BrainFuel

In today’s episode, we welcome Professor Steve Maddern, Director of Public Health, Swindon Borough Council. 

The idea for this episode was for Steve to share how he rose to be Director of Public Health to inspire communications and marketing professionals to believe no senior management level is too high. 

Our main question was “Imagine you are doing your TED Talk on Leadership – what one message would you share with someone who is a couple of steps behind you.”

His advice is well worth a listen and includes:

•  saying yes to opportunities
• informal and formal learning 
• considering the impact of work decisions on your whole life not just your work life.  

But ultimately whatever your dream turning up as your best self and keeping abreast of the knowledge you need to do to be the best at your job.

But our conversations gave us so much more; as Steve discusses how public health and marketing and comms have become much closer bedfellows.

Public Health, like marketing,  is often referred to as an art and a science. 

We discuss how there is so much growing synergy between the disciplines and that ultimately they need to work in sync to make a difference and be effective. 

Steve talks about his experience delivering a community-based activity campaign called the Big Pledge across Wiltshire. A legacy of the Olympics it used micro commitment to reset social norms. Steve highlights that the first year wasn’t very successful but use of data and perseverance resulted in it running for many years to become a phenomenal campaign that created community spirit whilst helping people to begin and keep active

Steve highlights the importance of attitudes when delivering communications and marketing – the willingness to test, review, refresh and adapt where needed. The safe space to explore what is working and what isn’t. The confidence and leadership to have honest conversations around measuring and evaluation. 

After all how realistic is it to think you can get it perfect every time? (Editor’s note: Expectations run perfect campaigns can cause real stress for colleagues!)

Steve’s current COVID campaign is called  It’s Up to all of Us. It is a community-based campaign - a call to action to protect each other and consider the impact of their actions directly or indirectly. This work highlighted the importance of the application of insight and a deep understanding the audience. Swindon has 40 different languages, reaching everyone to help keep them safe was fundamental. 

Steve says

“Behavioural science is more important than ever and I think this has shown the evolving and advancement of public health, it isn’t just a leaflet or a poster telling you what to do it’s about actually taking the insights from the communities and the people you want to influence and using that along with the data and the science to develop the campaign. 

Q: What makes you – your best self?

“Knowing I can make a difference.” "I am in awe of the team I have around me” 

Q: What book would you recommend

Nudge. The goal is to make better lifestyle choices the easy choice. It highlights the role of policy but also translates how behavioural science can be used as a local level. A core text for public health and communications.

Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness: Amazon.co.uk: Thaler, Richard H., Sunstein, Cass R: 8601404213366: Books

You can connect with Steve via LinkedIn

Today's episode welcomes Claire Holm, Head of Communications and Customer Service at North Devon District Council.

We chat about how loss aversion can be applied to support customer channel shift in local government. In other words, how we can use the science behind loss aversion to nudge people online and free up resources for the most vulnerable. 

We talk about the expectations and feelings of ownership residents have and how reactions can magnify during periods of change. 

We talk about the sheer difficulty of reducing budgets and how once you give someone something and they feel they own it you cannot take it away. 

Claire shares ideas and tangible ideas to use loss aversion, the importance of staying positive and not increasing anxiety

Ultimately to use loss aversion for positive gain. Don’t build messaging around fear.

In today’s episode, we welcome Louise Ward, 

Louise is co-founder of the Behavioural Science Club and she shares the birth of the club following Nudgestock 2020.

We explore how the club brings together practitioners, academics, professionals from a wide range of backgrounds to explore their shared passion and understand why we do what we do.

Books Louise recommends:

·       Alchemy: The surprising power if ideas that don’t make sense – Rory Sutherland

o   The best ideas don’t make rational sense: they make you feel more than they make you think.

·       Ripple: The big effects of small behaviour changes in business – Jez Groom & April Vellacott

o   How to make small behaviour changes that have wide-reaching effects in the real world. 

·       Hype Machine – Sinan Aral   

o   A look at how social media affects our decision-making and shapes our world in ways both useful and dangerous. 

