matheson, H. D., & Miller, M. K. (2000). Advertising agency activities used to attract new clients in Australia. Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing, 16 (2), 129-140 Watson, T., & Noble, P. (2007). Evaluating public relations: A best practice guide to public relations planning, research and evaluation. Kogan Page Publishers. Read More