Over the last couple of days, the internet and TV world has been ablaze about the recent video the Administration launched to help push conversion rates in the exchange amongst the “millennial” generation. Depending on what aisle of the party lines you lay on, the campaign was either great or just outright inappropriate. However, taking party lines out of the equation, you have to just acknowledge that the campaign.. in essence, worked. At the end of the day, this blog post doesn’t even have to do with the Affordable Care Act and if they hit the numbers to make it effective. I’m writing this because I feel that in my everyday life as a marketing professional, I am asked the questions “why should I pay for a strategy, can’t you just put something together fast and cheap?” The answer is yes, but it won’t be successful and it won’t be worth the money or “risk” you put up front to produce it. Do you think that the campaign that was produced was cheap? Or that it would have been successful if someone didn’t come up with the idea, develop the strategy and execute on it accurately? It excited me to hear the analytics reported out after the campaign went viral, because it made me feel proud of the type of work our industry does. According to a USA Today article, within less than 24 hours of that video going viral there were more than 890,000 visits to the site and Tuesday’s traffic to Healthcare.gov was almost 40% over Monday’s traffic.
I spoke to some of my older, more conservative mentors about this campaign, excited to show them what success is, and instantly it was balked at. They said how they didn’t like it and it was “stupid”… however, to that I answered – that campaign was NOT targeted at you. That’s why you don’t get it. However, if you look at the statistics, it clearly did work. There were 19,000 people who enrolled into Obamacare in less than 24 hours. Yes, maybe that number doesn’t do that “big” of a dent considering the population size of America, but that doesn’t neglect the fact that the Funny or Die video campaign hit the exact demographic of individuals it was aiming to target. The group that is the so called “key” to the ACA working… you know those young, healthy energetic millennials who will be the life long investors of the Affordable Care Act (start them young, right?).
At the end of the day, whichever side of the political line you lay on in regards to the Affordable Care Act, one fact remains and that is that a targeted, strategic campaign, executed accurately, can drive any company or brands conversion rates. Using ALL of your tools accurately, social – website – media – word of mouth, can create the ROI marketing results and new revenue you’re looking for.
