Turning Giveaways into Consumer Data

Hillcrest Hospital's branding campaign taps into a basic human desire to drive patients to its Web site—winning free stuff. The Mayfield Heights, OH, hospital offered a special giveaway for each service line on a campaign microsite by prompting visitors to request additional information and enter their contact information. The campaign won the hospital a silver award in the branding category at the 2009 HealthLeaders Media Marketing Awards.

The 424-bed Cleveland Clinic hospital decided to launch the "Behind Me/Ahead of Me"branding campaign after competing organizations began building new facilities and infringing on its market share. Marketers hoped the campaign would create a brand that leveraged key product lines consumers would recognize as sophisticated and drive patient volume.

The campaign consisted of print, TV, radio, outdoor, and online elements. Each piece drove consumers to a microsite to learn specific information?and possibly receive a giveaway.

"Though this giveaway, we are gathering consumer information to build a house mailing list to deepen relationships with our audience," marketers wrote on the submission form. "The information gathered is electronically formatted into a database and all respondent requests are fulfilled through the mail."

Hillcrest marketers decided to craft the campaign messaging to provide hope and assurance of a positive future, after research proved both resonated well with consumers.

"The 'Behind Me/Ahead of Me' concept was evolved to illustrate the exceptional outcomes and experiences that happen at Hillcrest,"marketers wrote."We wanted to illustrate a certain condition that a patient was able to put behind them due to the outstanding medical care that was provided. The images convey both everyday and milestone personal experiences that one can look forward to in the future?a concept found to be important to consumers in our focus groups."

The campaign drove more than 5,000 consumers to the microsite after the first push and the databases and continuing to grow.