Social Media and Nutrition Education: The Food Hero Experience

Social media can be a quick, low-cost, direct way for nutrition educators to broaden the scope of their targeted programs. The authors' viewpoint is that for social media to be effective, strategies for its use should follow “best practices” guidelines. This viewpoint suggests social media best practices based on experience gained from the Food Hero social marketing campaign. Understanding of how nutrition educators can take advantage of social media as a new mechanism for reaching their target audience is needed, including best practices for implementation, management, and evaluation.     

Using social marketing principles to guide the development of a nutrition education initiative for preschool-aged children

Within the field of nutrition education, social marketing has become a promising framework to systematically approach problems related to nutrition behavior. In 1997, the Colorado Nutrition Network began developing a social marketing campaign to promote healthful food choices among low-income Coloradans. A multifaceted formative evaluation plan that included focus groups, campaign concept pretesting, and a food frequency questionnaire was used to segment and scrutinize the target audience. The resulting pilot program was a blend of educational and marketing strategies targeting preschoolers that was implemented in Head Start classrooms. The 12-week intervention contained a narrow, behavior-based "try new foods" message, multiple nutrition education activities, and repeated opportunities to taste 13 novel foods. Key strategies used and findings from the formative evaluation process are presented herein in an effort to provide insight for nutrition educators interested in developing similar interventions.     

Marketing HIV Prevention for Heterosexually Identified Latino Men Who Have Sex with Men and Women: The Hombres Sanos Campaign

This article describes the development process of Hombres Sanos, a social marketing campaign to promote HIV testing and condom use for heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women. The steps included qualitative formative research and a social marketing analytic framework to understand our target audience better, identify incentives and barriers to risk reduction, guide product development, define an optimal promotional campaign, and inform the selection of campaign platforms. A better grasp of the authors' target beneficiaries' needs and values led to an innovative dual strategy for audience segmentation and targeting. The campaign had consumer-centered, culturally sensitive, and theory-driven communication materials. The authors found communication materials and events to be appealing and effective. The campaign was well received among the wider community, and evaluation showed promising results among Latino men in general and among heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women in particular. The authors provide a step-by-step overview of the project's formative research, including research methods and findings, and how these were translated into a social marketing campaign. In addition, the authors discuss the challenges encountered in this process and the potential of social marketing to reduce HIV risk among Latinos.     

Marketing HIV prevention for heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women: the Hombres Sanos campaign

This article describes the development process of Hombres Sanos, a social marketing campaign to promote HIV testing and condom use for heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women. The steps included qualitative formative research and a social marketing analytic framework to understand our target audience better, identify incentives and barriers to risk reduction, guide product development, define an optimal promotional campaign, and inform the selection of campaign platforms. A better grasp of the authors' target beneficiaries' needs and values led to an innovative dual strategy for audience segmentation and targeting. The campaign had consumer-centered, culturally sensitive, and theory-driven communication materials. The authors found communication materials and events to be appealing and effective. The campaign was well received among the wider community, and evaluation showed promising results among Latino men in general and among heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women in particular. The authors provide a step-by-step overview of the project's formative research, including research methods and findings, and how these were translated into a social marketing campaign. In addition, the authors discuss the challenges encountered in this process and the potential of social marketing to reduce HIV risk among Latinos.     

Bringing 5 A Day Consumers into Focus: Qualitative Use of Consumer Research to Guide Strategic Decision Making

As part of the national 5 A Day for Better Health program, a communication strategy based on a social marketing model was developed to guide the program's media campaign. Using this approach, the campaign focused on consumer wants and needs to help increase the prospects of influencing consumer behavior.The work discussed herein describes how consumer research was used to select and profile a target audience for the national 5 A Day media campaign. It shows how formative consumer research data from multiple sources were integrated to make practical strategic campaign decisions based on the target consumer's perspective.     

Addressing vaccine hesitancy: The potential value of commercial and social marketing principles and practices

Many countries and communities are dealing with groups and growing numbers of individuals who are delaying or refusing recommended vaccinations for themselves or their children. This has created a need for immunization programs to find approaches and strategies to address vaccine hesitancy. An important source of useful approaches and strategies is found in the frameworks, practices, and principles used by commercial and social marketers, many of which have been used by immunization programs. This review examines how social and commercial marketing principles and practices can be used to help address vaccine hesitancy. It provides an introduction to key marketing and social marketing concepts, identifies some of the major challenges to applying commercial and social marketing approaches to immunization programs, illustrates how immunization advocates and programs can use marketing and social marketing approaches to address vaccine hesitancy, and identifies some of the lessons that commercial and non-immunization sectors have learned that may have relevance for immunization. While the use of commercial and social marketing practices and principles does not guarantee success, the evidence, lessons learned, and applications to date indicate that they have considerable value in fostering vaccine acceptance.     

