The Challenge

Smoking kills 120,000 people every year. Although smoking peaked in the 1950s and 1960s the downward trend was levelling out in the nineties.

New government targets were set in 1998, aiming to reduce the level of adult smoking from 28% to 24% by 2010, with a fall to 26% by 2005.

The new campaign was based on a different approach. Rather than simply provide information on how smoking damaged health, the Department of Health would also support them in their battle with nicotine.

To increase quitters’ success rates there would be online help, a smoking helpline, a face-to-face support network and free nicotine replacement therapy on prescription.

With 76% of smokers claiming they want to give up, the message was pushing at an open door. However while international experience indicated that shock tactics such as exposing the industry’s marketing ploys and promoting the damage that smoking does to children were effective, some of these messages were too strong for an official campaign.

Given that the government takes lots of tax from tobacco sales, the hardest messages would be more credible coming from other sources. In November 2002 the Department of Health committed to funding tobacco control campaigns by charities.

The TV Solution

Cancer Research ran a multimedia campaign entitled Death Repackaged in 2003. The campaign, which ran on TV, radio, press and beer mats, looked to illustrate the hidden dangers of terms like 'light' and 'mild' by featuring dangerous creatures with cuddly names.

In 2004 the British Heart Foundation launched Artery, a TV, poster and press campaign that highlighted the damage that cigarettes can do by clogging up arteries.

At the same time, the NHS ran two separate campaigns, the first highlighted the health risks to children from passive smoking. This ran in 2003 across TV, cinema, press, posters and on bibs.

The second campaign Testimonials ran on TV, press and radio in 2003 and 2004 and featured smokers to show the health consequences the habit can cause. Janice showed a woman reliant on oxygen tanks while Jak featured a man who had suffered a heart attack.

According to Nielsen Media Research TV took 92.8% of the total budget in 2003 with activity focused on July and September, October and November. In 2004 activity was once again concentrated in the second six months particularly in July, August, October and November. TV took just under 75% of spend in 2004.

The Results

Research showed that this mixture of messages pushed up the effectiveness of the anti-smoking message. By February 2004 it had become the key reason for attempting to quit with 32% claiming it as their spur to action.

Spontaneous awareness of anti-smoking advertising reached its highest-ever level at 76% in 2004.

Research illustrated the multiplier effect, showing that smokers who had seen just one part of the campaign were less inspired to quit than those who had seen more strands.

Sixty-two per cent of smokers who had seen one or two ads would like to give up compared to 67% who had seen three ads and 71% among those who recognised all the activity.

And despite all the extra advertising, the strategy of having the message come from multiple voices has prevented smokers feeling victimised. Agreement with the phrase “These days smokers are under too much pressure to give up” has remained static since the campaign began.

The most crucial result, however, is that the advertising is encouraging people to take action. Calls to the NHS helpline rose 54% year on year in 2003/04.

And the activity has helped reduce the number of smokers. In 2003/04 smoking levels among adults in England fell to an estimated 25.6%, hitting the interim target three years early.
The financial savings are manifold. The NHS has saved £129m, the reduced risk of domestic fire saves £13m. The number of sick days has fallen, worth more than £28m to industry. The value of the human lives saved is estimated at £6.9bn. All this for an advertising spend of £49.3m.