Sunday Morning Social Marketing - Final Blog!

So I had planned to do Saturday night Social Marketing to wrap up my project but a ferocious rain storm knocked my power out last night!

I met with our professor on Thursday and she gave me some things to think about and change. 20 minutes goes by quickly so we weren't able to go over the entire plan so I'm still unsure about a few things. Below is my final plan outline, with some of the changes incorporated. I've gotten great feedback from my classmates up to this point so I'm still working on fixing some things, but any last minute feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Fundamental Entity

Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc. Delta GEMS Program

(The program is for at-risk adolescent females age 14-18)

Core Competence

Skill at Fostering Collaborative Relationships (does this sound like a skill and not a benefit?)

Goal

Goal is to reduce STD infection in African American female adolescents through normalizing

condom use behavior as a result of increased awareness and information. (As Dr. Nordhielm

would say, I may need to "unpack" this...)

Time Frame

Decrease incidence rate of STDS by 20% every year, over the course of 3 years (this is based on the average duration of a grant, why typically range from 3-5 years).

Category Definition

STD Prevention in (i'm not the category leader in STD prevention so I need to make this

smaller, so that I can be the "leader". Would "STD prevention in non-sexually active African American female adolescents" be a better category?)

Customer Definition

African American female adolescents age 14-18 who have not yet engaged in sexual

behavior and as a result, haven't thought about condom use.

Marketing Objective

Acquisition

Source of Volume

Stimulate Demand

4 B’s Analysis

Bodies

African American female adolescents age 14-18 who are not currently sexually active, but

contemplating engaging in sexual behavior in the future. (Per advice of class mate, i'm

looking up Census data to find out how many AA adolescent females there are)

Beliefs

I am not aware of condoms

Condoms symbolize lack of trust in a relationship

Condoms are difficult to access and expensive to purchase

Women who use condoms are promiscuous

Only men can use condoms, so there is no need for me as a female to be concerned with them

Behaviors

Before Behaviors

Not aware condoms should be used during sexual intercourse to prevent STD

Do not consider condoms an important component of sexual behavior

After Behaviors

Aware of condoms as a method of STD prevention

Understand importance of using condoms to prevent STDs

Benefits

Avoid stigma associated with having an STD

Preservation of health

Increased quality of life

Reduction in health care costs (costs associated screening and treatment)

STP:

Main Variable

Need for Sex (Thank you to Dr. Nordhielm for this advice!)

Key Competitors

Unprotected Sex

Target Audience Description

Keisha is 15 year old sophomore at Ypsilanti High School. While she is a fairly good student,

her main interest is wearing the latest fashions and keeping up with all the latest trends in

music and pop culture. She also enjoys spending time with a young gentleman from the

basketball team who has recently shown interest in her. Keisha recently heard about a local

organization, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc through her best friend and not waning to be left

out, decided to apply for the Delta GEMS program out of curiosity.

Keisha (along with her best friend Monique) were accepted into the program and enjoy the

weekly activities. Keisha was particularly intrigued by the most recent session

on“Responsible Dating”, as Keisha and her special friend have been spending more time

together. Her friends haven’t mentioned using condoms but since the women in the program

talked about it, it may be something for Keisha to ask her friends at school about.

Communications Plan

Communications Objective: Awareness & Information

(Goal is to normalize condom use behavior through increasing awareness and information)

Increase % agreement with “condoms are important” from 5% to 50%

Communication Media

Print and Broadcast

Online

Website

Social Networks

Text Messaging

Word of Mouth

Product

Condoms as a normal (and important) component of sexual behavior

Service

Product Attributes (Could use some assistance with this part...)

Search

Time

Cost

Experience

Feeling of being "in the know"

Autonomy to make informed decisions

Collaborators

Other Sororities and Fraternity

Schools

Local Organizations involved with adolescents and teens

Price

In being aware of importance of condoms, people may automatically assume one

is sexually active

People may assume you are promiscuous if aware of importance of condoms

Pricing Strategy

Trial

Not sure how you "try" awareness...Any suggestions?

