CSUS235 Michigan State The Other Hangover Messaging Strategy Case Discussion Discussion Questions Examining Campaign Strategy As you read in the case stu

CSUS235 Michigan State The Other Hangover Messaging Strategy Case Discussion Discussion Questions Examining Campaign Strategy

As you read in the case study, it is important to recognize that the messaging strategy used by The Other Hangover campaign was intentionally designed to be provocative in an effort to stand out and grab college students’ attention.

1. What are some of the potential criticisms that members of the community might have regarding the approach of the campaign and its focus on reputations and the social consequences of binge drinking? Gilkerson, Gross & Ahneman “The Other Hangover” Case Studies in Strategic Communication, 2 | 2013 115

2. What “public relations” issues should the sponsors of the campaign be prepared to address, and what key messages should they emphasize when responding to these criticisms? Are some of the potential criticisms of the campaign fair?

3. While obviously everyone will not always agree with the messaging used by a public health campaign, does this particular campaign cross a line and go too far in attempting to be edgy? Campaign Sponsorship and Strategy Implications The Other Hangover was developed independently by group of undergraduate advertising students participating in a competition—and the money used to implement the campaign they created was provided by an outside group which is funded by the distilling industry.

4. If you were a key administration official at the University where this campaign was developed, what concerns would you have about allowing the campaign to be implemented on campus?

5. Is the source of the campaign funding, corporations within the alcohol industry itself, a potential ethical issue?

6. What might be some of the unintended messages that community members might take away from this campaign?

7. What other members of the community, such as health and public safety officials, might consider themselves to be stakeholders in a campaign like The Other Hangover—and what sorts of concerns might those individuals have about the campaign? Campaign Messaging and Advertising Executions Look back at the various advertising executions used by The Other Hangover campaign, including the print ads (used for posters and bus shelter ads) and sidewalk-cling messages. Gilkerson, Gross & Ahneman “The Other Hangover” Case Studies in Strategic Communication, 2 | 2013 116

8. Considering the messaging strategy and advertising images that were chosen, who specifically do you think the “target audience” was intended to be? Are there certain audiences that are ignored by the campaign?

9. Do you think the messages and images in the campaign could be misinterpreted (or considered offensive) by some audiences?

10. Are there ways in which the campaign could be adapted to better communicate to some groups, or would this serve to dilute or otherwise weaken the message? Campaign Evaluation Effort Evaluating the success or failure of an advertising campaign is often a difficult and messy endeavor, especially because a real world campaign doesn’t operate within a vacuum (or in a controlled laboratory!), but instead is only one part of a noisy and complex media environment.

11. Considering the results outlined in the case study, did the evaluators of The Other Hangover campaign create useful measures for the success of the project?

12. Was their evaluation design, which utilized a series of longitudinal online surveys of University undergraduates who were exposed to the campaign, a fair approach in gauging student reactions and attitudes toward the campaign? What other types of evaluation efforts could have been conducted?

13. Considering the results of the evaluation, should the campaign organizers declare that the project was indeed a success?

