How to reach multiple target audiences with one campaign

By The Caybon Creative Team

The challenge we faced in our recent awareness campaign for Blood Health issues (concerning everything from bleeding disorders to blood cancers) stemmed from a client-base split between the charity and pharmaceutical sectors.

The charities and pharmaceutical companies (pharmas) had almost polar-opposite target audiences.

“The campaign’s target audience had a huge divide.”

The charities wanted to reach the public, patients and families of those living with the blood health issues; the pharmas wanted to reach professionals and decision-makers within the healthcare industry and even government.

The first challenge when this happens, is the content – ensuring a campaign maintains synergy. In our case, seamlessly blending both charity and pharmaceutical messaging and brand guidelines. This problem was solved by featuring case studies from both patients and the professionals responsible for their care. Consequently, all target audiences could find the content valuable and relatable.

KEY TAKEAWAY: CONTENT
Content can appeal to multiple target
audiences, as long as it’s relatable.

As well as content angles, distribution was another hurdle created by having multiple audiences. The solution is to create a multi-platform campaign.

A printed publication means you can reach the general public through partnerships: sharing circulation with newspapers or other publications, or having physical copies in public spaces, e.g. hospitals. On the other hand, distributing a printed publication at really niche events (like Blood Health at the International Symposium on Critical Bleeding) is a great way to reach a specific target audience.

Promoting the campaign on social media means you can align your content with influencers, key opinion leaders and organisations who all have different followings. If you choose wisely, you can get authoritative, expert organisations like the Royal College of Pathologists to share your campaign with their audience; but also secure social media posts from influencers like Bob Munro (the mind behind the London to Paris cycle) and Alex Dowsett (professional cyclist with haemophilia) to their followings of over 150,000 people, who are interested in the charities they represent (Myeloma UK and Little Bleeders).

An online element to your campaign means you have somewhere for all your social media distribution to link through to. A website or page also means you can build a network of link or content exchanges with other sites. For example, Blood Health hosted content by the CEO of Bloodwise, in exchange for a link to the campaign on their website. If you have a specific target audience, consider the e-newsletters that they may subscribe to and ask for distribution within them.

KEY TAKEAWAY: DISTRIBUTION
Distribute your content via multiple platforms,
through varying influencers and associations.

So, on the World Health Organization’s World Blood Donor day (June 14^th), the Blood Health campaign was launched in print (within the Guardian newspaper and at global industry events); on social media with influencers and associations spreading the word; and digitally through a dedicated website.

It’s worth noting the capabilities of digital distribution when it comes to reaching a target audience. The Blood Health campaign gained particular success through paid Facebook targeting, which meant that the clients knew who their content was being distributed to. Furthermore, tools like Google Analytics allow post-distribution analysis of readers’ demographic, geography, interests and behaviour.