Social Marketing

Social marketing is the use of marketing principles to influence human behaviour in order to improve health or in some other way, benefit society.

As successful social marketers, we understand the following principles.

We need to know our AUDIENCE and put them at the centre of every decision we make. Social marketing begins and ends with our target audience. In order to understand why our audience isn’t doing what we want them to do, we must understand what barriers are getting in their way.

As a client of Push Productions, it will be important to understand that you are not the target audience.

Social marketing is about ACTION. The process of heightening awareness, shifting attitudes and strengthening knowledge is valuable if, and only if, it leads to action on behalf of our targeted audience. We need to be absolutely clear in what you want your audience to know and do.

We accept that there must be an EXCHANGE. If we want someone to give up, or modify, an old behaviour or accept a new one, we must offer that person something very appealing in return. In commercial marketing, there are tangible exchanges (give me $3.00 and I’ll give you a Pepsi) and intangible exchanges (by drinking Pepsi, you’re also receiving everything that goes with the image of the brand).

In social marketing, we must know our audience well enough to understand what will motivate them to make changes in their lives. What benefits can we offer to help them over the hump? How can we make it easier for them to change?

We accept that COMPETITION always exists. Our audience, at any time, can choose to do something else. We also accept that we may be competing with other marketers and messages. For instance, if we want to inform our audience that drinking water is far healthier than drinking Pepsi, we will be competing with multimillion dollar campaigns that say that Pepsi is more refreshing to drink and far more trendy to consume than water.