Vancouver Coastal Health and Providence Health Care have launched a $200,000 advertising campaign to promote routine HIV testing to people outside of traditional at risk groups such as homosexuals, intravenous drug users and the homeless.
The social media and outdoor campaign by agency of record FCV, features several different executions with the tagline: “It’s different now.”
Sue Laughlin, project manager for Stop HIV/AIDS, said the campaign also targets physicians and other health-care service providers to encourage them to offer patients tests as part of their routine health care.
“There is a lot of stigma attached to HIV,” she said. “You can inform the public that this is a thing that people should do as a part of health care, that we don’t think you’re high risk by just asking you, because we ask everybody who has had sex.”
One of the posters shows a young couple holding hands and says: “We want to live our life to the fullest, we’re greedy that way.”
Another has a bunny mask over a well dressed woman and says: “We don’t think you’re special.”
None of the creative mentions HIV or testing, and that’s intentional, said Aaron Brady, business development manager at FCV, because research shows that’s a turnoff for their target market: men and women over 35 in metro Vancouver.
“A lot of people check out as soon as they see that it’s a health-care message of any kind,” said Brady adding that the strategy behind the campaign was to drive people to the website ItsDifferentNow.org where they can get more information about HIV research, find out about the importance of early detection, and see that getting tested is no longer a big deal.
“It’s very easy to get tested, it’s not the death sentence that it once was, it doesn’t cost anything, nobody needs to know,” said Brady.
The campaign launched last week with bus shelter ads, Twitter and Facebook in addition to a “sexy night out in Vancouver” contest. First prize is a night at the Georgia Hotel.
