Why? Because whether it’s social marketing or corporate social marketing, you are still working to effectively change or influence behavior for good–and an effective way to do so is making your desired behavior fun, popular and easy–which is exactly what started bubbling through on the social marketing list serv as others started sharing some of their favorite fun, popular and easy social marketing initiatives. Enjoy–and when you find yourself running around ragged, ask yourself: Is anyone having fun? Is this easy for people? and go from there.
The Piano Staircase
To encourage passerbyers to take the stairs rather then the escalator (and thus promote physical activity), this group turned the stairs into a piano–whenever you stepped on a stair a different sound would echo–in effect, making taking stairs more exciting than an everyday escalator. I can’t find the source, but it apparently had a 60% success rate. Who’s behind it? Volkswagon. Apparently, Volkswagon has been trying out some experimental marketing based around “The Fun Theory” to see if they could create desired behaviors if the action was made fun. You can read more about the piano staircase and other initiatives such as the recycling arcade and more at TheFunTheory.com.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw
The Pink Glove Dance
You may have seen this one already, as it’s been circling the blogosphere for a while. But, it’s an example of everyday people–hospital employees–finding a way to make their job fun while communicating a message–that you aren’t alone when taking steps to prevent breast cancer, like getting a mammogram.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEdVfyt-mLw
Musical Hand Sanitizer
Aas part of Volkswagon’s initiative, they are hosting an awards program on the best “fun” applications for healthy and good behaviors. One entry was a University who had installed hand sanitizers to prevent the spread of germs during the flu season. They found few students using them. Thus, they adopted the fun theory and installed some sounds. Each time someone went for hand sanitizer, a funny noise was created. Results? With the sounds included, students were seven times more likely to use the germ-reducing resource.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9nCRJo73oI&feature=player_embedded
Pedestrian TV Traffic Light
In this example, you get some free entertainment while waiting to cross the street. Instead of staring at a red outline of a person wishing it to change with your desired mind control, this traffic light shows TV clips–vidoes from YouTube, funny clips from TV shows, etc. This way, the hope is that you’ll actually wait until it’s safe to cross the street.
Design you own bottle at the vending machine. Granted, I know bottles and paint on bottles isn’t good for the environment. But if you can’t quite get that change initiated, then check out what this group did. To encourage people to buy water over sugary pop or juices form the vending machine, they enabled it so people can design their own water bottle from the vending machine at the point-of-purchase. Now that’s easy, and fun!
Fun, Popular and Easy…Online?
More examples are found on the FunTheory.com Web site mentioned earlier, and I have to admit–it’s fun just looking through them. But, my mind started going: How can you make your online and social media communications fun, popular and easy to help you achieve your behavior change mission? Now, that’s a weighty question. Then, I started thinking about what is it in a Web or social media behavior change initiative that makes it fun, popular and easy:
What about you? What are some of your favorite fun, popular and easy social marketing efforts? Any of those take place online?
]]>Word is – developments are on the move…
Stay tuned for the next edition of The Bulletin!
]]>Due to the roadblock that there aren’t very many full social marketing graduate programs existing in the United States (to my knowledge)(sound the deans, I think there’s a gap in the market up for grabs), as a fellow student, I wanted to offer some insights on educational opportunities for gaining social marketing expertise. And, some of the resources I myself have employed to keep learning, keep growing…
1. Own your education.
2. University of Southern Florida: Graduate Certificate, Social Marketing in Public Health
3. Numerous Workshops, one of which is Social Marketing University.
4. Contact working social marketing professionals. Read their blogs, websites, etc.
5. Subscribe to the SM Quarterly.
6. Currently, social marketing is rooted in public health, so many practitioners get a MPH or masters in public health communications, etc. (John Hopkins, George Washington both have these programs. I’ve also heard that the following schools have great health/social focuses in their research: Georige, Florida, UNC-Chapel Hill, Penn, and UT-Austin.) So, there’s more options.
7. However, social marketing continues to grow in other areas: civil issues, social issues, international issues, environmental behavior, etc. So, taking related coursework is helpful. Click here for a full listing of social marketing educational programs known to date.
8. The CDC has a great list of programs for those interested in professional development in the health marketing department.
9. Subscribe to the social marketing listserv run by professor and SM researcher Dr. Alan Andreason. Or, subscribe to the ‘Social Marketing in Higher Education’ list serv, run by Jim Grizzell from Cal Poly Pomona.
10. Nedra Weinreich, of the blog Spare Change and Weinreich Communications, has a full listing of resources and shares her story on how she entered into a SM career. She also offers more resources and information on how to prepare for a SM career.
Feel free to add more! =)
]]>