Stop the sores: the making and evaluation of a successful social marketing campaign

Los Angeles County has experienced a rapid increase in early syphilis among men who have sex with men (MSM) in recent years, with the number of cases rising from 126 in 2000 to 809 in 2005. As part of the public health response to this outbreak, a sustained social marketing campaign was launched in 2002, with the objectives of increasing syphilis testing, knowledge, and awareness among MSM in Los Angeles. This campaign, as implemented, exemplified key principles of social marketing, including market research, audience segmentation, and branding. A cross-sectional study conducted in 2004 to evaluate the campaign found that those MSM who were aware of the campaign were nearly twice as likely to have tested for syphilis in the past 6 months as those MSM who were not aware of the campaign. Those MSM who were aware of the campaign also had more syphilis awareness and knowledge in key areas.     

Formative research to develop a mass media campaign to increase physical activity and nutrition in a multiethnic state

Poor nutrition and physical inactivity are the second leading causes of preventable morbidity and mortality in the United States. Mass media campaigns have tremendous promise for reaching large segments of the population to influence these behaviors. There is still insufficient evidence in the literature, however, to recommend mass marketing campaigns for physical activity and nutrition. Successful mass media campaigns should have a formative research base that includes conducting preproduction research with the target audience, using theory as a conceptual foundation of the campaign, segmenting the audience into meaningful subgroups, and using a message approach that is targeted to and likely will be effective with the audience segment. In this study, these formative research steps were addressed to develop a mass media campaign based on the Theory of Planned Behavior to increase physical activity and fruit and vegetable consumption in 35-55-year-old adults in the state of Hawaii. For the walking campaign, our results identified time, a control belief, as the major barrier. For fruits and vegetable, the data suggested social norm (if others around me ate them) and control (if they were available). These data then were used to develop a mass media campaign based on these principals.     

Formative Research to Develop a Mass Media Campaign to Increase Physical Activity and Nutrition in a Multiethnic State

Poor nutrition and physical inactivity are the second leading causes of preventable morbidity and mortality in the United States. Mass media campaigns have tremendous promise for reaching large segments of the population to influence these behaviors. There is still insufficient evidence in the literature, however, to recommend mass marketing campaigns for physical activity and nutrition. Successful mass media campaigns should have a formative research base that includes conducting preproduction research with the target audience, using theory as a conceptual foundation of the campaign, segmenting the audience into meaningful subgroups, and using a message approach that is targeted to and likely will be effective with the audience segment. In this study, these formative research steps were addressed to develop a mass media campaign based on the Theory of Planned Behavior to increase physical activity and fruit and vegetable consumption in 35–55-year-old adults in the state of Hawaii. For the walking campaign, our results identified time, a control belief, as the major barrier. For fruits and vegetable, the data suggested social norm (if others around me ate them) and control (if they were available). These data then were used to develop a mass media campaign based on these principals.     

Promoting fruit and vegetable consumption in different lifestyle groups: recommendations for program development based on behavioral research and consumer media data

Fruit and vegetable consumption affects the etiology of cardiovascular disease as well as many different types of cancers. Still, Americans' consumption of fruit and vegetables is low. This article builds on initial research that assessed the validity of using a consumer-based psychographic audience segmentation in tandem with the theory of planned behavior to explain differences among individuals' consumption of fruit and vegetables. In this article, we integrate the findings from our initial analyses with media and purchase data from each audience segment. We then propose distinct, tailored program suggestions for reinventing social marketing programs focused on increasing fruit and vegetable consumption in each segment. Finally, we discuss the implications of utilizing a consumer-based psychographic audience segmentation versus a more traditional readiness-to-change social marketing segmentation. Differences between these two segmentation strategies, such as the ability to access media usage and purchase data, are highlighted and discussed.     

Promoting Fruit and Vegetable Consumption In Different Lifestyle Groups: Recommendations for Program Development Based on Behavioral Research and Consumer Media Data

Fruit and vegetable consumption affects the etiology of cardiovascular disease as well as many different types of cancers. Still, Americans' consumption of fruit and vegetables is low. This article builds on initial research that assessed the validity of using a consumer-based psychographic audience segmentation in tandem with the theory of planned behavior to explain differences among individuals' consumption of fruit and vegetables. In this article, we integrate the findings from our initial analyses with media and purchase data from each audience segment. We then propose distinct, tailored program suggestions for reinventing social marketing programs focused on increasing fruit and vegetable consumption in each segment. Finally, we discuss the implications of utilizing a consumer-based psychographic audience segmentation versus a more traditional readiness-to-change social marketing segmentation. Differences between these two segmentation strategies, such as the ability to access media usage and purchase data, are highlighted and discussed.     

The Turning Point Social Marketing National Excellence Collaborative: integrating social marketing into routine public health practice.

Social marketing can be an effective tool for achieving public health goals. Social marketing uses concepts from commercial marketing to plan and implement programs designed to bring about behavior change that will benefit individuals and society. Although social marketing principles have been used to address public health problems, efforts have been dominated by message-based, promotion-only strategies, and effective implementation has been hampered by both lack of understanding of and use of all of the components of a social marketing approach and lack of training. The Turning Point initiative's Social Marketing National Excellence Collaborative (SMNEC) was established to promote social marketing principles and practices to improve public health across the nation. After 4 years, the Collaborative's work has resulted in improved understanding of social marketing among participating members and the development of new tools to strengthen the social marketing skills among public health practitioners. The Collaborative has also made advances in incorporating and institutionalizing the practice of social marketing within public health in participating states.     

