Thursday, April 29, 2010
Friday, January 1, 2010
No Sympathy: Gillette Children's Unflinching Campaign Against Pity
One of the most common reactions to someone else's bad news is not knowing what to say. The first instinct is to give comfort, to be positive, to offer advice. These reactions are grounded in basic human goodness; without thinking about whether or not we should, we take full responsibility for taking away someone's pain, someone we perceive as helpless. Using only two words, Gillette Children's brand campaign cuts through to overturn those unquestioned assumptions decisively: “Cure Pity.”
Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare is a world-renowned, non-profit hospital in Minnesota’s Twin Cities. The integrated campaign, which uses local broadcast, web, and out-of-home advertising to feature stories like Noah's, inspires a new way of thinking---going from great to greater; from achievement to lasting achievement---as an alternative to our habitual response, which is to go from what we think of as "bad" to slightly better. From disabled to merely able. As a message, Cure Pity is powerful enough to help people start looking at their fellow humans a little differently.
Advertising also has a practical agenda, especially for organizations that thrive on donations. The campaign is as smart and strategic as it is inspired.
A more "pity-focused" message doesn't always prompt an immediate response. You see pictures of children suffering from widespread, incurable diseases, or social conditions like poverty, and feel no hope that your one, meager contribution can make any difference. You won't cure leukemia; you can't stop AIDs; and to date, there's no immediate way to prevent or stop certain congenital conditions like cerebral palsy. Perhaps you make one donation, one time, to shake off the uncomfortable feeling of pity. Instead of pity, a more positive message invites compassion, which is an invitation to a deeper experience of shared humanity.
Cure Pity asserts a call to action based on admiration instead of despair. In for-profit marketing terms, the tagline competitively positions Gillette Children’s as an organization focused on overall improvement of quality of life. Other hospital systems seem more symptom- and condition-focused in comparison.
From a visual perspective, the campaign has one unrealized opportunity. It could do much more to back up the inspiring images, and inspired copywriting, with inspired design. Something to stimulate the eye as much as the spirit, and likewise, to promote immediate recognition. Copy works together with design; if either seems weaker than the other, it can appear as though an organization is not fully committed to delivering what it says.
(A long time ago Blue Cross Blue Shield's "Do" campaign introduced a design approach that was unusually sophisticated for an insurance company. It was hot. And it was immediately recognizable. It's getting tired now, probably because Crispin Porter + Bogusky has left the building. Many non- and semi-non-profit organizations end up here: taking over a creative services role that falls outside of their core strengths. Neither the organization nor its agency can afford to maintain the relationship.)
Rethinking the way design can frame the existing patient stories and messaging is one way to refresh Cure Pity’s media approach, which is actually a few years’ old now. The brand messaging is strong and there’s no need to reinvent it, but the organization could look again at how it is expressed.
The strength of Cure Pity is storytelling. As a creative achievement, it asserts a social message that also helps a mission-driven organization continue to do great work. Advertising becomes culturally relevant when it can do either one of those things; curing pity does both.
- Eric Hayward
Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare is a world-renowned, non-profit hospital in Minnesota’s Twin Cities. The integrated campaign, which uses local broadcast, web, and out-of-home advertising to feature stories like Noah's, inspires a new way of thinking---going from great to greater; from achievement to lasting achievement---as an alternative to our habitual response, which is to go from what we think of as "bad" to slightly better. From disabled to merely able. As a message, Cure Pity is powerful enough to help people start looking at their fellow humans a little differently.
Advertising also has a practical agenda, especially for organizations that thrive on donations. The campaign is as smart and strategic as it is inspired.
A more "pity-focused" message doesn't always prompt an immediate response. You see pictures of children suffering from widespread, incurable diseases, or social conditions like poverty, and feel no hope that your one, meager contribution can make any difference. You won't cure leukemia; you can't stop AIDs; and to date, there's no immediate way to prevent or stop certain congenital conditions like cerebral palsy. Perhaps you make one donation, one time, to shake off the uncomfortable feeling of pity. Instead of pity, a more positive message invites compassion, which is an invitation to a deeper experience of shared humanity.
Cure Pity asserts a call to action based on admiration instead of despair. In for-profit marketing terms, the tagline competitively positions Gillette Children’s as an organization focused on overall improvement of quality of life. Other hospital systems seem more symptom- and condition-focused in comparison.
From a visual perspective, the campaign has one unrealized opportunity. It could do much more to back up the inspiring images, and inspired copywriting, with inspired design. Something to stimulate the eye as much as the spirit, and likewise, to promote immediate recognition. Copy works together with design; if either seems weaker than the other, it can appear as though an organization is not fully committed to delivering what it says.
