Social marketing
Social marketing principles
We use commercial multi-media marketing and social science to change people’s behaviour for the good.
To start, widentify the best marketing strategy to bring about positive lifestyle and behaviour change using frameworks such as COM-B behaviour change, exchange, and nudge theory.
Positive behaviour change is vital for many industries and topics including health, education, recycling, waste, food, charity, pets, travel, public transport, housing, energy and motor.
Collaboration:
Consider us an extension of your team. We work with you and any external social marketing organisations you partner, throughout the journey, collaborating seamlessly to help you maximise your brand equity and get the results you need.
From the outset, we include key staff from various disciplines to help foster the collaborative spirit and ensure all viewpoints and specialisms are considered.
Our social marketing approach:
Is tried and tested and helps change people’s lives for the better.
The six key stages of social marketing:
Stage 1: Understanding the behaviours that need to change
We start by understanding your priority aims and strategic objectives. The research package we recommend is determined by your needs, what existing insights you have, your timings, and your budget.
What is your ultimate aim? What objectives have you set for it? What does success look like? We will work with you to set some goals and KPIs that can be used to measure success once the campaign is live. This means we continue to learn and improve month on month, year on year.
An initial review of your existing and secondary data on your audience, topic, and industry, helps us identify the gaps in our knowledge of your market and competitors.
Then we design the right research approach built around the principles of behavioural science. Our expertise in applied behavioural theory – including bias, heurists, and social incentivisation – enables us to ascertain people’s true actions, without relying on what they say they do.
Our bespoke research uses a mix of qualitative and quantitative methods, including:
Our methodology mix:
- Community Panels
- Digital Immersions
- Depth Interviews
- Focus Groups
- Accompanied Shops
- Intercept Interviews
- Ethnography
- Usage and Attitude Surveys
- Brand and comms tracking surveys
- Observation
- Filmed Observation
- Customer Closeness
- Ideation and Co-Creation Workshops
- Creative optimisation and test surveys
- Segmentation and profiling surveys
- Kantar, Nielson and Mintel data analysis
Stage 2: Developing the right marketing strategy
Once we have the insight, we turn it into a strategy. Our first job is to plot the insight into the right framework to bring it to life.
Using our selected framework – COM-B behaviour change or Nudge – the insight is analysed to ascertain what are the real behaviours for people in their lives, and what barriers need to be removed so that experience a positive social change – ultimately to make things better for peoples’ lives, communities, prospects, and their roles in society.
At the end of the research, we look at traditional and innovative ways to bring your insights to life, so that they can be referred to, shared and revisited in the future.
- PowerPoint reports
- Insight booklets
- Digital reports
- Documentary style film
- Insights film
- Recorded debrief
Our team of strategic then work the research into the right marketing strategy for you, to ensure every insight has an impact.
The strategy will detail recommended interventions and develop a specific programme and campaign.
This includes the right marketing mix, and agreed level of collaboration with you and your stakeholders. Your social marketing plan is then designed with clear objectives for the implementation stage that can be measured further along the campaign road, ensuring we start with campaign impact and then adjust for greater success.
Stage 3: Creative development
Our skilled and experienced creative team will use their tried and tested creative development process to give you the assets you need for your activation plan. Whether it includes social media, website, digital displays, out of home posters leaflets and stickers, radio, TV or materials for professionals, everything will be provided ahead of time.
Starting with concepts and positioning routes, the team will involve you, your stakeholders and the target audience in the creative process, making it a community-centric collaborative experience. Once all are agreed on the right creative route, the team continue to develop the ideas until draft creative assets are produced. Another round of consultation then takes place before the creative assets are finalised.
At the end of the process, you’ll be provided a creative playbook with assets that can be used for each of your channel activations that you have planned.
We also test emerging ideas with the audiences, check that the evidence and assumptions are relevant and actionable, and adjust the creative accordingly.
Stage 4: Implementing against the agreed strategy
Closely following the strategy set out, we put together an activation package.
At MindField, we have access to a comprehensive set of media options including:
- Digital
- Social media
- Out of home
- Digital displays
- Radio
- TV
Every activation plan is designed to meet your needs, timings and budget.
Stage 5: Monitoring and evaluating activity
Using an agreed evaluation framework set against your goals and KPI’s, we will monitor your campaign from start to finish. Being aligned as a whole team on what success looks like ensures we have the north star front and centre throughout.
We have a toolkit of techniques for monitoring and evaluation including:
- Social media metrics analysis to track clicks
- Ad and comms tracking surveys
- Evaluation dips
- Stakeholder consultation
- Data tracking
- KPI tracking
Stage 6: Adjusting where needed
Using the insight gained from our monitoring and evaluation activity, we critically assess the success of the campaign we have in place.
