Harnessing Social Marketing Theory- Influencing Behavior for Health

Harnessing Social Marketing Theory- Influencing Behavior for Health

The social marketing theory is a combination of several theories aimed at influencing socially accepted attitudes and behaviors. The theory integrates marketing ideas and techniques to promote socially accepted behaviors and relay valuable information that is socially beneficial to society. This paper discusses the four main principles of this theory while explaining its application in influencing behavior in healthy and unhealthy ways. Additionally, the paper will indicate the competencies and responsibilities of health education professionals as they are applicable to the theory.

Key Principles

The four major components of social marketing theory include product, place, price, and promotion, also known as the 4Ps of social marketing. The first component, product, refers to the content. The quality of the content determines the marketing goals. A successful product should be constructed around consistent styles, themes, quality, and consistency. In this theory, the price refers to the monetary or non-monetary value associated with accessing and consuming data around the marketer’s efforts. Place refers to ensuring the target audience receives the product through the best channels available. Consumers must know where to get the product to buy. Finally, promotion entails all the things the marketer can do to facilitate the awareness of the product, such as running ads. Promotions should be aimed at calling for action.

Influencing Behavior

Through social marketing theory, systematic organizational responses can be achieved to address challenges in public health. Currently, social theorists are implementing commercial methods such as examining the target audience, providing tailor-made messages, and instituting the objectives of targeted behaviors in consumers. For instance, HIV prevention campaigns aimed at reaching high-risk populations can be advocated using social marketing since most of these populations is available online and can be targeted through social media. Therefore, promoting healthy sexual behavior can easily be socially marketed. Thus, HIV incidences can be reduced in the target audience (Rundle-Thiele et al., 2019). The market can be segmented to address the social norms alongside the cultural behaviors of subgroups.

Inversely, the competition for health messages promoted by social marketers promotes unhealthy social behavior. For instance, since promotions used in social marketing are aimed at influencing social behavior, the messages provided in the advertisements develop unhealthy eating habits. Additionally, seductive lifestyles are encouraged by alluring images. Cigarette marketing is one example of social marketing that helps unhealthy habits. While they were referred to as the torches of freedom to symbolize women’s liberation, smoking cigarettes is an unhealthy social behavior that can lead to addiction (Rundle-Thiele et al., 2019).

According to the ‘SBCC Challenge’ video, to help individuals adopt healthy behaviors, a more participatory social marketing approach is required. This social marketing approach has been pivotal in promoting healthy behavior changes in the individual, community, and global levels, for example, it has been pivotal in promoting the reduction of cigarette smoking among individuals and promoting immunizations in the community and global levels (The Health Communication Capacity Collaborative, 2016).

Competencies and Responsibilities

Health education professionals are charged with several responsibilities, which include communication and advocacy for health education. Through creating and advancing social marketing theories, these specialists help marketers strategize on healthy marketing techniques. Through the implementation of multimodal communication approaches, they can reach a wider audience with variable health concerns. Additionally, these professionals can assess the individual and community needs for health education. Their role in advocacy for behavioral and environmental policy change aimed at implementing community health initiatives that promote healthy behavior would be beneficial. Finally, these professionals have the responsibility of planning health education programs based on behavioral theory. Therefore, through the collection and evaluation of research data on health education, they can assess the effectiveness of these programs in relation to the reaction of messages, awareness of the audience, and the outcomes.

References:

Rundle-Thiele, S., David, P., Willmott, T., Pang, B., Eagle, L., & Hay, R. (2019). Social marketing theory development goals: an agenda to drive change. Journal of Marketing Management, 35(1-2), 160-181.

The Health Communication Capacity Collaborative, 2016. The SBCC Challenge.

Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utW3c7ybv98> [Accessed 18 April 2020].

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The social marketing theory is a combination of theories that aim to influence attitudes and behavior. The theory has been applied extensively in the public health field to influence both healthy and unhealthy behavior. While behavior influence is one main objective of the theory, it relies on four basic principles.

Identify and describe the four main principles of the social marketing theory.
Provide at least one example of how the theory can be applied to influence behavior in a healthy way and an unhealthy way.
View the Social and behavioral change communication challenge (SBCC)

at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utW3c7ybv98&feature=youtu.be.
According to the video, what social marketing approach is needed today to effectively influence health behaviors?
Identify two areas mentioned in the video where social marketing has been used and found to be successful in promoting health behavior changes.
Which responsibilities and competencies of a health education specialist can the social marketing theory apply to? Please explain.
Length: 2-3 pages (excluding the cover page and the reference list