(A long time ago Blue Cross Blue Shield's "Do" campaign introduced a design approach that was unusually sophisticated for an insurance company. It was hot. And it was immediately recognizable. It's getting tired now, probably because Crispin Porter + Bogusky has left the building. Many non- and semi-non-profit organizations end up here: taking over a creative services role that falls outside of their core strengths. Neither the organization nor its agency can afford to maintain the relationship.)
Rethinking the way design can frame the existing patient stories and messaging is one way to refresh Cure Pity’s media approach, which is actually a few years’ old now. The brand messaging is strong and there’s no need to reinvent it, but the organization could look again at how it is expressed.
The strength of Cure Pity is storytelling. As a creative achievement, it asserts a social message that also helps a mission-driven organization continue to do great work. Advertising becomes culturally relevant when it can do either one of those things; curing pity does both.
- Eric Hayward
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Are doctors easily influenced by drug marketing?
Legislation at federal and state levels places an increasing amount of restriction on pharmaceutical marketing. Proposed bills in the State of Minnesota, which would prohibit pharmaceutical companies from buying doctors' prescribing records, require unbiased drug data, and expand reporting requirements for organizations receiving gifts and consulting fees, are just the latest example of an established trend.
(Article at MPR.org: http://ow.ly/10zlT)
Most restrictive legislation is created under the assumption that doctors are easily influenced by drug marketing.
Is this true?
Doctors are people, and, with administrative pressure to see more patients in less time, its understandable they *might* rely on information from drug companies more than they would if they had more time for their own research.
At the same time, the medical profession is founded on solemn oaths to put patients first. Most doctors choose the job out of a sincere desire to serve.
It's equally likely that these trained professionals would hold drug company claims at arm's length, ensuring they had the best, and not just the most convenient, information at hand to ensure patients receive the best care.
Are we giving doctors enough credit? Don't have an answer to this one, so feel free to weigh in.
Most restrictive legislation is created under the assumption that doctors are easily influenced by drug marketing.
Is this true?
Doctors are people, and, with administrative pressure to see more patients in less time, its understandable they *might* rely on information from drug companies more than they would if they had more time for their own research.
At the same time, the medical profession is founded on solemn oaths to put patients first. Most doctors choose the job out of a sincere desire to serve.
It's equally likely that these trained professionals would hold drug company claims at arm's length, ensuring they had the best, and not just the most convenient, information at hand to ensure patients receive the best care.
Are we giving doctors enough credit? Don't have an answer to this one, so feel free to weigh in.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
why is health care so boring (part 1 of 2)
Check out this SlideShare Presentation:
why is health care so boring
View more documents from Eric Hayward.
where to go from here ("why is health care so boring?" part 2)
Check out this SlideShare Presentation:
Part 2: Where to go from here
View more documents from Eric Hayward.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
How Emotions Shape Our World.
Are we engaging in honest, compassionate communication when we talk to people about their health, or just spewing data? More importantly, are we listening?
If you go far enough out into space, the Earth looks like little more than a pale blue dot. Astronomer Carl Sagan said the following about such a picture of Earth, taken by Voyager spacecraft, in an excerpt from a 1996 commencement address.
That's home. On it...every hunter and forager...every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every...mother and father, every inventor and explorer...every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam. Think of the rivers of blood spilled [to] become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.
The delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe [is] challenged by this point of pale light... To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
From this perspective, it’s hard, at first, to think that anything we do matters. Fortunately we have emotions. Seemingly at war with the cold logic of space, the color of emotion paints our world as far bigger than a mere dot. Logic assembles our experience as data and facts. Emotions, however, spin facts into stories.
Telling ourselves these stories we define realities that challenge meaninglessness. These are the realities of family, lovers, and friends. Our emotions expand the significance of these circles to become worlds in themselves.
Health care: world of confusion
Are we pushing out data or addressing people's emotions when we talk to them about health?
(continues)
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5
If you go far enough out into space, the Earth looks like little more than a pale blue dot. Astronomer Carl Sagan said the following about such a picture of Earth, taken by Voyager spacecraft, in an excerpt from a 1996 commencement address.
That's home. On it...every hunter and forager...every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every...mother and father, every inventor and explorer...every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam. Think of the rivers of blood spilled [to] become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.The delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe [is] challenged by this point of pale light... To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
From this perspective, it’s hard, at first, to think that anything we do matters. Fortunately we have emotions. Seemingly at war with the cold logic of space, the color of emotion paints our world as far bigger than a mere dot. Logic assembles our experience as data and facts. Emotions, however, spin facts into stories.
Telling ourselves these stories we define realities that challenge meaninglessness. These are the realities of family, lovers, and friends. Our emotions expand the significance of these circles to become worlds in themselves.
Health care: world of confusion
Are we pushing out data or addressing people's emotions when we talk to them about health?
(continues)
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5
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