Say “No” To Shaving 🪒 To Save Lives
November 1st (Monday), marked the beginning of a month-long movement called “Movember”.
This movement puts a fun, conversation-starting 🗣 twist on the serious health issues men face, specifically mental health, suicide prevention, prostate cancer, and testicular cancer.
The movement was founded by the Movember Foundation in 2003. The internationally recognised month-long campaign raises money 💰 and encourages people to grow out their moustache or stick one on to spark conversations about men's health.
There are steps men can take to improve 📈 their health and longevity, starting with yearly checkups with a physician. These checkups will cover the basics including blood 🩸 pressure, cholesterol, and scheduling blood tests that screen for prostate cancer, diabetes, liver issues and anemia as well as screenings based on family history.
At age 45, men should have a baseline colonoscopy to screen for colon cancer. By 50, it is time to get the shingles vaccine 💉, and at 60 years old, men should get a tri-vascular screening to check for aneurysms and blockages in their blood flow.
For men of all ages, it is best to stop smoking, drink in moderation, protect against the sun ☀️, stay active, and limit stress by developing relationships and hobbies outside of work.
Here are 6 key lessons Movember has taught us about pulling off a successful marketing campaign:
1️⃣ Keep the conversation going offline
It is one thing to engage an audience sitting in front of a screen, but quite another to do it while they are out in the real world 🌎. One of Movember’s strokes of genius, and there are many, was to make itself a talking point offline by having perpetual billboards growing out of people’s faces for an entire month.
2️⃣ Get some headline endorsements
Celebrities and brands have gotten behind Movember. Everyone wants to be associated with it. If you can attract 🧲 big names and their followers on social media, your campaign will go stratospheric!
3️⃣ Invest in technology
Where would Movember be without technology? From the very beginning, the founders of the movement recognised the need to leverage the latest technology 📱 developments to reach the most people. However, the key lesson here is: make things as easy as possible.
The new Movember mobile application, named “Movember Mobile”, has made it simpler for users to take donations and upload 🤳 their new stache, while social media has provided a global platform for participants to share their experiences. As an online marketing campaign, Movember is a shining example of success 🌟 for all social media managers.
4️⃣ Have mass appeal
In a world of increasingly niche markets, it is easy to forget 🤔 that engaging a huge audience is still the ideal situation for most kinds of business. Movember is a truly global movement. It has cleverly skirted the problems of the obvious gender bias involved in a moustache 🥸 growing community. How? For every ‘Mo Bro’, there is a ‘Mo Sista’ on hand to provide moral support, raise money, and lend their voice to the campaign to promote men’s health issues.
5️⃣ Stay fresh
Imagine this, you come up with a good marketing idea 💡, and it works. Your traffic increases, and so does your revenue. You stick with the formula next year. Interest goes up again, but less than before. Growth 🌱 is slowing. At this point, you can either run your campaign into the ground until people are sick of it, or you can follow Movember’s lead and rebrand each year.
From “Movember & Sons”, in which fathers were encouraged to pass on moustache-muffled words of wisdom to their sons, to “Generation Mo”, an effort to reach out to younger people, the organisation has slowly built 🧱 a cross-generational appeal that is the envy of brand marketers everywhere.
6️⃣ Be funny
This is the easiest piece of advice to offer and the most difficult to realise 😮. Some people are funny, some can only ever try to be funny - a sure turn-off for an audience. It pays to hire writers and creatives with funnybones 🤣, and to let them do their thing.
Movember’s very premise is humorous. Moustaches, the founders know, are inherently funny, and if you trust an audience to enjoy the humour whilst bearing in mind the serious point behind it, they will reciprocate with loyalty 🤝.
With these lessons, you will be able to spread awareness about your brand in no time, just like Movember. Do you want to be as impactful and popular as the moustache? Give us a tinkle, and let us grow our moustaches together 🤩😎!
References:
Marketing Dive
News Center Maine
