Social Behaviour Change

You can't change people without understanding them. We combine thorough research, audience analysis, and a dash of creative magic to build campaigns that win over hearts and minds. Why? Because effective behaviour change marketing can literally save lives.

Industries

Roll of pride hockey tape in rainbow colours

change is hard

Tackling social behaviour change campaigns often means tackling some of the biggest social and health issues in our society. Rising rates of syphilis. Homophobia and racism in sport. Adhering to pandemic public health restrictions. Responsibly consuming alcohol and cannabis. Wearing your seatbelt. Safely operating farm equipment around power lines. Changing your carbon monoxide detector batteries. Overcoming vaccine hesitancy.

These are not small issues. But, done well, social marketing saves and improves lives. A responsibility we don’t take lightly.

Carbon monoxide detectors with funny faces on them

Not a one-size-fits-all approach

Social marketing campaigns don’t work unless the audience is well-defined and segmented or completely united in their behaviours and beliefs. To be effective, behaviour change campaigns require the audience to be able to self-identify. Which requires knowing, narrowing, and speaking directly to your audience.

Finding your audience

Before you can change a behaviour, you have to really understand it. Get to the root motivation. And, often, these answers aren’t sitting in secondary or quantitative research. You need to talk to people. See them in action.

That's why for behaviour change campaigns, we often hit the streets or even commission research. The methodology can be directed by budget and objectives, but we know that success comes from talking to people.

This research has taken us to campus pubs and cannabis stores. Knowing why our audience does what they do is the first step to developing effective communications strategies to help shift behaviour.

Moving the Needle

Sometimes, social behaviour change campaigns are literally about moving the needle — like encouraging vaccinations amongst hesitants, holdouts, and curmudgeons.

But success isn't measured by clicks, views, or impressions. It's measured in curbing, positively changing, or evolving behaviour. A process that takes time for individuals, and even longer for groups. Behaviours don’t change overnight and it often requires ongoing maintenance and support to ensure long-term change. It's important to have a partner that understands that and creates campaigns built to last.