Value

By being aware and informed, you have the ability to influence peers and set trends

No STD

Place

Schools

Clinics

Hangout Spots

Community Events

Metrics

Survey of Attitudes and Beliefs

Increased self-report of condom use

Increase in incidence (note: amount of new STD cases may increase as testing and

screening rates go up) but reduction in prevalence rate of STD as people are

properly diagnosed and treated

Sorry about the formatting, my blog never cooperates. But if you have any last minute tips or

suggestions I would greatly appreciate it!

STP: Segment, Target, Position

STP: Segment, Target, and Position

Key Competitors: There are a few competitors to contend with with regard to condom use. Namely, peer influence, partner attitudes, cost, and accessibility are at the forefront. In my last post I discussed the rationale for wanting to target adolescents who have yet to engage in sexual activity as this population may have an easier time adopting the desired behavior versus someone who is trying to introduce condom use for the first time after not having used them. The cost of condoms can be prohibitive for adolescents, thus the campaign I design may have to provide free condoms or direct the population to places where condoms can be acquired for a low cost. The same hold true for accessibility, as condoms will have to be readily available and accessible.

Main Variable & Dynamic Variable

This is the area where I will need assistance. I looked at the other blogs and it appears that the main variable is the cost of entry into the market. With that being said, I think my main variable is actually Peer Influence, as adolescents are highly influenced by attitudes of their friends.

My rationale is as follows.... Much of the literature i've reviewed cited cost and accessibility as barriers to condom use. However, adolescents/teens are interesting in that if something is the "latest, cool, new, hip" thing, they will go to extreme odds to acquire it. Mainly because "all the cool people have it, do it, are going to it" or whatever the case may be. Case In Point - I distinctly remember being in middle school and wanting Air Jordan tennis shoes, as expensive as they were, because everyone else was going to have them. I was totally prepared to save up my allowance, beg, do whatever I had to do to get these shoes. I didn't play a sport, I didn't even really wear sneakers, I just wanted to "fit in" with everyone else!

So, going off of that logic, and the advice of my classmate, condom use will have to be leveraged as the cool thing to do, and the adolescent with the most power and influence will set the tone for the peer group. In addition to that, does anyone remember the music group TLC promoting condom use in their music videos? I think this campaign will have to employ a similar tactic, especially given the influence the media has on adolescent attitudes and beliefs. I say that because "someone" and its usually a celebrity has to say what is cool. Then all the kids rush out and 'do, get, try' whatever the cool thing is for the moment. Or...adolescents are influenced by someone they look up to...like an older brother or older sister. This actually works really well with my core competency of DST with regard to cultivating sisterhood! See what great thoughts come after a cup of coffee! Celebrities can be a bit of liability, especially if they are caught contradicting the behavior they are supposed to be promoting. But a role model, like an older sister, that is closer to the reality of the adolescent may just work.

Dynamic Variable

I have no idea what the dynamic variable is or should be....I'll have to revisit this after consulting my professor. Suggestions also welcomed.

Target Audience Description
I'm going to skip this for now and come back to it. I need to decide what is most important to include in the description.

5 Box Positioning Statement - Should this be tied to the variables?

Current Do: I do not have sex, thus I do not use condoms.
Current Belief: I may use condoms if they are available, but I haven't really thought about it.
Consumer Proposition: If you do not use a condom, not only are you not cool, you could become infected with a STD.
Desired Belief: I want to fit in the cool kids who use condoms.
Desired Do: When I decide to have sex, I will use a condom every time.

This box needs work, but my coffee has worn off....

Social Marketing Sensory Overload

In trying to get a better understanding of the "Big Picture" framework, I fell behind in my blogging, but I think I have a better idea of how to approach my project. I was feeling somewhat "paralyzed" (which is ironic since we've discussed how certain messages can have that effect on the audience, but i digress...) given the complexity of my topic and not quite sure how to best proceed. But I suppose any attempt is better than none. So I'll do some brainstorming and see where it takes me.