·       The Choice Factory – Richard Shotton

o   Essential read to understand what drives peoples everyday decisions

·       Behavioural Economics – Bri Williams  

o   How to apply Behavioural Economics to improve your business

Behavioural Science Club: Join over 3500 members on LinkedIn. Meet with like-minded souls every Saturday to hear from experts and authors in behavioural science and related fields. 

In today's episode, we chat with the #NHSCommunicate winners.

Edna Boampong, is representing the team from Cheshire & Merseyside Health & Care Partnership Trust whose behaviour change programme increasing vaccine uptake in ethnic and minorities made a significant increase of 5711%.

Edna is now Director of Communications & Engagement, Shropshire, Telford, Wrekin ICS formerly Director of Communications & Engagement,  Cheshire & Merseyside Health & Care Partnership Trust. 

Insights from this episode
Understand your audience. Edna developed a proposal and brought partners and their budget on board to be able to commission this work out.  NHSEI team, Directors of Public Health and Public Health England.

Stage 1: Census data was out of date. A refreshed view was needed. Commissioned a data mining company to get a better, deep understanding of who the audiences are; down to street level.

Stage 2: Quantitative survey in the areas identified. Reached over 632 people in the target audience! Success down to using the new data tool and targeted ads. Data arrived just as the vaccine arrived. Ahead of the curve as aware of which communities were more likely to take the vaccine. BAME audiences are not a homogenous group.  Able to drill down to 8 groups that were most hesitant and focus efforts.  Insights included:  The older you were the more likely you were to take the vaccine.  Worry about catching covid at the vaccine centre itself. No trust in the Government.

Stage 3: The quantitative data tells you the what. The qualitative tells you the why. Ran focus groups and conversations with leaders.  Then able to segment further based on attitude and likelihood to take the vaccine.  key insight: trust in message and channel is key. First, think about the messaging. Second, think about the channels to target the audience with the message.

Microtargeting can mean you duck under the very busy crowded airwaves to cut through the noise.

Created Place Plans to equip the Local Authorities so they can then also amplify the messaging.

Top tip for winter: Follow the data.

Top don't bother: Don't assume.

Book recommendation: Then She Was Gone, Lisa Jewell

Don’t engage too late! How to use social marketing concepts: reward & exchange  

With Social Marketer Luke van der Beeke

This episode explores how to use the core social marketing principles: Exchange & Reward. It also touches on the concept of customer orientation and the behavioural bias hyperbolic discounting.

Luke explains what the concepts are and why they are so powerful.  He ends with a powerful domestic violence case study. 

Definitions:

·       Exchange concept has been around for a long time, in commercial marketing it is a transactional – you exchange money – a marketer is looking to optimise that value for their customers.

·       In social marketing we are looking to is get people to exchange behaviours. More often than not it is swapping out something they quite enjoy for something that is maybe not giving them the same level of gratification e.g. drive safely, smoking, eating healthy.

·       Customer orientation – understanding what you need to do in terms of maximising benefits minimise costs so an individual can take up a new behaviour.

Challenges:

·       Factual based communications are useful but behavioural comms is a different beast altogether.

·       We know through behavioural science people discount long-term benefits …. It informs how we need to go about presenting choices to maximise opportunities (Hyberbolic discounting)

·       Start engagement to understand what the exchange and reward is at problem definition stage! It’s so often late or…..hidden in consultation. 

Tips:

·       Engage to understand intrinsic rewards, the intangibles around the change and what the exchange is through the audience’s eyes. 

·       Stop using long term health messaging. Focus on tangibles and move beyond facts to messaging that  motivates the desired action or attitude 

·       Use the insight to segment and frame communications messaging rather than what ‘we’ think it should be.

 Ultimately the exchange concept is a useful tool to break down benefits and costs as seen by the target audience not how we think! 

BOOKS

Strategic Social Marketing by Jeff French & Professor Ross Gordon

Freaknomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner (Luke’s go to for behavioural economics) 

Optimists Tour of Future: One Curious Man Sets Out to Answer “What’s Next?” Mark Stevenson 

Contact & Links

[email protected]

 https://thebcc.org.au/

The National Social Marketing Centre | The NSMC

 
If you would like to know more about how to apply behavioural science and social marketing check out our Autumn Bootcamp. 

Today’s episode is all about CommsCamp 2021 – Still at home!

