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What Is Social Marketing?
Social marketing has become an effective way of motivating low-income
and high-risk people to adopt healthy behavior, including the use of
needed health products and services. PSI has become the leading social
marketing organization in the world, specializing in HIV/AIDS prevention,
family planning, and maternal and child health. PSI has almost 6,500
employees in the 70 countries where it operates, of which 98% are citizens
of the countries they serve.
Social marketing, as practiced by PSI, combines education to motivate healthy
behavior with the provision of needed health products and services to lower-income
persons. PSI motivates a wide variety of healthy behaviors, including use
of products and services. PSI procures products, establishes an office and
distribution system, and sells the products through the wholesale and retail
network, primarily to lower-income persons. Products and services are branded,
attractively packaged, widely marketed, effectively promoted to the poor
and selected target groups, and sold at low prices affordable to the poor.
Since this retail price is often even lower than the manufacturing cost (so
the poor can afford the price), donor contributions are a vital element of
the social marketing process.
A key ingredient of successful social marketing is effective communications
to encourage the adoption of appropriate health practices (including proper
use of the products and services). This is done by brand-specific advertising
as well as by generic educational campaigns, using a mix of strategies and
channels, including mass media and interpersonal communications, to reach
the target audience(s).
Following are answers to frequently asked questions about social marketing:
| Why is social marketing needed? |
| Methods traditionally used to deliver health products and services
in developing countries often do not reach a large portion of the
population, especially those at the low end of the cash economy.
Commercial entities sell products at high prices affordable only
to a small portion of the population, usually with little or no
promotion. Over-burdened public health systems generally do not
have enough outlets, and provide a free, generic product or service
that often is not valued by the consumer. Government ministries
are limited in the type and nature of motivational campaigns they
can undertake. |
| What products and services
does PSI socially market, and how does it obtain them? |
| PSI markets condoms for AIDS prevention, a wide range of contraceptives
for family planning, and a number of other health products aimed
especially at women and children, such as oral rehydration solutions,
mosquito nets, clean water kits, vitamins, antibiotics, and iodized
salt. Many of these products are donated to PSI by foundations,
multilateral international organizations, or the overseas development
agencies of donor governments. In other instances, donors provide
funds to PSI, which procures products at favorable rates on the
international market. PSI has also started to socially market health
services such as voluntary HIV counseling and testing and reproductive
health services. |
| Why sell products rather
than give them away? |
| By selling products
PSI can tap the resources of the local commercial infrastructure,
which is financially motivated to stock and sell the products.
This means that the products become available, not just in a small
number of public health clinics, but also at thousands of pharmacies
and other retail and NGO outlets. Those outside the cash economy
will continue to use the free products given away by public health
clinics. |
| How does PSI motivate poor
and other targeted consumers to engage in healthy behavior and to
use its products and services? |
| In some instances, there is a latent demand for the products,
and effective distribution of an attractively packaged product
at affordable prices is mainly what is needed to motivate use by
lower income groups. Whether or not this is so, PSI increases healthy
behavior through generic information, education, and communications
(IEC) programs that are not brand-specific and that educate individuals
and motivate them to engage in healthy behavior, and stimulates
increased product demand through the use of innovative and effective
advertising and promotion. PSI has developed and refined innovative
techniques to harness successfully the power of the mass media
to reach the poor, at risk target groups, and illiterate and remote
populations. PSI uses such diverse communications methods as mobile
video units, television soap operas, point-of-sale advertising,
itinerant poets, billboards, and movie spots. PSI also targets
at risk populations and motivates good health practices through
interpersonal communications. PSI has won several national and
international awards for these activities. |
| Why is it important to keep
education/communications campaigns together with sales of products
and services? |
| If an education/communications program stimulates healthy behavior,
including use of health products and services, but the products
are not available or affordable, then the value of the education
can be lost. Furthermore, it is important to coordinate communication
with sales, and to have responsibility and accountability for results
rest in one place. |
| What happens to revenues
from sales? |
| PSI is a nonprofit organization that puts all revenues back into
its programs, thus reducing the financial burden on donors. Some
other social marketing systems involve for-profit companies, which
retain revenues from program sales. |
| Who funds PSI programs? |
| PSI programs are funded by foundations and other private donors
and by governmental development assistance and multilateral agencies.
