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In: Archive Golden World Awards

2007 Healthcare - American Heart Foundation - Go Red for Women

The American Heart Association's Go Red for Women (GRFW) integrated communications campaign celebrated the energy, passion, emotion, intelligence and power that women possess to band together and wipe out heart disease. Grounded in substantial research, the GRFW campaign created personal, accessible and inclusive ways to help women understand their own risk factors and take actionable steps to decrease them, including GRFW's galvanizing act – the gesture of putting your hand to your heart and making a personal promise to do something for your heart health.

Statement of Opportunity

One humid August morning, 46-year-old Nancy McKesson collapsed in the elevator on the way to her office. She was a vegetarian, took an at-work yoga class, and cheered at her son’s softball games on the weekends. Nancy never thought a heart attack would happen to her. In fact, she never even considered it.

Despite the fact that heart disease is women’s #1 killer, only 13 percent of women in 2004 viewed it as a health threat. This alarming statistic led the AHA (a nonprofit association that aims to protect people of all ages and ethnicities from the ravages of heart disease and stroke), Edelman, and other partners to initiate the Go Red for Women (GRFW) campaign to raise awareness of heart disease risks and prevention.  AHA hoped that as a result of our efforts, hundreds of thousands of American women like Nancy would join GRFW, and achieve awareness that would lead to an average of 14 more years with their families.

Research

Our “American Woman” study involved a national, in-depth look at women of all ages and ethnicities. The survey aimed to determine women’s habits and practices regarding protection against cardiovascular disease. We learned that 73% of women understood that heart disease is a major threat and more than 75% were interested in actively preventing it in themselves and other women. However, because there was no way for women to know, feel and understand their personal risk, it was difficult for them to internalize the message. AHA needed to create a tool that would alert women to cardiovascular disease risks, including problematic cholesterol, blood pressure, and body mass index (BMI) numbers.

In the meantime, 2006 was witnessing an explosion in American consumers leveraging the Internet to research health information. According to Harris Interactive, 80% of U.S. adults were searching for health information online, representing a total of 136 million people. Additional 2006 demographic research by Nielsen/Netratings indicated that nearly 57% of these Internet health consumers were female, and a large majority was over the age of 25.

Edelman and the AHA conducted another research initiative to review women’s online activities and priorities, from which we determined that nearly 40% go to the Internet first for heart health information and most want to receive information on healthy living and nutrition. These findings validated the results of the prior studies and served as the basis for the GRFW Web site and e-communications content.

Planning

Specific program objectives included:

1.Increasing the visibility of GRFW as a standalone brand with aggressive metrics for success

2.Registering 500,000 GRFW online members to receive monthly newsletters and incentives for prevention

3.Creating an accessible risk assessment tool that allowed women to understand their personal risk and take active steps to prevent heart disease

4.Initiating a groundswell of support from women and stakeholders with authority to influence women’s heart health

GRFW honed in on women ages 35-54 because these women are most at risk for future heart disease. GRFW aimed to motivate them to alter their lifestyles with respect to diet, exercise, and access to physicians. Also, in order to effectively reach the critically important Hispanic audience, the plan included the use of Spanish-language communication materials. Based on the research, we concluded that the most effective way to achieve our objectives with these audiences was to center the campaign around the core message that women should personally take part in the fight against heart disease – and “Love Their Hearts” Communication strategies involved:

1.Sharing GRFW messages among women through a new, interactive Web site and an easy-to-use assessment tool that served as our call-to-action

2.Saturating national and local media markets with GRFW messaging

3.Reaching out to influential people (media, corporations, politicians, health professionals, etc.) to generate buzz

Execution

A combination of online and offline tactics was executed to spread the word about GRFW to the target audience and influencers. The standalone, bilingual Web site, GoRedForWomen.org, was friendly and sophisticated, and evoked the look and feel of the GRFW brand. The content was based on what the research determined the target was looking for: informative, personal, and emotionally engaging health-related material. It included heart health facts, real-world, video case studies, an e-commerce engine for purchasing GRFW products, and most importantly, a GRFW Heart Checkup. This risk assessment tool, which was only possible using the algorithm capabilities of the Internet, allowed women to take the test and know their 10-year risk of heart disease. A woman could print out the results and take them to her physician and share the tool with loved ones.

A monthly e-newsletter included heart-healthy tips, events and activities, news, recipes, and promotions. Four national partnerships (Macy’s, Pfizer, Bayer, and Pacificare) were leveraged online with contextual advertising and member discounts. GRFW’s online presence was supported by search engine marketing, webcasting, partner development and traditional PR tactics including:

1.National Wear Red Day: Thousands of corporations and hundreds of cities participated by going red. This could mean local news anchors wearing red or companies serving heart healthy red foods in the cafeteria.

2.Cities Go Red: Landmarks across the nation glowed with the color red, including the Empire State Building and Niagara Falls.

3.Public Service Announcement: GRFW messages lit up the jumbotrones in Times Square.

4.Media Outreach: We conducted local market broadcast and radio tours with national spokespeople, national pitched and paid placements and podcasts. GRFW was seen on The Today Show, The Early Show, Live! With Regis and Kelly, the Wall Street Journal, and Ladies’ Home Journal

5.Rhapsody in Red Event and Live Webcast: Taking place during New York Fashion Week at the New York Public Library and hosted by Sigourney Weaver, the event engaged influencers, healthcare professionals and media in the movement.

6.Medical Community Outreach: Pfizer’s sales force distributed 10,000 physician toolkits, while Bayer launched an online CME course to familiarize 40,000 pharmacists with AHA’s guidelines.

Evaluation

1.The GRFW campaign is still underway, but has already measurably increased awareness and action to prevent heart disease.

2.The GRFW campaign generated over 1.8 billion online and offline impressions during the first six months of the campaign.

3.The GoRedForWomen.org site was re-launched and achieved nearly 9 million hits in February alone, tripling the total traffic of the old site.

4.The new site registered 450,000 online members – 90% of its long-term goal of 500,000 – in just six months. These members receive information, on health tips and events to help prevent heart disease.

In a single month’s distribution, 75,000 members opened the e-newsletter. Since the launch, subscription has increased by 75% and open rates have doubled.

5.More than 130,000 people have launched the GRFW Heart Checkup tool. The average length per user session since launching the tool has risen from three minutes thirty seconds to four minutes and ten seconds.

6.12,800 companies and 150 national landmarks participated in National Wear Red Day and Cities Go Red.

7.On February 14, 2006, Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) introduced the “HEART for Women Act,” the first-ever federal legislation designed to address women’s health.

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