Given that the AAM wasn’t a well-known entity, and neither was the Act, Social Driver’s team needed to ask a series of questions that assured that they were engaging their target audience: “Is the content educational?” “Are we solving a problem for the audience?” “Is it entertaining?” “Does it empower your audience?” “Does it elevate them?”
Leveraging Emerging Technology to Reach Your Audience
“When we sat down, we looked at all the tactics that move this from not just being a social media post or a press release, but to something that is really fun, and we realized that the augmented reality lens was the perfect solution to be able to educate and make it entertaining while working in an all-virtual environment,” Abdool said.
The lens was designed to activate physicians, patients, and policymakers in the journey and potential of biosimilars. Thousands of people across the country were able to engage in the celebration using the augmented reality lens to raise awareness.
According to a Dec. 3, 2020, Social Driver blog post, the lens has been used more than 7.2K times on Instagram, generating over 10,000 views. The lens was also featured on AAM’s Biosimilars campaign website to continue to engage users and was shared by the American Marketing Association in San Diego as an example of ways organizations are leveraging social media to raise brand awareness.
“The interactivity and virality of #b10similars are unlike anything our association — or maybe any association — has ever done. The novelty of being a first-mover in using an augmented reality lens in advocacy is great, but the real value is being able to expand our visibility to highly trafficked but underutilized platforms, like Instagram and Snapchat,” stated Erica Klinger, senior director of marketing at AAM.
Getting Out of Your Comfort Zone
So, how do you get advocacy organizations to go outside their comfort zone and try new digital strategies? Abdool advises that any campaign gets buy-in on goal alignment from three audiences: “the board room, the showroom, and the war room.”
“For the board room, you need to ask, ‘What do the business leaders care about?’ ‘What’s going to move their bottom line at the end of the day?’ With the showroom, you’re talking about your audience – ‘Where are they located?’ ‘What do they care about?’ ‘What are they talking about?’ The war room is the marketing team – we need to make sure we don’t lose sight of what’s going to be most effective with our audience, giving them something that they care about and in a way that they can digest,” she said. “Once you start to set your goals against each of these sections, you start to have a strong narrative for supporting the outcome.”
Deploying Micro-Campaigns to See What Works
Abdool also advises trying out a new digital campaign by doing micro-campaigns throughout the year when you aren’t activating your base in a crisis. This approach gives you time to test different types of creative assets.
“Doing micro-campaigns let you see what works for your base and what doesn’t,” she explains, “so when you have that moment where you have to activate them, you know exactly what’s going to work. It’s also a good way to get buy-in because you can do it on a smaller scale,” concludes Abdool.
Choosing the Right Advocacy Tech Stack
From staying on top of the latest developments around the policy that matters most, to mobilizing supporters to message lawmakers through multiple channels, to reporting on advocacy efforts, success is largely dependent on using the right technology tools. FiscalNote’s advocacy solutions empower organizations of all sizes to quickly adapt and execute innovative advocacy strategies.