work >>> News

Celebrating 20 years of fighting breast cancer in KC

News | Print | Susan G Komen Greater Kansas City | By jim

hippos like giving back, so it’s no surprise that many of us are involved in a variety of organizations. For Gina Littlejohn, hippo account coordinator, the one near and dear to her heart is Susan G. Komen Greater Kansas City, where she volunteers on their marketing task force committee.

Gina didn’t waste any time volunteering hippo to help design posters to commemorate the group’s 20th anniversary.

We took them two ideas initially. They liked both, so we ended up turning one into an ad series and the other into a poster. The ad series celebrates local survivors with portraits and personal quotes, while showing that the organization has raised more than $10 million for local communities over the past 20 years. The poster celebrates the local Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure by highlighting the t-shirt designs from the past two decades.

So far, they’ve been a huge hit. Since debuting them in April, the group has plans to do 14 more portrait posters. 20 local survivors to celebrate 20 years of local giving.

Check out the first series here. 1 2 3 4 5 6

And be sure to visit their website to see how you can get involved.

Hippo releases new social platform for healthcare brands

News | OSF HealthCare | By jim

Although National Doctors’ Day has been an officially recognized day since 1990, it seems that, lately, more and more providers are starting to call attention to it. Typically, that’s been through a print ad or two, posters and maybe a direct mail piece.

But hippo got to thinking: is there a better way to engage the public … to help them express their appreciation for their doctors?

That thinking led to the creation of “High-Fives for Healing Hands” – a templated microsite that hospitals can brand. The site allows viewers to give “virtual high-fives” to the physicians they appreciate, and then share their “high-fives” with others. It’s also designed as a “responsive” site, meaning it’s optimized for viewing on multiple devices, including iPads and smartphones.

We rolled out our first one this past March for OSF HealthCare, a 9-hospital system in Illinois. Within 11 days, they logged almost 7,000 online visits. What’s more, the average viewer spent more than 3.5 minutes on the site submitting and viewing “high-fives.”

If your healthcare organization is looking for a better way to promote National Doctors’ Day – and digitally engage your patients – give us a call. We’ll show you a creative alternative that’s already proving to work.

See more here. 1 2 3 4 5

Is healthcare going mobile?

News | By jim

hippowatch

That’s what we wanted to know when we took a quick look around the mobile health scene in our latest hippowatch email.

Not surprisingly, we found that people love their smartphones. Half of America owns them. And despite the sore eyes and finger cramps that sometimes come with them, smartphones are increasingly supporting a wide variety of healthcare apps.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration reported more than 17,200 health and fitness apps and at least 14,500 medical apps on the market in mid-2012. And it’s not just consumers using them. 50 percent of physicians use apps on the job. And 40 percent believe mobile health can reduce patient visits to physicians.

From our perspective, that’s a signal that mobile health can – and probably will – have significant effects on the future of patient caregiver interactions.

You can check out other interesting stats here in the hippowatch.

While you’re at it, check out the latest responsive project we did for OSF HealthCare. It’s a responsive microsite that allowed patients to express virtual high-fives to doctors they appreciate.

Can buying lunch influence insurance decisions?

News | OSF Saint Francis Medical Center | By jim

That’s what hippo set out to learn last quarter in Peoria, Illinois, when our friends at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center asked us for some help. Every fall, many of Peoria’s largest employers enter into open enrollment periods, during which employees choose their annual health insurance plans. These plans sometimes include OSF Saint Francis as the provider of choice, while others offer a choice of providers.

While they didn’t want an overt advertising effort, OSF did want to do something under the radar that kept them top of mind during the two-month enrollment period. So we helped them create a “surprise and delight” plan. Over an eight-week span, OSF teams popped up in popular coffee shops and lunch spots around Peoria’s larger employers. When they noticed people buying healthy menu items, they picked up the tab and gave them an OSF branded tin of mints and a card that thanked them for making a healthy choice.

Within days, social chatter started spreading. Tweets and Facebook posts popped up with comments like “Tell OSF Thank You!” … “Love how OSF’s giving back to the community!” … and “OSF made my day!”

These kinds of grassroots community interactions are can be tricky to measure, but OSF reported an outstanding success. In fact, there were so many positive vibes coming out of the effort, other OSF facilities in the system have been asking for our help in implementing similar programs in their markets. What’s cool for us is that OSF is willing to think differently in finding new ways to connect with their community. It’s a fresh way to live out their Mission to “serve with the greatest care and love.”

Stay tuned for other cool new outreaches as hippo keeps thinking about creative alternatives to healthcare marketing.

hippo welcomes new Videographer Edward Schroer

News | By jim

At hippo, there’s nothing we love doing more than telling a story. Which is why we’re so pleased to announce the arrival of Edward Schroer — our new in-house Videographer. With Edward on board, we’ll have more ways to help our clients talk about their brand … and give you a glimpse into our culture and daily life.

With the ability to now write, shoot and edit videos in-house — including sound production, music and motion graphics — hippo is opening up new possibilities for our clients to help them reach out across the constantly evolving consumer touch points in today’s advertising world. Whether it’s on-location shoots, or in the studio, with Edward on our team we can fulfill a number of your needs ranging from in-house videos, presentations and product demos, to social media applications and viral videos. And between all of this, Edward will be documenting a little bit about our life here at the agency … so keep your eyes on our Facebook page or website for the occasional glimpse into agency life.

If you want to get a quick idea of some of the capabilities and styles Edward brings to the table, check out his reel here.

The creative alternative to healthcare marketing ... from MBB.

hippo
;