Kaiser Family Foundation/Viacom
From 2002 to 2005, as part of the DDB team, we worked with the Kaiser Family Foundation and Viacom on KNOW HIV/AIDS, a global campaign to combat AIDS through public service messages. Our challenge was to position the disease as preventable, indicating that the devastating death toll can be reversed. Many Americans don’t think the disease affects them, so first we needed to get the U.S. general population and opinion leaders to care about the international epidemic. Then we needed to convince them that the AIDS trend could be turned. To do this, we brought life to the question “what if AIDS affected your community like it affects other regions of the world?” and the idea that “young people are at the center of the epidemic, and through them we can turn the tide.” Coupled with a compelling message that solutions exist, we used the emotional medium of broadcast to raise awareness (including the first-ever AIDS awareness spot to run during the Super Bowl) combined with 1:1 mediums to drive action. Over the course of the campaign, our Emmy-winning work drove 27 million unique visitors to the KNOW HIV/AIDS website and increased awareness (33 to 36%) of AIDS as an urgent global health issue.
Program for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH)
PATH engaged with Global Change Network (GCN) as it was poised to launch an advocacy campaign on the issue of diarrheal disease as a major threat to child health globally.
Because the problem, solutions and stakeholders surrounding the issue of diarrheal disease are numerous and complex, PATH needed to develop a clear positioning statement and compelling messages to persuade external audiences to act on diarrheal disease. GCN worked with PATH’s advocacy team to position the disease among other pressing health issues and crafted a message map that sets the stage for a coordinated advocacy effort on combating diarrheal disease. As part of this effort, we are presently conducting an advocacy analysis and outreach effort with European NGOs focused on improving child health in the developing world.
In addition, we have worked with PATH’s marketing and communications team to develop an organizational presentation casting global health in a new message framework, showcasing its many successes.
Previously, our team was hired to identify and clearly differentiate PATH’s niche in the global health universe in policy influencers’ minds.. Although PATH was founded five years before the first AIDS case in Africa was identified, some elite audiences aren’t familiar with PATH’s work and don’t distinguish PATH from its allies like the Global Health Council and Institute for OneWorld Health. To do this, we worked with PATH’s senior staff to craft a positioning statement, carving out PATH’s niche in the global health landscape as the global health organization that assembles and aligns public-private partnerships to create and initiate inventive solutions that promote equity in global health.
Casella
Casella’s challenge was to turn itself from a company built on garbage to a company building its future on resources. Casella Waste Systems, one of the largest regional waste and recycling operations, has a treasure trove of renewable resource technologies. We’re working to transform the positioning and branding of their company from cradle-to-grave to grave-to-cradle, where what was once considered waste is now new resources. Over the last year, we collaborated with Casella in partnership with DDB Brand Integrity Group to create and launch the company’s new positioning, “Giving Resources New Life,” to their most important stakeholders across the nation—their employees. During the coming year, we’ll work with Casella to firmly establish the brand with all of their audiences.
The Center for Reproductive Rights
The Center for Reproductive Rights (the Center) recently completed a strategic plan to position itself as a global human rights organization. Globally, acknowledgment of reproductive rights as human rights is on the rise. However, in both policy and legal arenas in the U.S., reproductive rights have eroded. The Center wanted to reorient its U.S. work around the human rights framework emphasizing the many rights—equality, dignity, health and self-determination—that fall under the reproductive rights umbrella.
Since effective communications are central to any positioning effort, the Center hired our team to reposition it as a global human rights organization, establishing the Center as the “go-to” source for global trends on key issues and a leader in reframing U.S. reproductive rights. We launched a new communications effort for the Center that promotes its programmatic expertise and highlights its values. A strategic brand repositioning and new message framework placed the Center in the media, with key opinion leaders and enabled the organization to take advantage of highly visible human rights opportunities.
Global Health Technologies Coalition
The Global Health Technologies Coalition (GHTC) has a daunting challenge. It needs to convince policymakers to continue investing in vaccines, tests and drugs necessary to combat existing health threats like AIDS and emerging ones like H1N1 to stop the spread of disease and save lives. Policymakers are reluctant to spend money on new health interventions that will not be immediately available, especially in the midst of an economic downturn.
GHTC asked GCN to work with its 25 member groups to define its niche within a complex policy landscape and develop messages that would move policymakers to action. The resulting message architecture is now used in major presentations and policy materials by coalition member organizations and high-profile leaders in global health. It also serves as the messaging strategy, which guides the content for GHTC’s website, speeches and media materials.
The David and Lucile Packard Foundation
For ten years, we’ve worked with the Packard Foundation to help build awareness of international family planning issues through a multipronged approach including message development, public relations, advocacy, traditional advertising and online outreach. As part of the DDB team, through strategic messaging and partnership opportunities, we helped the Packard Foundation connect reproductive health and international family planning with related global issues such as HIV/AIDS and economic development.
In addition to advocacy communications, in 2000, we launched Planet, a full-scale advertising campaign for the Packard Foundation. The campaign increased overall awareness of international family planning an average of 20% for the target audience and grew online newsletter subscriptions 20% per month over a 10-month period.
Kore Leadership
Kore Leadership, a women’s development program uniquely positioned to help women meet the extraordinary opportunities of the 21st century, was in need of a marketing strategy to launch its company, products, and courses. Though Kore was founded more than ten years ago, it was finally ready to make its debut into the world and invite more women to take part in its transformative programs. Global Change Network (GCN) began by immersing itself in Kore’s personal development process, participating in a four-month course to give us the insight and authenticity to create Kore’s brand positioning, message architecture and strategic communications plan. GCN conducted in-depth primary research with Kore alumni, staff, and advisors and facilitated a day-long strategy session to jointly develop Kore’s immediate and longer term marketing strategy and tools. Kore is currently using the strategy and language GCN developed to set its marketing efforts in motion.
Malaria Vaccine Initiative (MVI)
Efforts to eradicate malaria have made tremendous progress over the last five to ten years, yet there is a long way to go before meeting this goal. Global Change Network (GCN)’s client, the Malaria Vaccine Initiative, is closer than ever to introducing the first vaccine against malaria, and is developing a more effective second-generation vaccine, to help reduce the suffering and deaths caused by this disease.
But malaria research needs more funding to successfully take a vaccine from the laboratory through development and into Africa where children can be protected against their most deadly killer. To move another step closer to achieving this, GCN worked with MVI to bring together MVI’s core team members and develop the strategic communications approach to create a greater sense of urgency and value around MVI’s efforts among policy makers, appropriators and other international donors. MVI is currently implementing the communications strategy created together with GCN.