Case study 1
Q 1-1. Identify the name of the campaign.
The name of the campaign is I Vaccinate and the main and basic purpose behind it is to provide parents of Michigan with substantial evidence as to why vaccination plays an essential role in protection of their kids.
Q 1-2. Identify the organizations that involve in the research, planning, creating, and managing the campaign.
There are mainly two organizations which are involved in the research, planning, and formulating the strategies for the campaign and they are Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) and Michigan Care Improvement Registry (MCIR). Michigan parents Veronica McNally and Sean McNally were individuals who established a foundation and supported the campaign financially. Moreover, Martin Waymire was also a key person engaged in research and managing campaign tactics particularly actively.
Research about situation, organization, and the public (Week 3, 4, 5: Formative research).
Q 2-1. Explain the situation (background) leading to the campaign.
The situation due to which this campaign a raised is a tragic one and involves Michigan parents Veronica McNally and Sean McNally who lost their daughter who was only 3 months old to a disease that could have been prevented by vaccination but due to lack of awareness and resources they did not pursue this option or know that it even existed. The McNally’s started a Foundation in the hopes that no other parent would have to go through what they went through and together with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) they raised enough capital and funding to start their public health campaign called I Vaccinate. Lastly the Michigan’s vaccination status urges the state to motivate parents to vaccinate their children through the new campaign because the childhood immunization rates dropped to among the nation’s worst – raking 44th for children ages 19 to 35 months
Q 2-2. How would you like to define the situation as an issue, risk, or crisis to a) the org. and b) the public and why?
The situation is a crisis for the organization because they are tackling a problem and struggling to get people on board with the vaccination.
The situation is an apparent risk to the public because they need to develop enough trust in the I Vaccinate campaign and they must deviate from their stereotypical beliefs about the vaccination and instead get on board with the campaign. They must also be informed by credible resources to understand benefits of making their children to get vaccinated to protect them from dangerous situations (severe illnesses and potential deaths) through vaccines. Without proper knowledge and awareness, plus a lack of public trust on vaccines’ safety and effectiveness among parents, parents keep resisting from vaccinations and put their children’s life/health in risky situation.
Q 2-3. Identify & describe research types (methods) the campaign team understand the situation, organization, and the public before designing and planning the campaign.
Before the designing of the campaign began the team launched focus groups and statewide surveys to be taken place to accumulate as much data as possible. The campaign team also conducted post awareness surveys to measure the projected awareness and how beneficial the campaign has been and will be in the future. There was another secondary research that took place and the campaign efforts direct toward communicating with those audiences who still were not targeted or persuaded such as the African American mothers and this occurred in the third year of the campaign.
Q 2-4.
Result of the first and second research fining showed the awareness of the importance of vaccination being increased and people finally understanding that the only beneficiary of this vaccination is them. However, the research also found that African American mothers were still less likely to have their child vaccinated alongside first-time mothers because both fear and question the safety of the vaccines themselves. The post awareness research also identified areas with the least vaccination coverage to develop the overall public relations plan and campaign strategy and the result of this also showed that awareness had increased, and people were becoming inclined towards the concept of vaccination.
Q 2-5. Identify and describe key strategic publics of the campaign.
The primary campaign receivers were pregnant women and women with children that were below the age of 6. The secondary target audience for the campaign were Michigan providers, hospitals, community health centers, public health agencies, the media, and lawmakers.
Campaign goals and objective (Week 6: Strategy – setting goals and objective)
Q 3-1. Identify and describe the campaign goal(s).
There was one broad goal for the campaign and that was to achieve 90% or higher vaccine coverage for the youth of Michigan and that the community should no longer be in threat of those diseases which can be countered with vaccination.
Q 3-2. Identify and describe the campaign objectives.
The campaign had three specific objectives:
Objective 1: To educate parents about the importance of vaccination by driving them towards the IVccinate.org to get all the facts and figures about vaccinations, to increase the viewership of the website by 20% each year
Objective 2: Media coverage to be increased by 20% each year
Objective 3: To decrease the percentage of mothers which believe that vaccination is unsafe.
Q 3-3. Identify and describe to which type of campaign objectives (awareness, acceptance, and actions) matches each objective you identified
The respective objectives are:
Objective 1: This is an awareness objective as the campaign aims to tell and spread the message of how important vaccination is and to lure people to the website.
Objective 2: This is also an awareness objective as media is being used to educate and inform people about the importance.
Objective 3: This is an action objective and since there is a significant percentage of women that believe vaccination is not safe, they must devise an action plan such as to increase actual vaccination rate and increase visiting the campaign website in order to tackle the problem.
Actions and Communication strategies (Week7 & 8: Strategy – creating action and response strategies & developing message strategy / communication process)
Q 4-1. Identify and describe which types of actions and communication strategies were used in the campaign
The campaign mainly features a parent focused website which has links to the origin of the facts and figures which have been established. Other than that, the communication strategies revolved around hooking the social media community, gaining support from different health care organizations as well as reaching out to people using television, radio, and digital marketing. An influencer campaign was also included in all this which would incorporate different vaccination stories.
