Alberta Prevents Cancer: Social Testing
How A/B testing found the best way to speak to Albertans about the factors that increase their risk of cancer.
Client
Alberta Cancer Prevention Legacy Foundation
The Challenge
Find the best way to speak to Albertans about the factors that increase their risk of cancer.
The Ask
Increase awareness of Alberta Prevents Cancer website.
Background
AlbertaPreventsCancer.ca had existed for a number of years but site traffic and awareness was low. The objective of the site is to encourage behaviour changes in Albertans by providing them with the tools, resources and information they needed to make a change.
My Role
Based on research and information provided, I created the testing plan, content strategy and content.
After extensive research, we gained two clear insights:
1. Albertans want personalized, localized information, and are motivated by statistics and local information. We should incorporate local cancer and risk factor stats when appropriate.
2. Make it easy. Our audiences want clear, actionable steps to be healthier – typically focused on exercise and eating better. Most people don’t actively seek out “prevention” (usually search by cancer or risk factor). We must connect these dots for them.
The Thinking
To support this campaign, we developed approximately 100 online ads that were grouped into three messaging buckets, determined from previous research:
1. PAR Stats – These messages used statistics from the Population Attributable Risk study to show our audience how many cases of cancer in Alberta could be prevented by modifying a certain risk factor.
2. Health = Prevention – These messages focused on telling people that their healthy actions had prevention benefits as well. Through contextual targeting, they were targeted toward people already engaged in healthy behaviours (e.g. eating right).
3. Take Action – These messages promoted the tip sheets we developed for the campaign landing pages and encouraged our audience to visit the site to find clear, actionable tips.
We promoted the campaign on digital networks, including a variety of online animated display ads, SEM, native advertising, and paid social media across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
The campaign was designed to test additional theories about the types of content and tools that resonated best with Albertans.
The Campaign
• An increase of 2,726% new visits to the website (compared to no advertising)
• A 569% increase in new visits to the website (compared to the previous campaign)
Note: The previous campaign was not executed by ZGM and the media spend was the same.
• Heat-mapping enabled us to optimize the landing pages
• Tracking individual page performance allowed us to optimize the media buy, promoting top performing ads.
• We were able to confirm the types of content PAR Stats and Take Action messaging resonated most with Albertans.
The Results
Top Performing Ads
Facbook
Display