A system for evaluating the use of media in CDC's National AIDS Information and Education Program.

The National AIDS Information and Education Program (NAIEP) commissioned the National Academy of Sciences to design a prototypical system of research for use in the evaluation of the agency''s media campaign. It consists of four types of evaluation: formative, efficacy, process, and outcome. These types of evaluations are used to answer such questions as the following: What message strategies will work best? Can a campaign under optimal conditions be expected to make a difference? What interventions are actually delivered during the campaign? Has the campaign actually had an impact? How NAIEP has used the system and adapted it during 1 year of research activities is outlined, and examples from a variety of other social marketing programs are described.     

Project LEAN--lessons learned from a national social marketing campaign.

The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation initiated a social marketing campaign in 1987 to reduce the nation''s risk for heart disease and some cancers. Consensus on recommendations for dietary change have stimulated the development of a variety of social marketing campaigns to promote behavior change. Project LEAN (Low-Fat Eating for America Now) is a national campaign whose goal is to reduce dietary fat consumption to 30 percent of total calories through public service advertising, publicity, and point-of-purchase programs in restaurants, supermarkets, and school and worksite cafeterias. The public service advertising reached 50 percent of the television viewing audience and the print publicity, more than 35 million readers. The toll-free hotline received more than 300,000 calls. Thirty-four organizations joined the foundation in partnership and raised $350,000 for collaborative activities. Thirteen States implemented local campaigns. Lessons have been learned about the use of the media, market segmentation, effective spokespersons, and successful partnerships. These lessons will be valuable to others planning social marketing campaigns on nutrition and other preventive behaviors.     

Prevention of HIV Among Adolescents

Adolescents are at risk for HIV primarily through their sexual behavior. A comprehensive prevention strategy includes a national HIV campaign based on social marketing principles; targeted social marketing, intensive skill building, and sexually transmitted disease control programs for youth at high risk; programs targeting institutions (e.g., school health clinics), providers, and parents; and interventions to identify and reduce risk acts among seropositive youth. The U.S. focus for HIV prevention has been single-session educational classes (an ineffective strategy) or intensive multi-session, small-group interventions for youth at high risk (demonstrated to increase condom use by about 30%). There is a need to expand the range, modalities, and dissemination of HIV prevention programs nationally, to recognize (especially by policymakers) limitations of abstinence programs, and to increase early detection of HIV among youth.     

VERB - a social marketing campaign to increase physical activity among youth

The VERB campaign is a multiethnic media campaign with a goal to increase and maintain physical activity among tweens, or children aged nine to 13 years. Parents, especially mothers aged 29 to 46, and other sources of influence on tweens (e.g., teachers, youth program leaders) are the secondary audiences of the VERB initiative. VERB applies sophisticated commercial marketing techniques to address the public health problem of sedentary lifestyles of American children, using the social marketing principles of product, price, place, and promotion. In this paper, we describe how these four principles were applied to formulate the strategies and tactics of the VERB campaign, and we provide examples of the multimedia materials (e.g., posters, print advertising, television, radio spots) that were created.     

Use of social marketing in population health programs (literature review)]

At present health education programmes abroad make wide use of social marketing strategy. Unlike commercial marketing whose purpose is competition and struggle for the expansion of commodity markets, social marketing is aimed at disseminating certain ideas or introducing certain practices, using largely the technological base and strategy of commercial marketing. The authors give 8 fundamental principles of social marketing (consumer orientation, the theory of barter, the analysis of audience and segmentation, special surveys to detect the orientation of population, the choice of channels for information transmission application of "marketing mixture", control of ongoing programme and marketing management). Application fields of social marketing in public health are discussed.     

“Smoking Is Sóóó ... Sandals and White Socks”: Co-Creation of a Dutch Anti-Smoking Campaign to Change Social Norms

This article considers co-creation as a new persuasive strategy in health campaigns. Co-creation enables target audience members to become active campaign producers. A recent Dutch anti-smoking campaign applied co-creation, inviting the target audience to complete the slogan “smoking is sóóó . . . ” with something outdated on social networking sites (SNSs) like Facebook and Twitter to stress non-smoking as the new social norm. From a corpus-linguistic perspective, we investigated how the slogans from the target audience resonated with or deviated from the campaign’s original message. In general, the target audience slogans followed the campaign’s approach, but on the SNSs, differences were found regarding the valence, type of utterance, and domain to which smoking was compared. The target audience frequently compared smoking with other (inter)personal social norms. Co-creation thus provides the target audience with an opportunity to disseminate campaign messages from their own perspective, but at the same time a co-creation strategy risks diluting the intended campaign message.