14. Realizing binge-drinking isn’t likely to be eliminated through a single campaign, how should “success” be defined when thinking about a campaign like The Other Hangover? Volume 2
2013
www.csscjournal.org
ISSN 2167-1974
“The Other Hangover”:
Implementing and Evaluating an Original,
Student-Designed Campaign to Curb Binge Drinking
Nathan Gilkerson
Marquette University
Michelle Gross
Ackmann & Dickenson, Inc.
University of Minnesota
Andrea M. Ahneman
University of Minnesota
Abstract
Binge drinking is a serious health and safety issue that has continued to plague
college campuses, despite decades of education campaigns promoting moderation
towards alcohol. As part of a student advertising competition, undergraduates were
asked to develop an integrated marketing campaign focused on reducing binge
drinking among college students which would successfully capture attention and
resonate with their peers. The campaign the students created, called “The Other
Hangover,” takes a unique approach to the binge-drinking issue—focusing attention
on the social consequences of overconsumption, such as damage to one’s reputation
and the loss of friendships. This case study examines the strategic development and
implementation of the campaign, a process which was largely managed by
undergraduate students connected to the project. In addition results of the
evaluation effort which was conducted to measure the campaign’s success are
reported, along with discussion questions designed for students and educators to
further explore the relevant issues related to the project.
Keywords: advertising campaign; IMC campaign; health communication; nonprofit
organization; strategic communication; public safety advertising; social norms; health
promotions
To cite this article
Gilkerson, N., Gross, M., & Ahneman, A. M. (2013). “The other hangover”: Implementing and evaluating an
original, student-designed campaign to curb binge drinking. Case Studies in Strategic Communication, 2, 93-131.
Available online: http://cssc.uscannenberg.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/v2art5.pdf
Gilkerson, Gross & Ahneman
“The Other Hangover”
Binge drinking is a serious health and safety issue plaguing college
campuses nationwide. According to the Harvard School of Public Health,
binge drinking is defined as five or more drinks in a sitting for men, and
four or more drinks for women (Wechsler & Nelson, 2001). This type of
heavy drinking is associated with alcohol poisoning, suicide, unintended
injuries and a host of other consequences. Examining campus binge
drinking culture, researchers have sounded the alarm bells and argued
that the societal costs of the problem, including hundreds of student
deaths annually and an estimated financial toll in the tens of billions, are
often greatly underappreciated (Wechsler & Wuethrich, 2002). Health
professionals, government organizations, and collegiate institutions have
focused attention on the issue of high-risk drinking for decades. Especially
on college campuses, a variety of methods have been engaged in attempts
to curb alcohol abuse among students, and a significant amount of funding
is devoted to this issue each year (DeJong, 2002). Numerous
interventions—from alcohol safety classes, counseling resources, and
health campaigns—permeate the college environment. Despite significant
efforts to reduce the problem, many students dismiss the threats and
continue to make binge drinking a major aspect of their college
experience.
In an effort to address this epidemic, the Century Council (a non-profit
organization composed of a group of alcohol distillers) sponsored the
National Student Advertising Competition (NSAC) during the 2008-2009
academic school year. Undergraduates were charged with developing an
integrated marketing campaign focused on reducing college binge
drinking. Over 150 schools participated in the competition (“The Century
Council,” 2010). The University of Minnesota was among the top teams in
the competition, and the group’s campaign—titled “The Other
Hangover”—was praised for its innovative message strategy. Following
the competition, the Century Council awarded a $75,000 grant to the
University of Minnesota’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication
to support implementation of the campaign on campus and to administer
an evaluation of the campaign’s overall effectiveness, both in resonating
with the University community and in shifting students’ attitudes and
behavior related to binge drinking.
The Other Hangover campaign appeared on the University of Minnesota
campus during the fall 2010 semester. During the summer leading up to
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the campaign launch of the campaign, a team of eight undergraduates led
by two graduate students worked together to facilitate the campaign’s
planning and implementation. This case study is intended to provide an
overview of project’s development, including a summary description of
the campaign’s strategy and creative messaging elements, as well as a
brief overview of the campaign evaluation efforts. Along with some
reflection on the project, including a discussion of the campaign’s key
challenges, successes, and “lessons-learned,” this case study aims to serve
as a useful tool—both for advertising educators interested in instructing
students through the implementation of similar “hands-on” advertising
and public relations campaigns, and for students, who can learn about the
challenges involved in positively influencing the health attitudes and
behavior of their peers.
Research Insights & Creative Messaging
Before addressing the campaign evaluation, this case study provides a
brief overview of the research, insights, and creative development of The
Other Hangover message strategy. Undergraduate members of
Minnesota’s NSAC team spent nine months formulating the positioning,
strategy, and creative elements of the campaign. The team first noted that
the most widely used frameworks of health persuasion (theory of
reasoned action/theory of planned behavior and health belief model) all
incorporate an expectancy-value mechanism whereby campaign messages
influence a set of beliefs regarding the likelihood and severity of each
outcome (Fishbein, Ajzen, & McArdle, 1980). Undergraduates found that
in order to influence attitudes, intentions, or actual behavior, is necessary
to change behavioral beliefs (beliefs about consequences of performing a
behavior), normative beliefs (beliefs about the behaviors of relevant
