Changing behaviors through mass communication and marketing isn't the easiest thing to do. You're attempting to connect with your audience at their core, trying to influence deeply rooted behaviors. At VI, we've got a long history of working on campaigns that focus on behavior change objectives. Often during campaign planning, we use a few different types of creative messaging strategies to impact our target audiences and nudge them toward that change.

Picture this. You’re at a swanky restaurant. Your waitress approaches. She asks how you’re doing. You misinterpret this normal interaction as a cue to unload every graphic detail of your latest squabble with your husband. Next, you walk her through the play-by-play of the nightmarish parent/teacher conference you had last week. When the meal comes, you eat it with your hands…with gusto. And it’s not a sandwich.

Audience segmentation is the process of dividing people into homogeneous subgroups based upon defined criterion such as habits, demographics, psychographics, communication behaviors and media use. This would be the next step you take to learn more about your target audience.

As marketers, we’re used to having research and data available whenever we want it. The days of intuition and gut feelings are gone, and our outcomes have benefitted from the wealth of information that is available to us.

Writing a multi-cultural campaign is a lot like getting a tattoo. What you thought would be a cool cultural nod, was actually not cool and dreadfully damaging to your public image. Pop stars might be able to survive an innocent spelling error. But marketers? A botched marketing campaign translation will have your audience saying thank u, next — without the thank you.

Ever wish you could bend the human will? For me, the thought arises when I see a wailing toddler in Walmart or when I hit the snooze button instead of hitting the gym—again. Don’t fret! It’s totally natural.

Every day, you make thousands of choices. What to wear, what to eat, how fast to drive, where to spend your free time. Imagine a friend evaluating your choices and constantly reminding you of the better choice – the healthier choice, the safer choice. Working on behavior change marketing campaigns is like that – a conscience for the audience nudging them in the right direction.

Advertising hasn’t always been seen as the most trusted industry. It’s known for half-truths and bait-and-switches in the name of a few extra dollars.

While TV and print budgets continue to decrease year after year, out-of-home budgets continue to grow with an estimated $29 billion for global out-of-home ad revenue in 2017. It’s projected to reach $33 billion by 2021, reported by the Outdoor Advertising Association of America and MAGNA Intelligence Study. So how is it that the oldest form of advertising is still growing year after year? The answer is technology and data.

Have you ever purchased a pair of Toms shoes? Or Warby Parker glasses? Remember when the Honey Nut Cheerios bee disappeared from cereal boxes? Or that one time you were waiting in line at Walgreens and you noticed a large poster of Ben Stiller wearing a red clown nose behind the register?

Remember the adorable scene in Finding Nemo where Nemo and his dad nestle into their sea anemone homes for safety? It reveals a biological interaction between two organisms living in close physical association, referred to as symbiosis.

In February, SNL hilariously parodied the world of advertising and marketing with the “Pitch Meeting” sketch. In the skit, Alec Baldwin and Aidy Bryant are two ad execs, pitching Cheetos against a rival agency. In increasingly tone-deaf creative proposals, the duo appropriates one social issue after another, trying to prove their cultural relevancy while completely losing sight of the product.