Steven Millman
Tim Tinker
A study of the effectiveness of communications messages and modes for information on the H1N1 virus shows where current efforts have worked or fallen short, and it lays the groundwork for more effective, targeted communications in the event of a recurrent H1N1 outbreak or other future potential pandemics.
Steven Millman and Tim Tinker of Booz Allen Hamilton designed the study, which was fielded by Zogby International. Millman, a senior associate who specializes in strategic communications, said the study was designed to evaluate the public's awareness of and compliance with government recommendations on measures to control the spread of H1N1.
Not surprisingly, Millman said, there was wide variance among demographic subgroups when it came to information consumption patterns (where individuals get their information). One surprise could have important ramifications for future communications strategies: Respondents said they trust sources such as doctors and government Web sites, but they also said they rarely consult those sources for information. These study results demonstrate the value of microtargeting – designing both the message content and the means of communications very specifically, to reach different audiences.
Tinker, senior associate and expert on risk and crisis communication, said that a communications strategy for potential pandemics is a complex communications endeavor requiring flexible, tested and multi-component approaches.
“From a communications perspective, we go through periods of complacency and urgency – as every year passes and a pandemic doesn't happen, it requires that much more effort to keep top-of-mind in people,” he said. But if people are heeding the prevention messages, then a pandemic outbreak either doesn't materialize or is significantly mitigated, reinforcing that sense of complacency and requiring new strategies to communicate prevention messages.
By identifying citizens' objections to changing their habits, their existing beliefs about the efficacy of their habits, the options available to them, and the questions they are likely to have, Tinker said, organizations such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) can more quickly and accurately map their communication response to changing public needs and expectations.
Especially powerful is anticipating and responding in advance of objections, before they have a chance to rise to the level of conscious thought, far easier than to let the objection take shape and then try to dispel it.
“We've been working on this for a number of years,” Tinker said. “We have a very good messaging platform with base messages that we would then customize to fit local conditions and events as a pandemic unfolds.” For example, there's a very broad messaging platform built around the concept of vaccines for pandemics, with the message changing depending on whether the timing is pre-outbreak, during the outbreak, or after the outbreak.
“One of the important things to understand from a communications perspective is how we can use communications to help people manage change during a crisis,” Tinker said. “That's really the role of communications, to use information to help stabilize an information environment, so that people are aware of not only what's happening around them, but how they can be aware of and manage those events, make good risk-reduction decisions, and take action.”
story posted May 5, 2010