others), or both (Fishbein, Ajzen, & McArdle, 1980). Therefore, message
design needed to be grounded in a solid understanding of students’ beliefs
of the consequences of binge drinking. To do so required extensive pre production research.
The team conducted interviews, focus groups, collages and photo diaries
and a national online survey that reached over 90 college campuses.
According to their non-scientific convenience survey of friends and peers,
81% of student respondents said they had had too much to drink during a
single occasion, and 56% admittedly regretted their behavior after over –
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consuming. This 56%—dubbed “At-Risk Drinkers”—was determined to be
the core target audience for the campaign. Since students in this category
regretted their behavior, it was deemed that they would be most open to
campaign messages.
Next the team identified the psychographic drivers of over-consumption,
looking at how college students’ common attitudes and values might
impact their behavior. They found that primary drinking motivations
include: social acceptance, newfound independence, stress reduction,
bragging rights, and what the team referred to as bargain boozing (i.e.,
drinking because of cheap bar specials). The student campaign team then
uncovered primary beliefs underlying over-consumption. Findings
suggested students expect to incur a number of negative consequences
(e.g., having a hangover, missing class, spending too much money) as a
result of over-consumption. For students, these consequences seemed to
be both expected and accepted, offering minimal opportunity for
messaging. Extreme outcomes – such as hospitalization – were discounted
because students found them unrealistic.
After examining past health campaigns, the team concluded that focusing
on neither extreme nor expected consequences of binge drinking has the
ability to change attitudes and behavior. Instead, they determined the
opportunity lies in communicating the ignored consequences: damage to
students’ reputations and image. Seventy-five percent of student
respondents believe that when they over-consume, their behavior has
negative social consequences, such as damaging a friendship, relationship,
or self-image. These compelling results focused the team’s creative
strategy, and led to the following campaign positioning statement: “Overconsumption leads to regrettable behavior that puts your reputation at
risk.”
To fully capitalize on this insight, the student campaign team branded
these social consequences “The Other Hangover.” The students defined The
Other Hangover as being the regrettable social consequences of
overconsumption such as embarrassment, guilt, or humiliation. Campaign
messages highlight the negative consequences of high-risk drinking on
students’ reputation, friendships, and self-image by showcasing familiar,
regrettable behavior that results in The Other Hangover. The call to action
was straightforward and realistic: don’t over do it.
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The Other Hangover campaign therefore attacked primary beliefs about
over-consumption: binge-drinking does not give you social currency, but
rather a social identity that you do not want to affiliate with, and social
consequences you do not want to experience. The edgy and attentiongrabbing advertising was designed to spark conversations, change the
attitudes students have about the dangers and risks of binge-drinking
behavior—and ultimately change behaviors and contribute toward a
reduction in the rate of student over-consumption of alcohol.
Campaign Execution Overview
Following the student campaign competition, the Century Council invited
the University of Minnesota to apply for grant funding to implement and
evaluate the campaign. Upon notification that the funds would be
awarded, a team of undergraduate students was recruited to work on the
campaign. To participate, candidates were required to submit applications
and resumes, and in-person interviews were held to determine which
students would be invited to become part of the team. A key component of
this process was compiling a group of motivated and dedicated students
who also had the necessary creative, technical and project management
skills to implement the campaign. Although each student received
internship credit for their contribution to the project, the true value was
gaining hands-on experience on a real world advertising campaign.
Individual students were assigned specific duties on the team, similar to
the unique responsibilities held by employees within a small advertising
agency. Wherever possible, students were given the authority to make
campaign decisions and manage business relationships. The
responsibilities of the students on the implementation team were
extremely varied, and ranged from website development and graphic
design work, to copywriting, art directing and creative efforts, to
researching, establishing and managing vendor relationships. The
students worked throughout the summer preceding the campaign launch
to coordinate placement of the various executions, both online—via
Facebook (including paid, targeted Facebook ads) and a stand-alone
website—and through guerilla marketing and traditional advertising
placements around campus (see Appendix A for tactical examples from
the campaign).
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Much of the group’s time was spent coordinating with outside vendors for
printing and producing various campaign materials, or negotiating and
planning media contracts. Members of the team coordinated directly with
the University’s student newspaper (The Minnesota Daily) to purchase
advertising during the semester, and also worked with professional media
companies including CBS Outdoor (for bus shelter ads) and ClearChannel
(for a large billboard, above a popular student bar). In addition, the
students worked to obtain permission from the University administration
to install temporary “sidewalk cling” advertisements in high-traffic
pedestrian areas around campus, as well as place campaign messaging
within the student union and residential life buildings. Students on the
team also partnered with the University’s athletics marketing department
to ensure that The Other Hangover had a significant presence at home
football games, including advertisements on the stadium’s “JumboTron”
scoreboards. (While the stadium-based ads were “paid” placements, the
independent sports marketing entity that contracts with the University