Q 4-2. Identify and describe the most appropriate communication process of the campaign (information, dialogue, persuasion process)
Amongst the three processes persuasion process is the most effective and that is because even if information is spread even more the people would not respond because they lack awareness and that can only be created through persuasiveness. They need to understand and be conveyed the importance of vaccines and be persuaded to be in favor of this.
Tactics and implementations (Week 11 & Week 12: Selecting communication tactics and implementing the strategic plan)
Q 5-1. Describe all the communication tactics the campaign used based on the following types: Interpersonal communication, owned media, shared media, paid media, earned media
First method was an approach directing towards the owned media which was the website which was designed for the Michigan parents to seek credible and authentic information pertaining to the vaccination and highlighting the importance of vaccination. This owned media was an important communication tactic as it featured FAQs which were frequently asked questions, and it addressed those questions to remove ambiguity and any doubts which circulated regarding the vaccination.
Second communication tactic that the organization used falls in the category of earned media and this was because the campaign had received support from many groups which led to have a news conference at MDHHS. The conference gained a lot of media coverage due to the large organizations that were extending their supports.
Third paid media tactic was activated by which the campaign was made to feature on more than 400 news stories and opinion editorials in the local state and national print as well as different radio and television outlets. The group organize media pitches and assessment articles around influenza seasons. For National Immunization Awareness Month in August 2019, the group coordinated a news gathering in Detroit and composed an assessment article in the Detroit Free Press. There was earned media in this as well such as the group additionally gave explanations and booked meeting during the measles flare-ups with news media.
The fourth and fifth tactic were a form of shared media as the organization hired more than 900 supporters to join a Facebook Group called “I Vaccinate Advocates” to help it reach everyone and gain the fame. The fifth and the final communication tactic revolved around bloggers on social media which were hired so that they encourage people to get vaccinated and be specific with their target audience. A few of the influencers were likewise pregnant during the time. Hence, their accounts addressed the significance of immunizations to ensure pregnant ladies and their unborn infants.
Q 5-2. Describe the specific timeframe these communication tactics was executed.
The timelines during which these communication tactics was executed were:
The first communication tactic of the owned media occurred in October 2016
The second earned media tactic implemented occurred on March 20,2017.
The third tactic for the paid media occurred in August 2019 where the team organized news stories and conferences.
The fourth and fifth tactic followed these shortly and were implemented effectively.
Evaluation (Week 13: Evaluating the strategic plan)
Q 6-1. Describe the campaign’s outputs evaluation.
The output of the campaign pertaining to the social media evaluation received more than 13.4 million impressions, 634,000 engagements (likes, shares, comments, or clicks), and 123,000 visits to IVaccinate.org via these social media contents.
Estimated reach increased from approximately 25 million in 2017-2019 to 108 million in 2018-2019.
The approximate number of messages that were created and distributed amounted to 39 which was via social media and
Q 6-2. Describe the campaign’s outtakes evaluation.
Results of campaign were followed. To start with, visitors to the site expanded by 138% (from 62,216 visits in 2017-2018 to 148,195 visits in 2018-2019). Media inclusion expanded by 32% (from 123 stories in 2017-2018 to 162 stories in 2018-2019). Assessed reach expanded from around 25 million out of 2017-2019 to 108 million out of 2018-2019
Q 6-3. Describe the campaign’s outcomes evaluation.
Second, post-mindfulness overview information from September 2019 showed that the level of Michigan moms say inoculations are perilous has dropped 45% since the mission started, from 8.7% in 2017 to 4.7% in 2019. Finally, the Michigan’s inoculation rates improved since the dispatch of the mission
The level of Michigan babies that were exceptional on completely suggested vaccines increased 5 rate focuses (from 54% to 59.2%), as indicated by state information from December 2019. The level of Michigan adolescents that were exceptional on completely suggested vaccinations expanded 12 rate focuses (from 29% to 41.3). Michigan likewise improved from 44th to 29th out of 50 states for inoculation inclusion among kid’s ages 19 months to 35 months.
Reflection (Your own evaluations)
Q 7-1. Based on your analysis above, propose your opinion/thoughts that would improve the campaign to be more effective.
There are certain steps that can be taken according to me which would improve the efficiency of the campaign:
The campaign can be more effective if the government is taken in loop as the issue is an important one and solving it would benefit both the people and the government so it will also be in their best interests thus the idea should be pitched to some government official with the aim to get them on board as this would increase the resources massively.
The educational institutes should be targeted so that the youth are aware and have enough knowledge to convince the parents at home and educate them in return about the importance of vaccination.
Door to door marketing can be done after collecting surveys and poll results and evaluating which of the houses have people which are not on board with vaccination and thus, they can be persuaded to think otherwise.