a creative agency that takes care of healthcare brands
Dr Ryan Wallman
24 Nov, 2014

We had a wonderful response to our healthcare advertising brief for One Minute Briefs last week. If you missed our blog post about this new competition being run by Wellmark and Advertising Health, you can read about it here.

We invited people to create an ad to raise awareness of Type 2 diabetes, based on the following brief.

 

healthcare advertising brief

 

More than 80 entries were submitted, covering a wide range of media and creative approaches. Selecting the winners was no easy task, and of course these things are always subjective, but here are the best ones according to us.

 

The overall winner is this excellent tear-off poster by Dave Holcroft (@paperjamcreate). 

healthcare advertising

 

This poster has visual impact, perfectly answers the brief and cleverly incorporates the call-to-action. I particularly like the fact that it is graphic without being gruesome in the manner of so-called ‘shockvertising’. It certainly hits home, but does so in an understated way. A worthy winner.

 

The runners-up, in no particular order, are as follows.

Louise Egan (@louegancreative) submitted this superb idea for a TV ad.

healthcare advertising

This is a fine example of creativity with a purpose. It’s a highly imaginative idea, but the creativity serves a clear function; it does not fall into the all-too-common trap of being creative for its own sake. What’s more, it manages to balance humour with a serious message, which is tricky to say the least.

 

Chris O’Donnell (@chridod1993) came up with this clever print ad. 

healthcare advertising

The power of this ad derives from some classic copywriting techniques. Echoing the way that we all tend to rationalise our decisions and their consequences, it uses repetition, surprise and (dare I say) ‘storytelling’ to make a very effective point. Who says copywriting is dead?

 

Gareth Horn (@gazzamatazzzz) took a different approach with this idea for a sticker on a bathroom mirror.

healthcare advertising

If there’s one rule in advertising, it’s that you must make the person at the other end feel as if you are talking specifically to them. You can’t deny that this ad does that. Creative, engaging, on-brief: what’s not to like?

 

And finally there’s this ad from Joel (@justjoel_).

healthcare advertising

This is a simple idea but it certainly gets the message across. And again, the imagery is understated, which (in my opinion) makes it more likely to work than a gruesomely realistic ad.

 

Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to everyone who submitted entries. Not only did we see some excellent ideas, but the ads have already had an impact. More than one person commented that they will be asking their doctor for a diabetes test after seeing the responses to the brief. And that’s the idea, after all: creativity that encourages healthy outcomes.

Stay tuned for our next brief.

 

By Ryan Wallman, Head of Copy at Wellmark. Ryan tweets about healthcare communications and pharma marketing @wellmark_health.

Dr Ryan Wallman, Creative Director at Wellmark. Connect with me on LinkedIn