offered the group significant discounts on the advertising due to the topic
and PSA-nature of the content.) In addition, team members approached
campus neighborhood bars and restaurants disseminating free campaign
posters and branded cardboard coasters. Once the campaign launched,
students also assisted with earned media efforts promoting the campaign
and staffed a branded campaign booth at various campus events.
Campaign Evaluation
A key component of the Century Council’s grant award to the University
was a requirement to incorporate an evaluation of the campaign’s
effectiveness. It was essential to evaluate how well the campaign was
received, both among its core target audience of undergraduate students
as well as within the broader University community. After significant
review of past health campaign evaluation designs published within the
academic literature, and discussions with University faculty regarding
best-practices for health campaign evaluation techniques, a multiplesurvey evaluation design was developed.
At the core of the evaluation was a panel style design using a series of
three surveys, which were distributed to the same group of respondents
immediately before, during, and after the official campaign period. This
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design allowed for the aggregate-level tracking of changes in attitudes and
reported behavior among the group of survey participants over time. With
the assistance of the University’s Office of Student Affairs, an official
university-sponsored email was distributed to approximately 5000
undergraduate students at the beginning of the academic school year
inviting them to participate in a research study. A total of 471
undergraduate students completed this initial survey. Follow-up surveys
were then emailed to that same population of respondents in mid-October
and again in December following the official end of the campaign. In
addition to these three surveys, the design also incorporated an additional
“post-only” cross-sectional survey administered simultaneously with the
final-wave panel survey. This independent survey was distributed to a
separate group of 439 randomly selected undergraduate students, none of
whom had participated in the ongoing longitudinal surveys. The addition
of this 4th survey allowed for statistical comparison between the two
evaluations taken following the end of the campaign, and tested whether
any sort of “Hawthorne” effects were evident among the students
participating in the panel survey. Put another way, the design allowed for
general statistical tests of whether students taking part in the three panel
surveys were clearly self-conscious of their participation in the campaign
evaluation—and thus provided results which were statistically different
from the group taking part only in the single follow-up evaluation survey
(see Figure 1 for survey timeline).
Figure 1. Timeline of survey activities.
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Survey Implementation
Survey implementation was coordinated through the one of the
University’s information technology units, which regularly provides
researchers with survey development assistance. Along with the ability to
adhere to IRB data protection protocols and regulations related to the use
of student email addresses, utilization of this formalized service was
preferable because department staff had significant experience both in
administering online surveys to the University population and in
safeguarding large amounts of sensitive data. All personal information
was stored in a separate database and could not be matched to
participants’ survey responses. All survey respondents were compensated
for participation. Students participating in the evaluation surveys were
mailed $5 Target gift cards following their completion of each of the first
two surveys, as well as a larger $10 gift card for completion of the third
and final survey. This strategy served to reduce attrition and encouraged
students to complete all three surveys within the design. The students
recruited for the “post-only” cross-section survey, which was slightly
longer than the individual panel surveys, were each mailed a $10 gift card
for completion of the evaluation survey.
Survey Questionnaire Development
The questionnaires were constructed using measurements shown to be
valid and reliable by past academic research. This strategy helped ensure
high levels of validity and allowed for optimal data comparisons.
Whenever possible, measures were adopted from well-cited surveys,
including the College Alcohol Study (Wechsler, Davenport, Dowdall,
Moeykens, & Castillo, 1994), the College Student Health Survey (“2009
College Student,” 2009), the Core Alcohol and Drug Survey (Presley,
Meilman, & Lyerla, 1994) and the NSAC team’s own original national
survey of peers.
Campaign evaluators adopted many survey items from the College Student
Health Survey, a survey that has been administered by Boynton Health
Service to students at the University of Minnesota and other Minnesota
colleges since 1995. Using measures from a survey that has been regularly
administered to the campaign’s target population over the past 15 years
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provided an opportunity to eventually compare evaluation results against
retrospective data and to track subtle changes over time. Questionnaire
items asked students about seven general areas: Alcohol
Usage/Frequency, Drinking Effects/Outcomes/Behaviors, Attitudes and
Beliefs, Drinking Motives, Campus Environment, Media Habits, and
Demographic Information. In addition to fixed-response survey items, the
evaluation also included a number of “open-ended” questions, asking
students to write about whether they were aware of, and liked or disliked,
The Other Hangover campaign—if they talked about the campaign with
their peers, and whether they felt that the campaign’s messaging was
effective. Evaluative results provided in this paper primarily focus on
campaign awareness, and message acceptance – both necessary steps
leading to attitude and behavior change. Following provides a brief
overview of evaluative findings.
Survey Results
A total representative sample of 910 undergraduates participated in the
campaign evaluation. The panel group was initially surveyed prior to the
official campaign launch in September (n = 471), again in October during
the peak of campaign activities (n = 468), and finally again in midDecember fo…
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