We look for ways it can be tweaked, updated, or refreshed for greater success. key touchpoints throughout the campaign.
MindField’s social marketing expertise:
We are passionate about making a positive change to help peoples’ lives, to help level up the inequalities people face in health, life, finances and their access to services. We find ways to remove barriers that exist in peoples’ motivations, capabilities and opportunities or to nudge people in the right direction.
We have supported our public sector and health clients in their behaviour change efforts, for many years, through our own nationally recognised professionals and our external academics who provide additional advice and guidance.
This provides the reassurance and confidence of knowing that your communication objectives are underpinned by recognised academic behavioural theory and executed with award winning creative design using the latest communication tools; whether it’s a local, regional or national project.
An expert team of social marketers and behaviour change experts:
Research Director
Joanna Brown
Jo is a behavioural science and behaviour change expert. She leads the MindField research team and ensures our work across Research, Strategy, Creative, Digital and Media is supported by a strong understanding of humans.
She works in partnership with clients to take insight into their strategies across brand, marketing, comms and product/service development.
Jo began her Research career 26 years ago and has worked across industries including Health, public sector, education, housing, global brands, grocery, FMCG, fashion, events, leisure, motor, media.
Senior Research Manager
Hannah Tales
Hannah is an accomplished dual-skilled researcher with a proven track record of leading clients to success.
Her degree in Psychology enables her to ground both qual and quant insight in understanding consumer needs, attitudes and behaviours.
Research Manager
Hannah Abraham
Hannah is a naturally curious and inquisitive researcher.
Due to her background in radio and journalism studies, Hannah enjoys connecting with people and unearthing the reasons for their behaviour. She particularly enjoys exploring the differences in people’s experiences, influences and perceptions.
Hannah is an engaging and analytical moderator and is highly experienced in managing research projects – ensuring smooth running of the whole process.
Our social marketing clients:
Recent brand research work:
Manchester Health Innovation:
There are long-standing health inequalities in Greater Manchester. Manchester Health Innovation and partners have been awarded a share of the £100m Innovate UK fund to run 7 diagnostic accelerator projects to work towards better health equality in the region. The focus is on groups from non-white British backgrounds, those living in areas of high deprivation, LGBTQ+, and neuro diversity.
Mind Field are the chosen research partner. We have been chosen because of our expertise in behaviour change. We bring the innovative research solutions needed to ensure success across the various projects. We know how to get deep into marginalised communities and research sensitive topics.
A full programme of research for campaign development across 5-7 projects, including ethnography, co-creation and testing. Tried and tested methods to ensure high engagement and meaningful insight.
The work is likely to lead on to additional projects across our other services.
Buckinghamshire Council Healthy Start:
Low take up in the Healthy start scheme lead Buckinghamshire Council to question what barriers families are facing in claiming. They knew this important first step was needed to create a campaign that will work to increase claims.
A behaviour change is needed. Those who are entitled to healthy start money should be claiming it. We know that for a new behaviour to change, opportunity, capability and motivation all must be working in unison. We used the COM-B behaviour change framework to conduct ethnographic research with local families, develop creative concepts, run co-creation workshops and produce final creative assets.
A digital campaign supported by out of home and stakeholder engagement materials was developed.
“Since we commissioned the work we have gone from 56% to 70% eligible population accessing the scheme”
– Sally Hone, Public Health Principle
RSPCA:
All animals should live a pain-free life, but some are more prone to suffering than others. Fashionable brachycephalic dogs (flat-faced pugs, French and English, bulldogs etc) can be born into a short life of suffering and chronic pain, all because of how they’ve been bred. Yet it’s these extreme physical traits that make them desirable and why people show them off on social media. RSPCA want to end extreme breeding by educating and igniting the passion in dog lovers that this is not ok.
We had to help RSPCA overcome the cognitive dissonance they’d face in presenting this message to the dog-loving public. We mustn’t alienate owners of brachy breeds and turn them off the message. The focus must be on reducing the demand to stop the breeders. Our research team pre-tested the creative with the target audience to ensure it was impactful but communicated the correct message, tone and emotion.
Our headline paired with the RSPCA pledge encouraged animal lovers to sign up to help end the suffering. We added human medical breathing apparatus to the dogs to amplify their health problems and suffering. The media strategy launched the campaign with targeted social and digital display ads to coincide with Crufts 2024 when dog-lovers online searches would peak, and the brachycephalic breeds would be in the news for winning awards at the show.