We are joined three of the great minds behind the scenes Dan Slee, Lucy Salvage and Bridget Aherne.  Not only is CommsCamp free all the organising is on top of the day job.

Key points in this episode

CommsCamp is an Unconference for public sector communicators; the vision is it takes people out of their comfort zone and makes them even more comfortable!

It’s the tea break at a normal conference but stretched out over the whole day.

Key factors:

·       Leave your job title at the door

·       Agenda setting on the day

·       30 second pitching at the day

·       No powerpoint

·       Cake

·       Curry

·       Quizzes

·       Fundraising for the Christie Hospital in Manchester

Pitching 

A good pitch can be on personal well-being or it can be work related; it doesn’t need to be sophisticated just focus on what you feel strongly about. You can share knowledge, solutions as well as a therapy or rant session. 

It’s a safe container to get stuff off your chest. 

And it’s also about problem solving and passing on knowledge.

It’s like a live Facebook Sector Comms Public Headspace session – rather than posting on the Facebook wall we are there live together.

Dates for commscamp still at home 2021

Pre event social – 21st Curry and quiz social (early evening)

Day 1: September 22nd  9:30 – 1pm

Day 2: September 23rd 9:30 – 1pm

Links

Public Sector Comms Headspace

The Christie Foundation https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/commscampstillathome

Recommended Books

Dan’s choice:
 Harold Nicolson 'Letters and Diaries 1939 to 1945'  get it here Amazon and also on ebay second hand, too 

Lucy’s choice:

The Beekeeper of Aleppo: Christy Lefteri get it here on Amazon

Bridget’s choice:

The Manchester Man: Isabella Banks get it here on Amazon

Today’s episode is all about CommsCamp 2021 – Still at home!

We are joined three of the great minds behind the scenes Dan Slee, Lucy Salvage and Bridget Aherne.  Not only is CommsCamp free all the organising is on top of the day job.

Key points in this episode

CommsCamp is an Unconference for public sector communicators; the vision is it takes people out of their comfort zone and makes them even more comfortable!

It’s the tea break at a normal conference but stretched out over the whole day.

Key factors:

·       Leave your job title at the door

·       Agenda setting on the day

·       30 second pitching at the day

·       No powerpoint

·       Cake

·       Curry

·       Quizzes

·       Fundraising for the Christie Hospital in Manchester

Pitching 

A good pitch can be on personal well-being or it can be work related; it doesn’t need to be sophisticated just focus on what you feel strongly about. You can share knowledge, solutions as well as a therapy or rant session. 

It’s a safe container to get stuff off your chest. 

And it’s also about problem solving and passing on knowledge.

It’s like a live Facebook Sector Comms Public Headspace session – rather than posting on the Facebook wall we are there live together.

Dates for commscamp still at home 2021

Pre event social – 21st Curry and quiz social (early evening)

Day 1: September 22nd  9:30 – 1pm

Day 2: September 23rd 9:30 – 1pm

Links

Public Sector Comms Headspace

The Christie Foundation https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/commscampstillathome

Recommended Books

Dan’s choice:
 Harold Nicolson 'Letters and Diaries 1939 to 1945'  get it here Amazon and also on ebay second hand, too 

Lucy’s choice:

The Beekeeper of Aleppo: Christy Lefteri get it here on Amazon

Bridget’s choice:

The Manchester Man: Isabella Banks get it here on Amazon

Segmenting Your Audience:  Don’t over-cook then under-cook  with social marketer Professor Alan Tapp

 The second is the three-part series exploring social marketing 

·       Professor Alan Tapp began his career in marketing in commercial direct and database marketing and for the past 15 years has taught and delivered social marketing. He currently teaches at Bristol Business School and supports Local Authorities including Dorset County Council, South Gloucestershire Council.

·       This episode ends with an example of segmentation and cancer self-care. 

·       Segmentation is a key principle in social marketing. (Remember we are not talking about social media!)

·       It is also a huge subject. 

·       Segmentation is a way of grouping or differentiating audiences. You can segment by many factors, age, gender, socio-demographic, psychographic. It is a task that needs data and as this episode reveals it is very different in the public sector

·       Public sector and commercial segmentation are different. 

o   A commercial company will draw on years of internal data sources that are shaping their products, customer experience, and marketing.  For example a club card. 

o   Public sector balances political considerations, committee-style decisions, often with few streams of market research but loads of organisation based data. 