I wanted to get a sense of what other STD social marketing campaigns had done so I did what any other self respecting student would, I turned to google. I actually found some good information in reading various cases, and that helped in generating ideas for how to proceed with my plan.

One thing I wanted to revisit from last time was my source of volume. I think it'll be best to stimulate demand by promoting condom use. My rationale is to target adolescents who in theory have not had sex, so that when they do engage in the behavior, condom use will be considered an essential component. I think its easier to normalize condom use from the outset, where as in attempting to target adolescents who are already sexually active, there may be issues implementing the behavior due to issues of trust and power dynamics. Thus, just like children know to get in the car and automatically put on a seat belt, adolescents should know if you have sex, you should automatically put on a condom....and maybe that'll be the concept behind the messaging....

Opening Pandoras Box to STD Prevention

Given my interest in health disparities, I chose to focus on designing a social marketing plan that would prevent STI infection in African American female adolescents. While this is just a hypothetical class project, I feel particularly close to this project and would like to see something like it (whatever “it” ends up being) come to fruition.

As I am member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc, I thought the Delta GEMS program would be a good entity through which to implement a social marketing campaign such as this given the demographic the program works with. In doing some preliminary research, many of the chapters around the country are addressing STI prevention in their programs, so in a dream world, my plan could be adopted by the national chapter and standardized for implementation across the nation (with variations for regional differences). But before I get ahead of myself, I need to figure out exactly what I am going to do!

The Business Objective and Strategic Quadrant section of my proposal are listed below and I welcome feedback, advice, and guidance, as I have a million ideas and would like to go in equally as many directions. I’d love to have input from any sorors out there who work with this population and particular health topic.

Business Objective

Fundamental Entity: Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc. Delta GEMS Program

The program is for at-risk adolescent females age 14-18. I selected this particular program as the participants are comprised of the demographic that is disproportionately affected by STDs.

Core competence: Cultivating Sisterhood

Goal: Reduce incidence (new diagnosis) of STD infection in African American female adolescents.

Time frame: Ideally I would like to observe a decline in incidence of STDS every year, over the course of 3 years.

Strategic Quadrant

Category Definition: STD Prevention

Customer Definition: African American female adolescents age 14-18 who would like to protect themselves from STD infection.

Marketing Objective: My objective is to prevent STD infection in African American adolescents age 14-18.

Source of Volume: This is where I have to think the most about my plan. I’m not sure if I should “steal share” or “generate demand”.

Options include:
Abstinence - Generate demand among those who are abstaining from sexual behavior
"Promotion of do not have sex instead" of "engage in safe sexual behavior"
Increase age of sexual debut
Promotion of the benefit of waiting until older to initiate engaging in sexual behavior

Condom Use:
Initiate condom use behavior
Make condom use consistent
Multiple Partners
Reduce number of partners

4 B’s Analysis:

Bodies: All African American female adolescents age 14-18 who are contemplating engaging in sexual behavior

Beliefs:
I won’t be cool if I do not have sex.
“I’m Clean” or “My partner is clean”
I can’t risk being caught with condoms because I’ll get in trouble by my parents.
If we use condoms, my partner doesn’t love me.
If I ask him to use a condom he’ll leave me or think I’m cheating.
I can’t afford to purchase condoms.
I don’t know where to get condoms,
I don’t know how to use condoms.

Behaviors

Before Behaviors:
Engaging in sex with multiple partners
Engaging in sex without using a condom
Inconsistently using condoms

After Behaviors:
Reduction in number of partners.
Consistent use of condoms during sexual intercourse.
Proper condom use

My Foray into Social Marketing

As a future public health professional I thought it would important to take a course in Social Marketing. Our first class was Monday evening, it is now Thursday afternoon, and I have no idea what topic I will select for my project (a draft of which is due Monday...). There are so many health related behaviors to change, I'm not sure which one to begin with. With that being said, I'll execute my favorite behavior of procrastination and continue to ponder on how I will change the wolrd through marketing behavior change....