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Photo: NCHM Director Jay Bernhardt


Health Marketing Musings
from Jay M. Bernhardt, PhD, MPH

 

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Last week I attended a morning panel presentation at Emory University's Goizueta Business School featuring Richard Edelman, Chairman and CEO of Edelman. Richard discussed the 2007 Edition of the Edelman Trust Barometer, an annual survey of influentials from 18 countries and their perceptions of trust and credibility in different organizational sectors and information sources.

There are many important findings in this report with relevance to health communication and marketing. For example, the information source now perceived to be most credible in both developing and developed countries is a "person like me," followed closely by doctors and health care specialists. Perceived similarity is defined by sharing common interests, holding similar political beliefs, or coming from the same community, as opposed to having the same nationality, gender, or race/ethnicity. (The least credible sources were PR executives, celebrity endorsers, and bloggers!)

We know from Bandura's work that perceived source similarity is a major mediator of social and observational learning. We also know from the work of Petty, Cacioppo, and colleagues that source perceptions matter most when receivers are least engaged, and that the level of receiver engagement is affected by perceived message relevance, external distractions, and numerous other audience characteristics and situational factors. What does this all mean for health marketing today?

Credible and trusted sources are more important than ever for effective health interventions. In today's health marketing milieu, overflowing with terabytes of ever changing and contradictory health messages created and shared by experts and users 24/7/365 through every channel, the new reality is that almost all health information processing is peripheral. Only the most trusted sources can be heard through the noise.

My take home message from the Trust Barometer is that effective health marketing must now embrace what Richard Edelman calls the "sweet spot" at the nexus of vertical (or top-down) communication from respected experts like CDC scientists and from horizontal (or user-generated) communication from "people like me." This intersection where traditional media meets new media will define the future of consumer-centric health communication and marketing and will revolutionize health in the US and around the world. Trust me!

Posted by Jay on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 at 5:00pm ETCommentSubmit a comment


Quote iconJay,

It's interesting that the most trusted sources continue to be "someone like me", and that the research and theory behind this conclusion comes from so many different communication streams and is so long standing. Jay's comments remind me of the rhetorical theory literature, in which Kenneth Burke's work on the concept of identification is described as a central force in persuasion. The idea that motivation (or symbolically moving together) is founded in consubstantiation (that is con—with—shared substance. The more I share with you (cultural identity, past experience, geographic location, etc), the more I am likely to be motivated by what you have to say. Then again Aristotle said 2500 years ago that persuasion is based on 3 elements: logos (logic), pathos (emotion), and ethos (loosely translated to mean credibility/trust). Of all of these he concluded trust was the most important for persuasion. Aristotelian concepts of ethos are based on shared values.

Perhaps the identification with the source of a message is one of those few enduring concepts that has stood the test of fads and cultural changes.

Marsha Vanderford

Received from Marsha Vanderford on Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 5:01pm ETCommentComment

 


Quote iconDr. Bernhardt,

Your comments are reinforcing of an article I just read, "Are Your Managers Ready for Generation Y Employees," located at http://ezinearticles.com/?Are-Your-Managers-Ready-for-Generation-Y-Emplo yees?&id=512018. Communications based on relationships of trust are essential in the workplace, and just as important in HIV prevention marketing.

One-to-one with someone we trust has always been the best way to transmit knowledge or misinformation. Let's make it our business to transmit knowledge—starting with comprehensive school health education.

Dianne Green, Manager
HIV/STD Capacity Building Group
Texas Department of State Health Services

Received from Dianne Green on Monday, July 9, 2007 at 11:37am ETCommentComment


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