·       Once you have segmented ….then you target. 

·       Let’s be honest segmenting costs time and energy – it’s effortful and intensive so when making decisions consider how you will capture your return on investment.

·       How do you know if you have got your return on investment? That’s right – the ‘e’ word again…evaluation. Segmentation and targeting are different but both imply evaluation….otherwise where are you getting that data from????

Tips: 

• Keep it simple – don’t overcook the data and undercook the delivery. If you have core channels you will be using find out your target levels. There is no point in segmenting when you have one broadcast channel to use! 
• Hover above – look at the whole picture
• Get curious 
• Get some insight work and use it to think and plan

Recommended books

Persuasion in Society Herbert Simons. 2001   

Social Marketing: From Tunes to Symphonies,  Gerald Hastings 2013 

If you would like to learn more about how to apply social marketing and behavioural science into everyday communications & marketing check out our Autumn Bootcamp.

Social marketing is not social media

 Three things you need to know about social marketing

This is the first episode in a 3 part series and to  get started we talk about 3 things you need to know about social marketing: 

1)      Social marketing is not social media! Obvious? Yes. Social marketing uses intervention levers across multiple levers including training, education, public health, legislation. Smoking reduction is considered a successful social marketing approach to behaviour change as it tackles multiple influencers at once across policy as well as the individual. Macro efforts including legislation allowed local authorities to niche with services and marketing and reach those most in need. 

2)      There are three key concepts, segmentation exchange and reward.  Love Your Skin young person campaign is used as an example of how to do this and shift from a population approach to a segment that allowed a deep understanding of young people and understand what would motivate them.

3)      Insight is key, actionable insight will help you focus on measurable behaviour change. This is a huge win. Shifting from policy goals to behavioural goals and securing all your stakeholders is key. Remember if you can't measure it you can't grow it and you may be inadvertently causing a negative impact. 

Never take for granted that our audience will understand our message the way it is intended.

Want to know about Behaviour Change Marketing check out our Autumn Bootcamp 

3 research tips for inhouse communicators

Anneliese Levy Health Communications Specialist

Today’s episode offers two case studies that illustrate how easy it is to reframe impactful content as well as three useful research tips to help them develop their audience insight – with no budget. 

We are joined by Anneliese Levy a health communications specialist that excels in health content research and development. Founder of Thoughtful Content Anneliese is in high demand for her research plus copy skills – a winning formula for anyone tackling health messaging. 

Her clients include national charities such as Blood Cancer UK and global pharmaceutical companies. 

Anneliese shares two examples of how insightful based content can increase impact and three top tips for inhouse communicators on how to do research internally. 

Case study 1: Blood Cancer UK focused on reframing messaging around healthy eating that was turning people off to reshaping it to encourage a new love of food. Avoiding the loss aversion of giving her something else you love when going through cancer treatment. A small but powerful change that can positively help instead of hinder people at the most vulnerable when going through cancer treatment.

Case 2 : Physiotherapy for Older people: Anneliese’s research showed how important our feeling of  ‘being young is’ an interesting insight for anyone planning older person campaign’s. 

Her three tips include:

Tip 1: Speak directly to your audience, explore experiences, perceptions and barriers. Speaks to non-experts as well as your patient experts. Go outside a normal pool of people. Snowball sampling is when you build contacts on contacts often through social media. 

              e.g. Anneliese work on pancreatic cancer researched with older people in East London who knew nothing about pancreatic cancer which is most likely the same knowledge you would have when newly diagnosed. This also opens up opportunities to talk about 

Tip 2: Hang out with your audience indirectly, in social forums etc.

Tip 3: Review existing research –for example Cochrane Review and Google Scholar  don’t be put off by academic papers there are often plain language summaries. It’s time intensive but it’s ££ free. 

Book recommendation Content Design by Sarah Richardson

You can contact Anneliese via www.thoughtfulcontent.co.uk @annieislaurie  - Twitter and @thoughtfulcontent for Instagram

Want to know about Behaviour Change Marketing check out our Autumn Bootcamp