MARKETINGESSENTIALSCASE STUDY: How Dignity Health GotConsumers to Break theSmartphone Addiction

Category:Social media, digitalvideo, out-of-home

Vertical market:Healthcare

Agency:Allison & Partners;Eleven Inc.; R/GA;Horizon

Campaign:‘Take Back YourMorning’

Timing ofcampaign: November 2015-January 2016

Summary: Convincing people to take back a fewminutes at a timeevery morning toimprove their ownhealth and extend theidea that strong socialconnections can leadto better health.

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CASE STUDY:DIGNITY HEALTHMARKETING ESSENTIALS

THE MARKETING CHALLENGEIt’s no secret that consumers are more pluggedinto personal digital devices than ever before. Mostpeople also know that uber-connected smartphonehabits are probably not good for them. But how doyou take that not-so-cheerful insight and not onlymake it relevant, but also turn it into a positiveassociation for a healthcare brand?

Dignity Health, the fifth-largest hospital system inthe U.S., had been running an inspirational healthand wellness campaign about the power of humankindness and connections called “Hellohumankindness,” for two years in 2015. Theumbrella campaign, still running, illuminates thebenefits of human-to-human interactions with thegoal of connecting that idea to the compassionatehealthcare relationships Dignity Health fostersbetween its healthcare providers and patients.

“While medicine can cure, humankindness heals,” notes the Hellohumankindness website. “We seeit working in our hospitals andclinics every day. It’s not about

being nice. It’s about championing a healthier wayto approach healthcare.”

Dignity Health was looking for a way to extend thecampaign through branded content and asked itsad agency partners to leverage the power of thebrand campaign. And while “Hello humankindness”was built around the goal “to facilitate and enableacts of kindness,” the branded content charge toagencies gave broad freedom to apply new con-cepts and strategies.

Allison & Partners public relations and Eleven Inc.creative marketing agency decided to focus on thepower of connections with a specific look at theconnection people have with their phones. Theresearch uncovered a strong connection, althoughoften to the detriment of consumers’ health andhuman relationships. The study found that peoplechecked their smartphones an average of 134times per day, with 32% admitting their phone usehad somewhat or greatly harmed personal relation-ships. But the pain wasn’t only emotional–40%experienced physical discomfort or pain from toomuch phone use, while 56% had either tripped orphysically bumped into another person while dis-tracted by their smartphone.

THE INSIGHTAlong with the mental and physical health find-ings, the agency research also uncovered a strongconnection to mornings. Whether the phone wasbeing used as an alarm clock or to try to get ajump on work, most people’s habit was to reachfor it as the first move of the day. Fifty-five percentof people checked their phones before brushingtheir teeth and 32% checked it before sayinggood morning to loved ones.

‘Hellohumankindness’is an ongoingcampaign forDignity Health.

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CASE STUDY:DIGNITY HEALTHMARKETING ESSENTIALS

“All of these data points led to the idea if youcould claim a moment back in time, you could cre-ate deeper personal connections. The researchgave us a great hook for the earned side,” saidCathy Planchard, president of All Told, the inte-grated marketing division of Allison & Partners.“We narrowed down to what can someone do andfocused on Take Back Your Morning as the cam-paign call to action.”

The team realized that convincing people to takeback a few minutes at a time every morning–reconnect with family at breakfast, hold a lovedones hand for a few quiet moments or enjoy achat with a colleague–would not only improvetheir own health, but also contribute to the overallmission.

THE CAMPAIGN“Take Back Your Morning” was created by Dignity’sband of agencies, Allison & Partners and Eleven,

along with digital agency R/GA and media-buyingagency Horizon, which worked as a team to createthe campaign that began with a pledge. The Nov. 2launch—purposefully chosen for the same date day-light savings added an extra hour—Dignity Healthinvited people to hashtag #TakeBackYourMorningon social media and pledge to start the day device-free. People were also encouraged to tag a friendand share personal stories and ideas. Twitter andFacebook content was posted from the Dignityteam offering ideas, suggestions and health bene-fits.

A series of online videos were created by Elevenwith copy suggesting, “Let’s spend less time onour devices. And more time with each other,” andintercut with scenes of problematic overuse ofphones–a distracted woman walking into an eleva-tor door, an on-the-phone dad ignoring his child,and a baby who dissolved into cries when thephone she’s playing with is taken away. The mediaplan by Horizon was designed and implemented tomaximize morning visibility.

‘#Take BackYour Morning’urged talkingover texting.

CASE STUDY:DIGNITY HEALTHMARKETING ESSENTIALS

The next phase of the campaign literally took to thestreets of downtown Phoenix, and Sacramento,Calif., in late November and December. Dignityteams painted white-lined walking lanes labeled“This space reserved for actual human interaction.”The stunt was covered widely across news andsocial media, generating conversations about toomany digital distractions and the cost of sacrificingreal interactions.

Through the holidays, the online social media pushcontinued with reminders about the physical andemotional health benefits of spending in-persontime with family and friends.

“Human connections actually heal. When peopleare present to each other–caregivers to patients, orloved ones to one another–the capacity of thehuman body to heal is that much greater,” said MarkViden, VP-brand marketing at Dignity Health. “Thecampaign resonated so well because there’s a cul-tural tension obviously there. People want to bemore engaged with each other and less engagedwith their technology.”

THE RESULTSn 38,000 social engagements on platforms

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram

n More than 2.3 million video views total byend of campaign

n 11 million earned media impressions

The campaign was promoted through DignityHealth’s social media channels, boosting fanengagement to an all-time high. The video shortsresulted in the most engagement across all socialplatforms, including Twitter and Instagram andFacebook. Dignity Health’s social channels featured130 posts related to Take Back Your Morning. Theposts resulted in nearly 38,000 social engagementsand more than 1.5 million estimated social impres-sions. The top social post on Facebook garnered

more than 8,700 likes, 677 comments and 2,007shares. Facebook performed as the top channel forengagement, making up 96% of the total socialmedia engagements.

NEXT STEPS While the Take Back Your Morning campaign hasofficially ended–the microsite is still active andoccasional social media postings continue–DignityHealth plans to continue to extend its HelloHumankindness campaigns in similar ways.

“Healthcare can be a very serious topic. We thinkcampaigns like Take Back Your Morning allow for amore engaging lighthearted approach to the deliv-ery of health,” Mr. Viden said. “We know that themost sacred encounter you’re going to have isbetween your caregiver and you. We want to shareour mission of healing in a way that is broader thanjust our industry and allows for, hopefully, a greatersocietal change.”

MARKETING LESSONSChallenge industry thinking. Hospital adver-tising doesn’t always have to feature doctors inwhite coats and patient testimonials to be effective.Dignity Health took a firm stand to build its re-brand in 2013 around human kindness and con-nections and pushed out that altruism in marketing–not a white coat in sight.

Don’t be afraid to “stretch” marketing suc-cess. “Hello humankindness” was working well forDignity, but branching out into the mobile isolationtheme offered an opportunity to resonate with newconsumers.

Make sure agencies work together. Toooften each agency stays silo-ed in its specialty–creative, PR, digital–resulting in discordant cam-paigns. Planchard said get them together early andoften for the effective integrated work.

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