Mass media and social media campaigns

Mass media and social media campaigns use social marketing techniques to try and reduce the number of people who smoke and/or vape by changing attitudes, beliefs, and intentions about tobacco and/or vape use. Social marketing uses knowledge about the intended audience to develop targeted marketing messages. Campaigns promote being smoke and vape free as desirable and attainable. They do this by:

• sharing information about the negative consequences of smoking or vaping
• highlighting the benefits of not smoking or vaping
• raising awareness of available quit support.

Social marketing campaigns use education to:

• prevent the uptake of smoking or recreational vaping
• promote quit attempts in people who currently smoke or vape
• encourage smoke and vape free homes and cars.

Effective social marketing campaigns include a clear call to action (CTA). The CTA prompts the audience to respond the campaign message, for example by committing never to vape, calling the Quitline or pledging to have a smoke and vape free home and car. Box 1 has more information about the CTA.

Campaign messages can be shared using:

• traditional media (e.g., TV, radio, newspapers, other print media)
• ‘out-of-home’ media (e.g., bus wraps, billboards, bus stand posters, videos in clinics, posters at schools or in workplaces)
• social media (e.g., Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, etc.).

A 2021 publication from the Mayi Kuwayu study showed that education provided by the TIS program has changed awareness and understanding of the impact of smoking on long term health in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults. We know that negative attitudes towards smoking are an important precursor to smoking behaviour change. Anti-smoking attitudes are more likely to lead to quit attempts, and to successful long term smoke free living.

There is evidence that social marketing campaigns can help prevent smoking from starting, encourage people to stop smoking, and prevent relapse among recent quitters by reminding them about why they chose to stop smoking. However one of the biggest effects is in relation to promoting access to cessation support services such as Quitline, counselling and other health professionals. Developing capacity to support people who are ready to quit – by taking the systems approach described under Planning Guidance, is therefore essential if programs are to be sustainable.

Social marketing campaigns also prevent uptake of vaping, encourage cessation and prevent relapse. Because the main audience for anti-vaping campaigns is youth, emerging evidence supports the use of social media to deliver these messages.

A campaign’s impact is influenced by:

• repetition – the more often the messages are heard, the more likely they are to sink in
• reach – how far the messages are spread, how large the audience is
• intensity – how regularly the messages are heard
• how long the campaign is – it needs to be long enough for all target audiences to have heard the message but not so long that they get sick of it and tune out.

Don’t Make Smokes Your Story campaign ad

The relevance of the message has been found to be important for audience engagement. The context, characters and role models used in advertising or community activities must seem believable, if people who smoke are to connect to them. When a campaign does not relate to how people see themselves, they find it hard to become interested in the content. While there is some evidence that mass media campaigns do influence attitudes and beliefs of Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islander people regarding smoking, more specific local messages tailored for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people seem to be most effective. Evidence from the Talking About The Smokes project also supports the importance of using targeted advertising.

The Australian Government’s Don’t Make Smokes Your Story campaign is a good example of how advertising and community-based activities can work together to encourage behaviour change among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who smoke. You can adapt and use these materials and resources for your own activities.

In 2024, the Australian Government launched a new national campaign ‘Give Up For Good’. The campaign includes four separate but complementary advertising streams to raise awareness of the health harms of smoking and vaping and encourage Australians to seek support from newly expanded quit support services.

The campaigns will run across television, digital video and audio, social media, gaming, radio, cinema and out-of-home channels like billboards, shopping centres and bus shelters. Box 2 gives more information on the four campaign streams.