How humanizing a “free screening” offer helped a client achieve 95% of their 3-year goal — in just 8 months.
Situation
Healthcare inequity is perhaps the most pressing social issue facing the medical community today. To help combat unequal access to care, and make up screening ground lost to COVID-19, Moncrief Cancer Institute partnered with Schaefer to help encourage underserved and uninsured members of the community to sign up for a free cancer screening.
Goals
- Craft messaging and materials that would drive cancer screenings among the target patients (3rd-grade reading level)
- Develop tactics that would reach the audience throughout their day-to-day movements
- Leverage the screening to build brand awareness among the underserved community
Strategy
While the offer of a free cancer screening may seem like an easy sell, the initiative faced several challenges: members of the targeted, underserved audience were often hard to reach. Many were skeptical of receiving healthcare services, for fear that they would reveal conditions that are terminal, untreatable, or expensive to treat. Many also suspected that a “free screening” might come with hidden costs or fees. And, to address health literacy, all materials needed to be flexible enough to reach our various audiences in the media channels they use every day, and in their preferred language.
Schaefer knew we needed to develop a campaign that was driven by a straight-forward invitation for people to call in and see if they qualify for the free screening. However, knowing that many members of our demographic would be more likely to do something for their family rather than for themselves, we delivered a secondary message that leveraged this emotional connection.
Solution
The creative for the campaign tapped into a core motivation for the audience and featured screening patients who proudly showed “I Voted”-like stickers, proclaiming that they did it for their kids, their families, their spouses, or their friends. The end effect was a message that communicated that a screening isn’t just something you do for yourself; you do it for the people you love.
This solution helped accomplish two very important things: It turned a straightforward offer into an emotional appeal, which drove engagement. And it also helped the campaign speak more effectively with our key demographic – primarily patients over the age of 40, across a diverse array of tight-knit communities.
Results
Ambitious goals were set for the campaign—and an avalanche of responses followed:
- Generated 1,000+ online appointments and 4,600+ calls to schedule—or 95% of the total 3-year goal—in the first 8 months of the campaign
- Drove more than 16,000 visits to the screening landing page
- More than 8,800 clinical services were provided to nearly 6,000 individuals in the first year
The tremendous success led to a decision to raise Year 2 program goals and allowed the client to secure additional on-the-ground resources to reach more people in the community.
Summary
By humanizing their appeal to an underserved audience, Moncrief Cancer Institute was able to move one step closer to alleviating healthcare inequity. In the process, they generated brand awareness and community goodwill — a very healthy outcome for both themselves and the communities they serve.