Both private and public funding are critical; PSI often uses funds
from private sources to start programs quickly and when funds are
urgently needed. Government and multilateral agency contributions
are vital because they enable PSI to turn pilot projects funded
by private sources into longer-term national programs. Foundation
funds are leveraged many-fold in this fashion. |
| How does PSI help develop
the commercial infrastructure? |
| Although PSI may establish its own distributorship, it invariably
uses existing wholesalers and retailers. In addition, PSI works
with local advertising and research agencies and other such local
businesses. In countries that do not have these resources, PSI
helps train individuals and businesses and makes them part of the
social marketing network. PSI has contributed to the creation of
a commercial infrastructure by training retailers and other private
sector entrepreneurs. PSI’s promotional activities often stimulate
sales of similar products by commercial vendors. Finally, when
PSI expands a local market, such as mosquito nets, new or enhanced
commercial activities (such as local net manufacturing) are fostered. |
| How does PSI collaborate
with the local government and develop local capacity? |
| PSI operates mainly in the private sector, but its projects are
also part of, and complementary to, the host governments’ public
health programs. PSI often has a formal agreement with the host
government, or obtains government approval to operate within the
country. In some instances, PSI also trains government officials
in marketing and communications techniques, so that these individuals
are able to manage public sector programs more effectively. PSI
uses non-governmental organizations to distribute products in remote
and difficult-to-reach areas. PSI typically trains these organizations
in marketing and motivational techniques. Staffs of local affiliates
are trained in the PSI network constantly, among other reasons,
because determined, skilled staff produces results. |
| Can social marketing programs
become financially sustainable? |
| Yes, social marketing programs in more advanced developing countries
can become, in part or in whole, financially sustainable. Theoretically,
any program can become financially sustainable if the product price
is simply increased to cover all costs. The problem with doing
this in most developing countries, particularly the poorest ones,
is that the price would become too high for most people in the
country. PSI is dedicated to serving lower-income persons. Even
where a social marketing program cannot be made fully financially
sustainable, PSI is able to recover a meaningful percentage of
operating costs through sales revenues, and maximize sustainability
through efficient management of program resources, sale of multiple
products to spread overhead and high sales volume to reduce per
unit cost. This cost recovery then is used to provide more health
impact. PSI programs are institutionally sustainable. |
| What are the different models
of social marketing programs? |
| The typical and traditional product social marketing program
involves developing a brand; establishing an in-country management
unit; and selling and promoting through the local infrastructure.
Some social marketing entities try to use standardized, continent-wide
brands and try to manage programs through regional offices, but
such systems have been less effective. The so-called “manufacturer’s
model” of social marketing involves giving grants to commercial
manufacturers and their distribution agents, in return for which
the product is advertised more than would otherwise be the case
and/or the retail price is reduced. But when the subsidies end,
promotion declines, retail prices are usually raised, and sales
decline, particularly to lower-income consumers. |
| What is the social marketing
of health services? |
| The social marketing principles applied by PSI to health products
can also be applied successfully to health services. PSI’s first
effort to do so was the Green Star Network in Pakistan. Green Star,
one of the largest developing country, private reproductive health
networks in the world, provides comprehensive, accessible and affordable
reproductive health products and services to millions of low-income
Pakistani women every year. PSI affiliates in Haiti, Madagascar,
Myanmar and Zimbabwe have also launched franchised clinic networks.
In 1999, PSI/Zimbabwe launched the New Start network of 12 voluntary
HIV counseling and testing centers. Numbers of clients visiting
the centers monthly has increased to more than 4,000 in 2002. In
Togo, Mivado mobile clinics have proven to be a useful tool for
reaching the poor in under-served rural areas of the country. |
| Has social marketing been
successful and cost-efficient? |
| PSI’s programs have been highly successful in terms of efficiency,
sales, and reduction of disease and mortality. In 2001, PSI sales
prevented an estimated 400,000 primary cases of HIV infection,
provided more than 8.2 million couple years of protection (which
translates into averting about 4.7 million unwanted pregnancies),
and prevented 11,000 child deaths due to malaria. In Pakistan alone,
PSI created 35 million new users of iodized salt in less than two
years (thus allowing millions of babies, who otherwise would have
suffered from iodine deficiency disorder, to lead healthy lives)
and prevented other mortality and morbidity among lower-income
families. PSI delivers products at very low per-unit costs and
at costs lower than those of alternative delivery systems. |
| How can PSI ensure that
its products and services are properly used to improve health?
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| Project impact is always carefully evaluated, by PSI, as well
as by independent research organizations, through retailer surveys,
consumer intercept studies, focus groups, and general population
research such as knowledge, attitude and practices studies. This
research helps ensure that PSI education successfully motivates
healthy behavior and that PSI products are not only used, but used
properly and by targeted groups. PSI provides carefully designed
instructions with its products and trains vendors and medical practitioners
in product use. PSI assures retailers charge prices affordable
to the poor by several marketing techniques, including putting
price on the packages and advertising price, and by using a large
number of retailers. |
| In what ways is PSI different
from other social marketing organizations? |
| PSI operates social marketing projects with resident managers
(either local or expatriate) and local staffs who receive expert
and constant training. PSI is fortunate to have talented, highly
motivated individuals who have the skills in marketing, communications,
financial management, and administration. It is also the only organization
that manages social marketing programs in HIV/AIDS prevention,
maternal and child health, and family planning. PSI’s product sales
levels are higher and per-unit costs are very low compared to other
social marketing organizations. PSI is a non-profit organization
and uses sales revenues to defray the costs of its projects; many
other social marketing entities are for-profit and retain revenues.
Finally, when donor funds are not available, PSI endeavors to assist
the local activity to continue through financial contributions
and other means. |
| How does social marketing
contribute to a sector-wide approach (SWAPS)? |
| Social marketing can work well both with and without the “sector-wide
approach,” in which donors implement their aid programs primarily
through local governmental institutions. In fact, social marketing
is essential where donors are implementing SWAPS. Social marketing
(as part of HIV/AIDS prevention, family planning, and maternal
and child health) is generally written into governments’ health
sector approach. In such instances, the government contracts with
PSI to implement the social marketing element, as that part of
the SWAPS can best be done by an organization outside government,
especially when the government is burdened with other responsibilities. |
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PSI/Afghanistan works with local bazaar merchants such
as this one to make health products like Clorin safe water
solution (at bottom) available to lower-income people that
need them.
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